[log in to unmask] wrote:

> I am starting my 67th year of beekeeping in 2000.  I have NO holes drilled in
> any body (that is stupid), I have no reducers inserted in the bottom board in
> order to allow air movement into the colony; but I have a 1" slot cut in the
> front edge of the INNER COVER as an UPPER ENTRANCE.  This "hole" lets the
> rising moist air out in the winter, and the foraging bees use it in the
> spring and summer to enter and exit the
> supers without going through the congested brood chamber below.

Well, since I have holes drilled in all of my hive bodies, I ought to feel
chastised by this post.  However, since sometime George overstates his case, I
still feel OK about myself.

Just a few comments about extra entrances:  Bees freely use entrances all over
the hive bodies, but I don't see them use entrances in the super all that much.
During the summer, I have all two or three hive body entrance holes open, as
well as broken places elsewhere.  My feeling is that if the bees use them, the
entrances are helpful to the colony.

Now, at this time of the year the picture changes.  Mice can use the extra
entrances just as easily.  So I plug up all broken corners with duct tape, plug
up the entrance hole in the lowest hive body, and put on entrance reducers - all
to keep mice out of the hive.  I'd leave them all open otherwise - they give
wonderful winter ventilation.  And that is the reason I leave open the holes in
the second and third hive body.  Like George, I have a slit cut into the inner
cover, also for ventilation.

Ted Fischer
Dexter, Michigan USA