Funny how killing off one's bees can be candy coated with less offensive
names.  "Evicting!".  Recent articles in the trade rags have termed the
practice "depopulating".  Call it what you will, I find it offensive.

It used to be common practice north of the border (US/Canada) until the
border closed to keep mites out.  Hmmm.  Why is that border still closed...?
Oh wait!  That wasn't the topic, it was eviction.  Yes, eviction!

That was a recommended practice by Dr. Frugala in U of Minn.  Run 2 sets of
hives, one set for production, one set for wintering.  It's been some time,
but my recollection was that the overwintering set was built from a single
deep to eventually occupy 3 deeps during the season.  The overwintering
colony was never subjected to the stresses of producing a honey crop.  It
was strictly a "build itself up colony" whose sole purpose was to go into
the winter strong, vigorous and with plenty of stores.  The following
spring, the 3 deep hive that successfully made it through the winter was
split into a 2-deep unit which was supered up for honey production, and the
third deep that was split off became the unit that was the "leave alone,
build into 3-deeps for overwintering" hive for that season.  The 2-deep
colony that was supered for honey was exploited for honey production, with
no concern whatsoever for its winter preparations.  At the end of the season
it would be evicted.  Actually it was depopulated sometime during the winter
by shaking the bees into the snow.

Now this was quite a while ago, I don't recall when Dr. Frugala passed away,
but I think (and I may well be wrong on this) that this method pre-dated
Varroa infestation.  I never paid close attention to the practice because
killing off (oh wait, we're being kinder, gentler, we're evicting and
depopulating, not killing) a colony of bees is repugnant to me.  But I've
been wondering the past few seasons if some of the concepts of the method
could be adapted to today's times, without having to snuff the bees.

I'm a big fan of Gene Killion's comb honey production methods.  When you
shake bees from a double-deep into a single, the bees EXPLODE into the
supers.  I've been considering such a shake down on all my production
colonies, regardless if I'm running them for comb or extracted honey.  So my
overwintered hive (I overwinter doubles) would be shaken down to a single
for production, and while the single is making a crop, the other deep can
receive a new queen and pretty much be left alone, not stressed and built
into a double deep during the season.  It could be "drone trapped" to
address mites, but not subjected to the stress of production.  Towards the
end of the season, the production single could be united with the
non-stressed colony that has built into a double, creating a 3-deep colony
that may be better prepared to survive upstate New York's formidable winter.


I'm haven't thought throuugh the mite-dynamics of combining the production
colony with the "now double" hopefully mite free (realisticly, low load)
colony, but I have an intuitive feeling that there will be an advantage
there that is not when the entire colony is subjected to production stress.
I suspect it will be something like combining a weaker colony with a
stronger colony and can imagine that the non-stressed/non-production double
will help the production single more than the stressed production single
will impare the non-stressed double.  It certainly will give the colony a
better chance than an eviction notice!

Aaron Morris - I think, therefore I bee!