Marc Sevigny asks about the causes of bees storing honey in the top brood
nest with an excluder over their heads, then a super of foundation, and a
medium super of honey.   Marc doesn't say whether the super is the same
size as the medium with honey, or what size the brood nest super is.  This
information would make it easier to give advice more to the point to help
Marc.  Vince and someone else gave some good information in reply.
 
Depending on the honey flow intensity, the colony size, and the super size,
my advice would be as follows:
 
a.)  Always bait supers of foundation immediately over the excluder with
honey or at least drawn comb.  In Marc's case use honey from the medium
super if the frames are the same size.
b.)  Move honey from the outside of the top brood nest to the center of the
foundation super if the frames are the same size.  Then spread the center
honey combs and add comb or foundation to the top brood nest.
c.)  Move bait combs of honey from another hive that has the same size
frames into the super of foundation.
d.)  If none of these is possible remove the excluder as Vince suggested
and let the bees move up.  They may do so if the honey flow is on.  But
something still needs to be done to alleviate the crowded condition in the
brood nest which results from too much honey being stored there at this
time of year.  There shouldn't be more than two or three frames of honey in
the second brood nest at this time.
 
One of the major reasons for bees storing honey in the brood nest as you
describe is that the queen is not producing enough pheromone to stimulate
bee behavior above the two story brood nest.  If you notice closely when
you open the brood nest and manipulate the frames you will notice the bees
getting "noisy," creating a lot of fanning noise.  Colonies headed by such
a queen often store two or three combs of pollen immediately above the
brood nest in the first super even over an excluder.  And, sometimes if the
colony has moved up, the bees will also store a super of honey below the
brood nest.  This is what I call aberrant behavior.  The bees shouldn't
store food in this manner.
 
It should be noted that if the colony size filled the brood nest supers and
mostly filled the medium which has honey in it, and then the medium was
lifted to put a deep super of foundation over the excluder, the bees may be
reluctant to draw the foundation unless they are on the main honey flow.
They want the honey close to the brood nest.
 
For non-commercial beekeeping it sure pays to have the brood nest and honey
supers all the same size so that combs can be exchanged between them.  BUT,
I grow more hesitant to recommend moving honey from the brood nest to the
honey supers because of the use of all kinds of miticides in the brood
nest.  I favor removing the honey combs from the top brood nest to relieve
the congestion and putting them into the warehouse, then replacing them
into the hive later in the summer for winter stores.
 
James C. Bach
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