> As was mentioned, however, sometimes the bees consolidate or add to the > little bit of honey, leaving patches of honey in the supers, too little > to bother extracting. > > In this case, and even though it is a bother, you can scratch open any > capped cells and put the partly filled supers UNDER the brood nest. I > got this advice from an experienced beekeeper, and haven't done it > often, but the couple of times I've tried it, the bees removed the honey > completely. As the fall brood emerges, it leaves space for storage. > Remove the cleaned supers when it's barely warm enough that bees can > still fly home. (before it gets too cold). Here in New Zealand, another trick I've seen is to place a piece of sacking that is smaller than a box size below the box(es) with scraps of honey (again, make sure they've been scratched to expose the honey). The sacking should be about 30-50mm (1 1/2 to 2 inches) smaller on each side, so the bees can come up from around the sides. The cluster won't move up there, and the bees will just 're-pack' the bits of honey around the broodnest area. (\ Nick Wallingford {|||8- home [log in to unmask] (/ work [log in to unmask] NZ Beekeeping http://www.wave.co.nz/pages/nickw/nzbkpg.htm