Frame Guide › Management
New Colony Drawing Comb: what it looks like on the frame
Two weeks after you installed a package on fresh foundation.
Bright white new wax in the centre with bare foundation still showing at the edges, and a small tight patch of brood in the middle. Bees always draw comb from the centre outward, so this is precisely what a healthy two-week-old package looks like.
Keep feeding until most of the box is drawn
Making wax is expensive — roughly eight pounds of honey for every pound of comb — so a package on bare foundation needs syrup to keep building. Feed until they've drawn most of the box, then stop once a real flow is on or you put honey supers on, so you're not bottling sugar syrup.
Easy to mistake for
- RobbingLate August dearth. Bees wrestling on the landing board.
- Wax Moth DamageThe outside frames of a colony that's been dwindling for a month.
Could you spot this with the lid off?
Read the Frame deals you 8 random frames. Say what you see, say what you'd do, and find out why. It's free and runs on your phone.
Drill management → Mixed round (all 32 frames) →More management
- Honey-Bound Brood NestStrong flow on. Bees crowding, and the queen seems to have nowhere to go.
- Starved ColonyLate March · they were flying in December. Now, silence.
- Normal Drone CombMay · the bottom edge of a frame from a strong, healthy hive.
- Pollen-Bound Brood NestA heavy pollen flow on, and a small colony that isn't growing.
- Uncapped Honey SuperLate June · a super frame, heavy in your hand. You're thinking about pulling honey.
- Moldy CombSpring · frames from a hive that died in January, left in the damp box since.
- Fall Brood NestEarly October · a strong colony, the goldenrod flow just ended.
These frames are drawn to teach the pattern, and real frames vary. From The Alleman Apiary in Middletown, PA.