Making hive increases

By Dana Stahlman
Making Increases in hive numbers
• There are a number of reasons to make hive
increases.
– It has been a long standing practice to make
increases to replace winter losses.
– Many individuals have a desire to have more
colonies of bees.
– Some make increase such as nucleus hives to sell
and it becomes a good money making
opportunity.
Making Increases in hive numbers
•The question to be asked is what
resources are available to make hive
increases?
– How many new hives need to be created?
– How much time do you have?
– Create full sized hives or Nucleus hives?
– What hive equipment is available to make increases?
– What bee resources are available?
– One can also use package bees to make increases but that is
not going to be discussed in this presentation
Making hive increase Methods
• How many new hives need to be created?

– Far too many beekeepers try to make increases

without considering many of the factors to be
faced!
– Time: Managing two hives of bees doesn’t take much time. Once a new hive is
added to the number managed, a certain amount of time must also be increased to
care for the extra hive.
 Making A hive increase is one method to
control swarming “The Lazy Way”
• Most beekeeping books address the way to make splits.
• Most common method used……….
• Make two hives from one strong hive. Works most of the
time.
•
Quick and easy

Not the best of

management for a bee
hive. One hive will
always be stronger
than the other!
 Another version of about the same thing
• Only real difference is a new queen must be purchased before the
split is made. The new queen is placed in the weaker of the two
new hives made up and her hive is placed on the original hive
location to pick up all field bees.

The advantage of this split is it will have

a new queen laying within several days.
In just over three weeks this hive will
be adding population to the old bee
stock.
The hive with the old queen can be
managed for honey production and this
will delay any swarming by her hive.

The new queen and hive will cause a

break in brood production which will
delay Varroa mite population growth.
 you want to grow your apiary and hive
numbers.
• The one book that has taught me the most and given me an insight to how I
manage bees is Dr. C.C. Miller’s Fifty Years Among the Bees I re-read it each winter
and still continue to find something new to try each year.
• If you have a collection of old bee magazines, making splits has been written about over and over
each and every year from one author to another. The variation and number of methods are
numerous. One of the latest has been done by Dr. Joe Latshaw using Polystyrene nucleus hives –
starting with one frame of bees and brood and the introduction of a new queen with enough time
for the bees to build into strong nucleus hives to overwinter and begin the following year as well
populated production hives. The method he used has this advantage: Nucleus colonies will be
established after the primary honey flow, giving each new colony a locally produced queen. Fewer resources
are needed to establish nucleus colonies later in the season as warmer temperatures reduce the risk of
chilling. As with traditional methods, newly established nucleus colonies will require supplemental feeding
until they become established. His research paper is available on-line by searching for Overwintered in
Polystyrene Boxes.
The Miller Method of Hive increase
• Dr. Miller’s philosophy was to keep all hives strong and productive.
• Most splitting methods leave hives somewhat weak – a colony with
a strong population is divided and increases have ½ of the original
population or less.
• That was not Dr. Miller’s approach. However, it does take a
number of hives (at least five or six or more) to use the Miller
increase method. Miller never took bees from a hive to give to another
[just brood frames].
The Miller Method of increase
• To understand the reasoning behind the Miller Method, you will
have to understand some basic facts about how honey bees develop.
– Fact # 1 When young bees begin to fly from a hive they establish a location to
return to. This return point is very precise. In most cases, bees that forage
never have to worry about a hive being moved. They return to their hive day
after day and only on occasion may drift into another hive.

– Fact # 2 It is commonly believed that bees will not allow another bee from
another hive to enter their hive. That is not entirely correct. A hive of bees
will defend their hive if attacked such as would happen in a robbing situation.
But if a bee [a stranger] arrives at the landing board with resources such as
nectar or pollen, it will be admitted to the hive. Miller did not move bees so
there is no problem with bees fighting.
Miller Method
– Fact # 3 Young bees that have not flown from the hive will remain with a
queen or brood. If there is no brood in a hive, the bees will most likely
leave/abscond. Only a few very young bees remaining.

– Fact # 4 A queen releases a pheromone that bees can recognize as their own.
When a bee returns to a hive and finds that pheromone present, it will make a
quick adjustment to what ever change has been made to that colony.

– Fact # 5 If the pheromone is missing the bees will attempt to raise a new
queen from larvae present in the hive. This is called the emergency queen
response.
– Fact # 6 It takes no more than 12 days for a hive of bees to replace a queen. A
bit longer for that queen to begin laying eggs.
 The Miller method uses these facts to
develop new hives
• In 1899 Miller increased 9 hives of bees into 56 and all colony
increases produced a honey crop for him!
• In 1899, one could not buy packages as beekeepers do today and
yes, in 1899 bees did die over the winter season and in many cases
surviving hives were not strong.
• Miller understood [the Secret of the 9 day cycle]
– Miller’s method is based upon hive manipulation every nine day. A queen emerges
from a cell raised under the emergency impulse in 11 to 12 days depending on the
age of the larvae chosen by the bees. If for example one could not make a hive
manipulation based on weather conditions – a one day delay would be okay.
“The Nine Day Cycle”
• To be successful, a beekeeper must stick to a strict schedule. I doubt
if many beekeepers would be interested in increasing hive numbers
from nine to 56 but it is possible.
• First [the schedule]
It is necessary to prepare a
calendar. I chose to start
with May because hives at
this time should be strong
enough to split.
It doesn’t make any difference on what
date you select to begin.
• But once you begin, you must stick to the schedule. All equipment
necessary to carry out the increases must be on hand before the
scheduled date of the work to be done.
• First task: Identify the bee resources available to make increase.

– How many hives are available as a resource for bees? You could begin with
as little as three or four. The more you have the faster increases can be made.

– For demonstration purposes: I am going to use five hives

The demonstration using 5 hives to begin
• On day one the job is to:
– identify the strongest hive with the best queen!
– identify the hive that is the second strongest!

– Miller worked with single deep hives and built them up over
the summer period. Most of you most likely keep your hives
in a double hive style. The method can be adapted to almost
any hive style you might use. But the most important thing is
to keep the location of these two hives exactly where they are:
Why: Because the flight bees returning to these locations are
what makes all future manipulations possible.
 The demonstration bee yard

Hive # 5 The Red

Hive
This hive is the The strongest hive is located at
strongest hive in location 5
the yard. It will
contain the queen The second strongest is located at
that is most likely location 3
the best available.
These hive locations are now fixed.
 The demonstration bee yard

Hive # 3 The Yellow Hive

Hive #3 is now coded yellow. From The location of hive

this point on the site #3 will 3 and 5 are going to
designate the hive location not the be referred to as
hive. It is from this location that all locations/sites and
new hives are going to be created. hive numbers will
have no importance.
 The demonstration bee yard

The other hives in the bee yard are

going to be feeder hives and will
play an important role in this entire
process. They will give up frames
of brood but no bees to the red hive.

When the first split is made, it will come

from the yellow hive location along with
The good/best queen
the queen from that location.
will always remain in
the red hive
Before we move to the first split lets review
a few important issues
• The queen mother for all the splits we make will be from the red
hive. We will raise all of our own queens.

• The hive at the yellow location will be moved to another location

in the bee yard. Thus, this location will collect all the older
foraging bees returning to this location. This is an important
point.

• If you use a double brood chamber hive system, you will need a
new bottom board, inner cover and top cover to complete the
second step of this process. If not you will need to provide a hive
body with frames in addition to the other hive equipment.
 The demonstration bee yard
Hive # 3 will now become a feeder
hive. This now makes hives 1, 2,
3, and 4 feeder hives. Some of
these hives might be very weak.
Feeder hives are exactly that:
Hive # 3 is moved to a
They will provide frames of brood
new location. It will
and empty cells for the red hive
still have its queen
location but no live bees.
and retain its brood
Confused – You will understand
and young bees. This
after the next step.
move will set it back a
little bit but it will
recover its strength
very quickly – a
matter of weeks
 The demonstration bee yard
The red hive is now moved to the
yellow location. It is no longer
considered the red hive but
becomes the yellow hive.
The yellow hive’s role is to produce
future splits. The hive is made Hive # 5 the red hive is
queen-less by returning the queen moved to the yellow location.
back to the red location. The brood There it will pick up the field
bees from hive # 3. It will
including young larvae will be used contain frames of larvae that
by the bees to build emergency queen-less bees can use to
queen cells. It will have a lot of bees make queen cells. The queen
and it will be used every 9 days to must be found and returned
take frames of bees and queen cells to her field bees coming back
to the red location.
to build a new or several new hives.
 The demonstration bee yard
The Yellow hive will always be
queen-less.

Frames from the red hive will

always be moved from the red
hive location to the yellow hive Hive # 5 the red hive is
moved to the yellow location.
location with each cycle. But the
There it will pick up the field
queen from the red hive will bees from hive # 3. It will
always be moved or kept at the contain frames of larvae that
red hive. Nine days later, these queen-less bees can use to
frames will have queen cells to make queen cells. The queen
must be found and returned
help make new splits.
to her field bees coming back
to the red location.
 The demonstration bee yard

The Red hive location

Increases are begun in this hive. This hive location is the place
the mother queen is always kept. Since we just started the
process it is necessary to understand what is happening at this
location. When we moved the hive at this location to the
yellow location, all the field bees return to this location.

But there must be a hive at this location to receive the field bees
and frames from the feeder hives with brood. The queen will
lay eggs and by the time the next cycle is started, some of these
eggs will hatch into larvae. It’s flying force will continue to
increase from the added bees that emerge from the frames of
brood moved into it.
 The Biology of the Red hive location
• Once the strong hive is moved to the yellow location, the original force of bees
in a strong hive can be a considerable number of bees. Most bees that flew
from the red hive location will return to the red hive location.
• The queen returned to this location is their mother and the bees accept her
pheromones. There is no introduction problem – the bees accept her without
issue.
• If frames of brood without bees are placed in this hive, the brood in those
frames when they emerge are accepted immediately. Many of them will be
moved in the next stage to the yellow hive but many will also remain at the red
hive location.
• Any eggs produced by the queens in the feeder hives will be too old or will be
capped over by the time the frame is ready to be moved to the yellow hive.
• When a frame with young larvae is moved to the yellow hive location nine
days later, all of those eggs and larvae will have been produced by the red
queen,
 The demonstration bee yard

The Red hive location

This hive is rebuilt every nine days with frames from the feeder
hives. It will have a strong bee population from both the flying
bees that oriented to the site as well as some younger bees that
emerge from capped cells in the frames moved into it every nine
days.
It’s queen will have filled many open cells with eggs – some of
which will become future queens raised by the queen-less hive
(Yellow hive).
 So How does it work?
• After the hives are set up and the first cycle begun, the
Secret the 9 day cycle begins.
• It is important to mark dates on a calendar! Do not depend on
memory. If the cycle is broken – a young queen emerges in the yellow
hive, the cycle will have to be started over again.

• Work begins in the bee yard nine days from the last visit. First, all
equipment required for new hives must be assembled and be ready
to use.
 So How does it work?
• The first job is to inspect the yellow hive. Have the bees built queen cells?
How many frames are available for a split?
• When this process is first started, each new split might be made up of
three frames of bees and brood. Miller preferred to add frames to this
nuc once the virgin queens had mated and were laying eggs.
• These frames would come from the feeder hives. The object was to build
strong hives. If a feeder hive needed frames, Miller added frames of
brood only – no bees and only a frame or so at a time. It was assumed
that food would also be available for the bees to gather, but if not the bees
would need fed.
• It is a fact that bees moved within this same bee yard would stay with the
brood and queen cells in the nuc hives. All flying bees would return to
the yellow location – adding more bee population to make more splits in
the future.
 So How does it work?
• After splits are made up, the job was to move frames of bees and
brood from the red hive location to the yellow hive location. Of
course, the queen in the red hive had to be found and kept at that
location.
• It would also be possible to add supers or more boxes to each of the
yellow and red hive locations if needed. They can produce honey
just like all the other colonies.
• The job then transfers to the feeder hives. Each cycle requires that
enough frames be found with brood to put into the red hive. Thus,
frames from hives 1, 2, 3, 4 are taken from these hives making sure
that no bees are transferred in the process. When frames are
removed from these feeder hives, they can be replaced with either
new frames with foundation or drawn comb.
 Every nine days, the beekeeper can add at
least one new hive to the bee yard and often
more.
And if the beekeeper were to
3 continue to take one frame of
brood from each of the hives
1, 2, 3, 4 to add to the blue
If one were to make up
two new hives during each hives created, how soon
9 day cycle they may be would the blue hives be ready
able to create all these new to help grow the process?
blue hives in one month
From this to = and control swarming at It is surprising how quickly a
the same time. hive can build up if no bees
are removed from a feeder
hive to make new increases.

This works well in the warmer part of summer when there is little chance for brood to be chilled with real
cold weather. In fact several frames of brood removed from strong hives is a good swarm prevention
technique.
These are not welfare hives and should not
be!
• A beekeeper managing a yard for increases can also manage it for
honey production. If swarming can be controlled and new hives
reinforced with brood from feeder hives several things happen:
– 1. Swarming is reduced. Hives with constricted brood chambers will swarm. By
taking frames from the brood chamber to help other hives gain bee populations, the
beekeeper will have opened the brood chamber for the egg laying ability of the
queen.
– 2. New hives are added gradually. Time management is scheduled so the beekeeper
has time to manage each phase of the process.
– 3. Larger honey crops can be gathered because all hives are equalized and most
hives have genetic stock only from the superior queen.
– 4. The beekeeper maintains and manages all hives – hopefully with an intelligent
plan in place and a schedule to make it possible.