Assessing and Preparing the First Hive for Expansion

that's why I use all mediums so looking at the bee yard there were only three hives here when we first started the three tallest hives one two three all the rest of these are swarms that we caught this year absolutely amazing we'll pop the top of this and these have screened inter covers so you can see down in there will pop the top of one here so you can see in there this is the most recent swarm that we captured and you can see there are a lot of bees rocking in there we have to make a run for more supplies because this is ready for another box to go on top these bees are getting crowded now the hives that we're going to give the most attention today are the most crowded hives this is the second most crowded hive and you can see how skinny it is compared to this one that's an eighth frame that's a five frame that's an eighth frame and that big wide one is a 10 frame so that's what we're doing we're going to turn this five frame into a 10 frame so why do we have blocks and rocks and heavy things on top of these hives because when the wind gets up it blows right up this hill and will blow the lid right off the top of these hives I've seen it happen and it actually killed one hive this winter the lid blew off it rained in it and the bees froze to death we're going to open this guy up and get into it so what I just did was stack two cinder blocks up here so we could take this five frame new hive and sit it right in front of where it's located so the bees will still continue to go in it as we replace the old hive with a newer hive this high probably weighs 40 pounds we've got it in position it is a bit tipsy