Setting up a Two-Queen Colony

Setting up a Two-Queen Colony

This is a new little game I'm playing this year to see how it does. The idea of a two-queen colony is that you essentially create a super field force. It's undeniable from my experience that 1 big hive will make more honey than two hives half the size. A big portion of that is the carrying cost of the brood nest. In sharing hives like this, the nurse bees can now travel between the two brood nests if needed to spread the work force around a bit.

When it comes to the foragers, you've now gotten advantage that if one colony finds nectar before the other, the message still gets shared.

Now let's just hope they don't get irritated and decide to kill one of the queens and all merge to one hive. I guess if they do it's not the worst thing in the world.

facebook: brueggens bees

[TequilaTTYH]

Well done,
I have often considered doing exactly this but haven't gotten around to try it plus I don't the ready made equipment. Please keep us informed whether success or failure is the result. You may have a water issue if there is sustained heavy rain from one side which will run down the supers and possibly into the brood box and therefore has the potential to influence the success of the experiment. I know that the bees will propolyse the joint between the bottom super and the wood but logic would say that water will seep in somewhere. When we put 8 frame supers on 10 frame brood boxes, I glued and screwed 1.5 inch square 'wings' to the base of the first super. This solves the water problem, looks quite nice (if you put a bevel on it) and doesn't preclude it from being used as a normal super in the future (it just has wings).
Cheers from Adelaide Australia
Geoffk
PS I enjoy you channel.

[firedude]

Please keep us updated. I'd love see how this turns out.

[schem]

Thanks for the content even though I don't own bee's your videos are very amusing

[waynemoffat]

Hi how's the two queen hive going?

[muratgokirmak]

Hive a (5 frame +2 wall) +hive b (5 frame 2 wall)= 14 floor (10 frame +2 wall)= 12 you need 2 thick and equal. Try 3 hives 6 frames = 2 hives 10 frame it's fit :)

[thomasr.miller]

I hope this  BEExperiment works.  got my fingers crossed . thanks, have a great day.((:}

[j.ericswede]

Here is an article from back in the 1940's describing Two Queen Honey Production from a legend in U.S. Beekeeping, Clayton Leon Farrar.


Hope this helps.

[TequilaTTYH]

Well done,
I have often considered doing exactly this but haven't gotten around to try it plus I don't the ready made equipment. Please keep us informed whether success or failure is the result. You may have a water issue if there is sustained heavy rain from one side which will run down the supers and possibly into the brood box and therefore has the potential to influence the success of the experiment. I know that the bees will propolyse the joint between the bottom super and the wood but logic would say that water will seep in somewhere. When we put 8 frame supers on 10 frame brood boxes, I glued and screwed 1.5 inch square 'wings' to the base of the first super. This solves the water problem, looks quite nice (if you put a bevel on it) and doesn't preclude it from being used as a normal super in the future (it just has wings).
Cheers from Adelaide Australia
Geoffk
PS I enjoy you channel.