Production of brood frames in bee (Apis mellifera) colonies

Abstract

The efficient production of brood frames is critical for nucleus colony establishment, colony reinforcement, disease risk mitigation, and high-population colonies with specialized production goals. This study evaluated two hive systems designed for brood frame production: a two-queen colony (Hive A) and a three-queen colony (Hive B). The proposed system implements a 10-day production cycle: capped brood frames are removed from the super every 10 days for use in other colonies, while uncapped brood frames from the hive body are moved into the super; these are subsequently removed after 10 days for further colony support. Hive A consisted of a divided 10 frame hive with two 5-frame compartments, each containing a mated queen, topped by a 10-frame honey super separated from the brood chamber by a queen excluder. Hive B consisted of a base of three nucleus colonies (each with a mated queen) with two 10-frame supers above and separated from the nuclei by two queen excluders. Over a 58-day period, Hive A produced 19 brood frames and 9 food frames, demonstrating stable productivity. In contrast, Hive B failed to stabilize and produced no brood frames by the study’s conclusion. These results indicate that the two-queen system is a viable and efficient method for brood frame production, while the three-queen system requires further optimization to address instability challenges.