3.0 PRACTICE OF BEEKEEPING
The candidate will be:
3.6 aware of the need to add supers, and the timing of the operation;
NOTES
Bees will continually add to their honey stores as long as there is nectar available to forage. The beekeeper needs to add supers in order to give the bees enough space to process and store honey.
“Raw” nectar needs a greater area of comb for storage until the worker bees process this down by evaporating the water content.
Lack of space to store honey may cause the bees to swarm because they feel overcrowded or do not have enough work to do.
One rule of thumb is to place the first super on a hive when the bees are covering all but the outside frames of the brood box. Similarly, additional supers should be added as the bees work their way to the outside of the existing supers. In general is is better to be generous with adding supers.