# Top Bar Hive Mess - Bees Not Following Guides!



## Phantomfyre (Jul 1, 2004)

Hoping you guys can help me with the unholy mess I have on my hands. I am a brand-new beek, just started my first two hives earlier this month. I didn't want to use Langstroth hives for a number of reasons, so I built my own boxes that are basically Warre hives, but I'm treating them like vertical top-bar hives or some sort of hybrid. (I fully intend to go in and check on the bees on a regular basis, not using Warre's methodology of never intruding on them.) In short, they are square boxes with top bars. I used a wax strip on my top bars as guides. I installed the bees on April 7th, and due to foul weather, didn't get back in to check on things until yesterday, so it's been just over 2 weeks. 

Well, guess what. NEITHER colony followed my guides! The first box had 2 sections of comb hanging from one bar, and all the other bars had one, but built precariously off one edge of the top bar. They had not left themselves "bee space" - they connected all the comb sections together at the top, across the gaps between the top bars, I guess as bracing since they didn't use the top bars to support the comb? Not surprisingly, one of the biggest sections of comb broke off while I was trying to examine it, and fell down flat onto the bottom of the box. I hope I didn't squash the queen in the chaos! That comb had lots of brood, so I tried frantically - and only partly successfully - to wire the broken (very soft!) comb back onto the top bar. I hung it back in the hive as best I could, shut everything up, cried and swore a little, and then went to check on hive #2. Same deal, only worse! They had built their comb nearly diagonally across the bars (!!!) so I couldn't pull ANYTHING out to look at it. Just a mess. So I closed that hive up, cried some more, drank a few beers, skipped dinner and went to bed. 

The good news: in just two weeks, despite pretty miserable weather (cold, rainy), they've built a lot of comb, packed in pollen and have brood. (I've been feeding them sugar syrup.) 

The bad news: I've got to fix this mess, and I don't know how.

The ugly: I was a little hungover this morning, and had to play my trumpet for Easter service. Way to go, slick.

Anyway - back to the bee issue.

First, what do I do with the mess I've got? I can't even get the comb out of hive #2 without destroying nearly all of it. But I don't dare set the hives back to zero by doing that! They were only 2-pound packages to start with! What happens if I just leave them alone alone for now? Obviously, I can't "work" them, which is an issue - both functionally and legally - but it really isn't a problem for the bees, right? They're happy and getting things up and running in there. Later, wouldn't I be able to swap that box up higher, give it time to clear of brood, and then strip out the comb and start it over?

Second, how do I keep them from doing this in the future? I'm hoping I can get them to "do it right" when I add the next box, but I don't have a table saw, so no good (safe, straight) way to cut a kerf in the top bars as a guide, nor a way to cut tiny strips of wood to tack on as guides. I'm looking at buying a table saw just for this purpose, but... I've got to do that in a hurry, I guess, because I feel like it's time to add another brood box!

Thanks in advance for your help!


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## blaineiac (Jan 10, 2010)

What direction are your hives oriented. I've heard that if they aren't due north/south that the bees will still prefer to build the comb e/w. Also I read that paint stirers or popsicle sticks work great as guides. I lost mine this year. they had 17 full bars and died out. The good thing is that I have all those bars to start another one. If I get a swarm. Good Luck. Blaine


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## bee_linux (Jan 30, 2011)

First off, welcome to beekeeping. It's a lot of fun. I've kept top bars for quite some time and have run into your problem only a few times. (Knock on wood!). It can be a very big mess and it's important that you fix it quickly. One bad comb leads to more bad combs. I have frames that I've made for cutouts that I use. It's a bit messy, but I cut out the wacky comb and put them in frames. Then I use kite string or rubber bands to secure and drop them back into the hive. I've also used hair clips attached to the bars with zip ties. The bees attach them very quickly and you can save a lot of the brood. Once you have some straight combs in place they'll follow for the rest of them pretty well. Once you get some good combs, I rotate the frames/clips out. If you start anymore hives in the future, (and you probably will, it's addictive), save some of the straight combs from previous hives and put them in the new hives. It gives the queen a place to lay quickly and helps guide them for the new combs. I keep some straight empty combs in the freezer just for this reason. You could also put one in the empty boxes that you're stacking on top.

As far as compass directions, I've heard that before but it's never been the case for me. I've seen them in all directions in both man-made hives and feral colonies. I think because most hives have an entrance facing south and that they usually have the guide going east/west so they build east/west.

Also, I've never found it necessary to pre-wax my bars. I just use 1/8 inch wood starter strips that I rip down on my table saw from scrap wood. They festoon off of that and start building.

Here are examples of my frames/clips

http://www.midwestgeeks.com/extra-equipment-needed.html

Hope that help. Any other questions, just ask, you'll find there are a lot of people here with great information.


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## indypartridge (Oct 26, 2004)

Phantomfyre said:


> They had not left themselves "bee space" - they connected all the comb sections together at the top, across the gaps between the top bars, I guess as bracing since they didn't use the top bars to support the comb?


Without a picture I'm just shooting in the dark, but what do you mean by gaps between top bars? The top bars should be flush against each other.


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## Phantomfyre (Jul 1, 2004)

Thanks for the responses thus far. I know I need to fix this ASAP, but this point, they've already built comb on 6/8 bars, so I think it's too late for them to get anything right in these boxes? And I don't have time to build frames this week, plus I can't get back into the hives - rain, rain, rain, all week! By the time I get back in there, they'll be built on 8/8 for sure. That's why I'm thinking to just let these boxes go, and try to get it right in the next box up. They have to build from the top down, I'm thinking they won't use the mess below as any kind of guide...?



bee_linux said:


> Also, I've never found it necessary to pre-wax my bars.


My bars were just 1" wide by 7/8" tall chunks of wood - no little wood strip or kerf of any kind (no table saw), so I had to use something. Without a table saw, I had no good way to cut things smaller. (Not that it's not possible without a table saw, it's just not possible for ME, lacking lots of woodworking experience...  )



bee_linux said:


> I just use 1/8 inch wood starter strips that I rip down on my table saw from scrap wood.


How do you attach those little strips? Glue? Staples? I worry that if I don't get those strips attached strongly enough, they'll be a weak point and the comb will fall off once it's full and heavy...?



indypartridge said:


> Without a picture I'm just shooting in the dark, but what do you mean by gaps between top bars? The top bars should be flush against each other.


These aren't horizontal top-bar hives, they're vertical top-bar hives, like Warre hives. So I need the spacing between the bars (like in a Langstroth hive) so they can travel up and down between the supers. Right? Maybe they don't...?

These girls sure aren't making things easy on me. Both packages had also built comb in their package box, so right from the get-go, my very first installations, weren't "normal" and straight-forward. By the time I get them going right, they'll have forced me to dry out behind the ears, I think!


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## bee_linux (Jan 30, 2011)

I rip a 1/8 inch slot down the middle and put in my wood strips. Without a table saw that would be a bit harder to do. I've seen guys use waxed string and staple it in a line down the middle of the bar. Never done it myself, but it seemed to work for them. May give that a try. Keep us update on how it works out.


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