Beekeepers have a need to store bee-less frames overwinter for a variety of reasons: empty honey supers, frames from a deceased colony, or frames from a massive summer colony that has slimmed down for the winter months.
Whatever the reason, it is important to know how to safely store your precious comb for reuse the next season.
Why Care About Storing Frames Properly?
Worker bees need to consume 8 pounds of honey to create a single pound of wax. The more pre-drawn frames a beekeeper has for their bees, the more honey can be harvested and overwintered. So let’s keep those unused drawn frames safe for next year!
Who and What You Are Protecting Them From
There are many factors that can cause frame loss if improperly stored, mainly involving other critters making a home out of the frames. Critters that love to live in and destroy wax are ants, mice, and moths, to name just a few.
Ants will not destroy the structure of the cells, but will move their nests to the warm wax, lay eggs in cells, and consume any leftover resources stored in the comb. Vaseline or Tanglefoot is helpful to spread on the legs of the storage shelf to prevent ants from accessing frames. Frames with heavy ant presence are usually rejected by bees.
Mice will destroy low hanging comb, but are not usually interested in frames higher up. The draw to a mouse is the nice warm insolation that comb provides, so the low hanging comb is ripped up to make room for a messy mouse nest. Keep frames above ground level to deter mice in storage, and keep mouse guards on active colonies. Frames heavily used by mice may be rejected by bees.
Wax Moth is the most destructive wax pest, and a beekeeper’s bane! The wax moth is drawn to protein which puts brood frames at high risk for winter storage. Luckily, moths require warm, still, and dark conditions to thrive. Good lighting and ventilation will deter this pest. Freezing frames for 3 days before storage will kill any wax moth eggs present and give you a good head start. Frames and wooden hive equipment heavily infested with wax moth should be thrown out.
Mold is a common theme in stored frames, but luckily it is rarely a problem for honeybees, who readily clean and reuse all but the worst of your moldy frames!
Robbing bees or wasps are only a problem if frames are stored in the open where these insects can smell and access the comb. If you see a robbing event, cardboard soaked in a fumigant like Fischer’s Bee Quick can eventually dissuade the robbing force so the beekeeper can move the frames to a better location. Robbers have no regard for the structure of the frames, and will rip cappings off and leave a jagged, chewed cell surface. Bees can usually fix up robbed frames, but may reject the worst of the frames.
Safe Storage Strategies
Many beekeepers store their frames in many different ways, but here are a few guidelines to help get you started on your own storage system.
Frame storage strategies:
- Above ground level. For example:
- On a shelf
- On 2 cables (first photo, as shown above)
- With good ventilation
- Frames can be stored as 5 to a 10 frame box
- Near a screened window
- Near a door that opens frequently
- With good lighting
- Overhead garage light
- String of LED lights draped over boxes
- Storage area should be on a shelf or wire stand where it is easy to block off curious ants with Vaseline or Tanglefoot.
Written by Camille Dill
Feel free to email any questions to bees@shonnards.com, or call at 541-929-3524. Check out our Beekeeping page for more resources!