In the mid 90's, I read Walt Wright's articles. It was a fascinating concept. I tried checker boarding and liked it.

I didn't understand why checker boarding worked. Conventional beekeepers continually shuffle frames and reverse boxes. As a commercial beekeeper, I didn't have time to observe much natural bee behavior. I thought standard beekeeping practices were based on bee biology.

Leaving commercial beekeeping, gave me more time. So, I built a top bar hive(tbh) to study bee behavior. In a tbh, it's easy to observe without much disturbance. The bees do things their way. The broodnest is left intact. And a beekeeper can keep his hands out of it. :>)

Plus, vertically oriented behavior, is compressed and easy to recognize. As broodnest behavior changes, the bee's focus often quickly switches from horizontal to vertical.

I saw how important and complex, the broodnest structure and bee behavior is. I retrieved Walt's articles. They confirmed what I saw.

Walt Wrights Manuscript

For a decade, Walt published articles in the American bee magazines. He focuses on Langstroth beekeeping. And his observations are essential for any vertical hive beekeeper wanting maximum production, with minimum effort.

The easiest way to get this information is from Walt. Those articles compiled, are about 60 pages long. It's written by a beekeeper, for beekeepers. It's a great beekeeping deal. You can get a copy by sending Walt $10. He has a pdf version available on the internet for $8.

Wrangler's Mangling

I won't reproduce Walt's manuscript. But I will correlate his ideas with my own tbh observations and experience. I'll use Walt's terminology for consistency. If anything gets mangled, I did it :<)

Success from the bees perspective.

Broodnest Behavior

Two principles control colony behavior. Reproductive swarming is the primary focus in early spring. Eventually, a colony shifts activities from swarming to survival. These two principles aren't mutually exclusive. In any given cavity, a colony balances food and brood to safely achieve these objectives with minimum risk. A colony won't risk its survival to swarm.

Broodnest Expansion

In late winter, the bees are directly beneath their food supply. They expand the broodnest by consuming food. That expansion is mostly upward. Food consumption also fuels brood rearing in open comb that is warm enough. Drone comb is eventually exposed. A month after broodnest expansion begins, drones are raised.

Honey Reserves

Somehow the bees monitor honey quantity. And they maintain a reserve amount. Walt found that bees reserve a shallow super's worth. I run deeps and have determined it's about 4 deep frames. That's essentially the same amount and isn't much of a reserve. A large brood rearing colony can consume a deep frame in a day. So, the reserve is a minimal amount, especially when conditions turn bad.

The reserve honey is an emergency food source. When these reserves are tapped, broodnest expansion stops. If the reserves are further depleted, brood rearing stops. Beyond that, brood cannibalism and hive malnutrition rapidly occur. Once a hive dips into its reserves, the colonies maximum seasonal potential is reduced.

This hive is going to swarm. The broodnest is backfilled. They have drones and a queen cell.

Reproduction - Swarm Preparations

As broodnest expansion reaches its limits, the bees prepare to swarm. They begin backfilling the broodnest with uncapped nectar or diluted honey.

When nectar is available before swarm preparations, tbh bees build storage comb behind the broodnest. And store additional reserves there. But once the bees prepare to swarm, little activity occurs behind the broodnest, even if empty comb and nectar resources are available. Their focus shifts from horizontal to vertical.

If enough fresh nectar isn't available, the bees move resources forward from the honey storage area behind the broodnest. This leaves empty combs toward the hives rear.

Open space and open comb aren't factors in swarm preparation for a tbh. When both conditions exist at the far end of the hive, the bees swarm when the broodnest meets their vertically determined requirements. A tbh beekeeper, unfamiliar with this behavior, are often surprised when hives, with open comb and empty horizontal space, swarm.

Backfilling, restricts the queens laying. Provides fuel for the departing swarm, and reduces the broodnest volume. The fewer bees remaining after the swarm departs, can easily take care of the reduced amount of brood. And the additional open comb is readily available for the next generation of brood.

As a commercial beekeeper, I saw backfilling when no surplus nectar was available. We called it shake. Some beekeepers got excited about it, thinking the bees were finally making a living. I always wondered where it came from. Hummmm.......

Once backfilling begins, swarm cells are started. If there isn't enough food reserves, or backfill, or time, the colony terminates swarming. Then, they switch to their survival behavior without negatively impacting the colony.

After a certain time, all swarming preparations cease. Walt calls this the 'Reproductive Swarm Cut-Off Date'. At that time, a colony not on the verge of swarming, abandons swarming regardless of conditions.

Queen cells left after the swarm cut-off date, are supersedure cells. If a beekeeper cuts these cells and doesn't recognize this behavioral change, a colony that needs a new queen, might not get one.

Bees actively working the third alfalfa cutting.

Colony Survival - Nectar Lull

Once a colony swarms, or abandons swarm preparations, its focus shifts to survival. The next three weeks are geared toward producing a colony with the right demographics. Enough house bees are raised to handle the huge nectar/storage demands required for winter survival. And foraging activities are greatly reduced, even when abundant nectar resource are available. Walt calls this the lull in nectar storage.

In my region, the bees work three alfalfa cuttings. They make a little alfalfa/clover honey during the first cutting.

During the second cutting, colonies are strong. Hot days and cool nights, necessary factors for abundant nectar production, exist. The alfalfa is left to bloom longer than the first cutting, as the farmers are distracted by other crops. But the bees don't make much honey on the second cutting. It's a real lull for beekeepers, too. Most go fishing or take a small vacation.

I would see these conditions and expect a great second cutting honey crop. But I never saw one. Until I understood the nectar lull, I was clue less as to why the second cutting was so unproductive.

Seeing this lull in my tbhs, I worried they would starve before fall. They consumed most of the surplus honey above their reserves to produce more bees. And they didn't get much from the second alfalfa cutting.

White Wax

About three weeks after the reproductive swarm cut-off date, a hive has the right demographics for a main flow. Walt calls this the white wax period. At that time, fresh nectar is stored above the broodnest. And storage cell walls are lengthened in areas of larger cell size comb.

In a tbh, the bees enlarged storage cells near the top bar. These enlarged cells often jut into the adjoining combs space making some combs extra fat and others extra thin. To maintain easy comb access, the bulges must be trimmed off with a serrated knife. The bees don't build these bulging combs when nectar is available earlier. White wax signals a fundamental shift in bee behavior.

Tbh bees switch from a horizontal orientation to a vertical one mirroring swarm preparations. Fresh nectar is stored at the broodnest's top. And all cells, larger than small cell size, are filled and capped. The remaining small cell comb, at the broodnest's bottom, is filled with nectar. But it isn't capped. If nectar resources fall short, the bees move honey from the tbh's far end and pack the broodnest with it. That often leaves more empty comb at the hive's rear.

Once the broodnest is packed, the bees switch to a horizontal focus. They fill the honey storage area until optimum survival conditions exist. After that, hive activity is greatly reduced. Foraging, even though hive space and nectar resources exist, almost ceases. And they won't take additional feed.

Optimum Survival Condition

Now, the bees are almost ready for winter. Hive activity is at a minimum. And the bees are putting on their winter fat. The cluster size is optimum. There's enough food and it's in the right place. The open broodnest comb, where the bees cluster over the winter, is on the small cell comb near the hive entrance. There, broodnest pests are actively removed, leaving the colony in the best possible health.

Langstroth Hive

The bee's priorities aren't the beekeepers. A hive, that throws a reproductive swarm and quickly reaches an optimum state for over wintering, won't produce much extra surplus honey. But when this basic seasonal broodnest behavior is understood, bees can be managed to prevent swarming and produce an exceptional honey surplus.

Although the broodnest dynamics are intricate and somewhat complicated, management using those behaviors is a simple. When outside resources first become available, frames of capped honey, in the supers directly above the broodnest, are alternated with empty frames. A super has a honey frame, empty frame, honey frame, etc. If additional supers are above the broodnest, the frames are alternated in the opposite fashion, that is an empty frame, honey frame, empty frame, etc.

The objective is to break up the solid band of capped honey directly above the broodnest with the empty frames. And yet, leave brood undisturbed and in contact with its food supply. This is called checker boarding. Supers, with empty comb or foundation, are placed on top of the checker boarded hive. Then, the hive is ready for the season.

Checker boarding allows rapid broodnest expansion. With half the honey consumed, brood rearing space doubles. Early surplus nectar is moved above the broodnest's top into empty comb. Nectar isn't packed into the broodnest below a solid honey band which leaves it open for more brood. Broodnest activities and swarming impulses aren't interrupted. And broodnest expansion isn't restricted by a solid wall of capped honey. With checker boarding, the broodnest expands naturally, without disruption, and is large. That extra space prevents congestion. And it takes more nectar to backfill as a hive prepares to swarm. That delays swarming. But the bees surely try to pack it. And they gather much honey in the process.

Other swarm control methods, like reversing hive bodies or adding empty supers above the broodnest, disrupt the swarming impulse. They also disrupt broodnest organization, at a critical time, when brood rearing is reaching its maximum potential. With these methods, the swarming pulse is abated because the hive is weakened and confused.

When empty supers are put above the capped honey reserves, the broodnest dynamics, below the solid honey band, remain unchanged. Although hive congestion is relieved, swarming behavior proceeds unabated.

Later, when the bees switch to survival mode, a checker boarded hive has abundant vertical, empty comb space for storing lots of fresh nectar. At white wax, the bees attempt to fill the large empty area above the broodnest. Much to the beekeepers delight.

Walt has more to say about nectar management. Checker boarding can be fine tuned to local conditions. If you try check boarding, your hives are much stronger, much earlier. And, with a few exceptions, swarming is a thing of the past. Your honey production increases. And your work load is easier. That's been my experience.

Checker boarded hives in early spring.

Checker Boarding My Langstroth Hives

I over winter my hives in three deeps. In late winter/early spring, the broodnest is centered in the middle box. The top box is full of capped honey. The bottom box consists of empty frames with pollen and a little honey.

When I checker board my hives, the middle box with the brood, goes on the bottom. The empty frames from the bottom box are alternated with the full frames from the top box. These two checker boarded boxes are set on top of the brood box.

The resulting hive has a box of brood on the bottom. Two boxes of checker boarded frames on top of that. At this time, empty supers could be put on top of the checker boarded hive. The hive is good to go. But, I wait until dandelion bloom, almost two months after I checker board, to add a couple more extra supers. That way, I can work them without handling empty boxes.

I checker board my hives before March's end. Swarm preparations start the forth week of May. My swarm reproductive cutoff date occurs during the third week of June. Actual reproductive swarming occurs from the second week in June to the first week in July. The storage lull occurs from the third week of June until the second week of July. The white wax period begins during the second week of July. Timing isn't critical for checker boarding, if it's done early enough.

There's no vertical management option in a tbh.

Tbh Checker Boarding

Unfortunately, I haven't found a way to checker board a tbh. They have limited vertical management potential. At certain times, like during broodnest expansion, the bees work horizontally. But at other times, particularly when they pack the broodnest during swarm or winter preparations, their focus is completely vertical.

In a tbh, the broodnest is defined by its location and cell size. It doesn't shift positions as resources change, which is typical in a Langstroth hive and it's homogeneous comb. The same well defined broodnest exists, in natural comb, inside tall, vertical spaces. Although a tall cavity has more vertical options, the bees remain oriented from the broodnest outward.

That broodnest orientation keeps the bees in a conservative mode. It allows the bees to balance brood and food for any given cavity shape or size. The broodnest's smaller cell size areas are cleansed of pests keeping the brood healthy. The colony isn't stressed by raising too many bees or gathering too much food. That's great for reproduction and survival but leaves only a small surplus for the beekeeper.

With a tbh's limited vertical range, the bees quickly reach their goals for swarm and winter preparations. The broodnest is impacted with nectar and colony sizes are smaller. This probably explains the different production rates often noted between tbhs and Langstroth type hives.

Tbhs, with taller combs, may experience less impact than those with very short combs. How tall is tall enough? I'm not sure. But I know climate is a major component, as it effects the timing and duration for the different broodnest behaviors.

My combo long hive in action.

Long Hives

Long hives, when based on standard equipment, have many tbh advantages. And they can be managed vertically like a Langstroth hive. So, when run vertically, they can be checker boarded just like a Lang hive. My combo hive has always been my best producer. Others, who have run similar hives report the same.

Musings

It's interesting to think about the negative impacts standard beekeeping methods have on colony development. Most hives are run with broodnests that are too small, especially if they are migratory. These hives won't have much stored pollen. The bees, when expanding the broodnest, rapidly reach their honey reserve limits. The smaller broodnest easily becomes congested. And is quickly backfilled.

This results in hives that need frequent feeding, pollen substitutes, swarm inspections and volume management. In a northern climate, these activities must often be done when it's cold. That negatively impacts colony development at a critical time. And sometimes the weather won't permit any operations. Then a large hive quickly becomes a damaged hive, when the honey reserve is depleted and broodnest expansion stops.

Under such conditions, beekeepers become like busy bees, especially if their hives have returned from pollinating California almonds. The corn syrup pumps must be kept continually running from April to June or the bees start cannibalizing worker brood. They normally do the drone brood in when the scant pollen resource from California are consumed.

It's interesting to compare a typical migratory hive with one that is over wintered and checker boarded. When the migratory hive returns from California almonds, its clusters match the best over wintered hive. But two months later, the over wintered hives are far superior to the migratory ones. They are 50 percent larger as they have continued brood rearing with almost three uninterrupted brood cycles. But the migratory hives are struggling on the brink of their honey reserves and pollen resources. This results in highly interrupted brood cycles until natural resources are available at dandelion bloom. And as the migratory hive's population mostly consists of older bees, a decline in cluster size occurs when older bees die but aren't replaced by the dandelion stimulated brood.

By the middle of June, a good migratory hive consists of two deeps ready to swarm. An over wintered/checker boarded hive consists of four deeps ready for the flow.

Conclusions

Checker boarding is a simple and elegant management scheme. Swarming and survival impulses are used to maximize hive population and honey production with swarm control as a great side benefit. The implementation and timing, for checker boarding, aren't critical if it's done early enough.

It's actually harder to understand the bee behavior, upon which checker boarding is base, and write about it, than it is to manage hives using it.

After building a tbh and watching what the bees do, I finally understood what Walt was writing about. And once understood, it's easy to conclude that modern bee management is too disruptive, takes far too much work and is often done too late to cooperate with the bees natural propensities.

I took a decade of beekeeping records and compared them to Walt's timing. Adjusted for my seasonal differences, the behaviors and timings correlated within a week of what was predicted.

Thanks Walt, for sharing your observations. Although Walt's manuscript is the most comprehensive source, you can see Walt's original articles here.

Follow Up

This season, I ran a bee yard the standard way, without checker boarding. These hives were in double deeps. They were manually hefted to determine spring feed requirements. Light weight hives were fed honey frames. At the first sign of polished swarm cups, a super was added on top of the two brood boxes. After that, swarming hives were checked once a week and swarm cells were cut out.

The results: The statistics reversed themselves compared to checker boarded hives. With checker boarding, less than 10 percent of my hives wanted to swarm. Without checker boarding, over 90 percent wanted to swarm. Their broodnests were quickly backfilled and brood rearing was greatly reduced before the first cups were polished.

After checker boarding for so long, I forgot how much work it takes to prevent swarming using other methods. When cutting cells, it's easy to overlook one. And some colonies swarm before a virgin hatches. Some swarm before the queen cells are sealed! About 25 percent of these test hives swarmed regardless of my anti-swarm efforts.

I kept the remaining hives from swarming. But I was less than happy with the results. First, those broodnests were backfilled and brood rearing was almost completely curtailed. Only a few hives attempted to use the extra storage space in empty supers above the broodnest.

The comparison between those hives that actually swarmed, in this yard, and those that chose not to swarm was dramatic. The swarmed hives were actively foraging, rearing brood and filling the empty supers above the broodnest with yellow sweet clover honey. But, with one exception, the swarm prevented hives continued to linger on with backfilled broodnests, marginal brood rearing and only minor foraging activity. The yellow sweet clover flow didn't benefit these swarm prevented colonies.

I suspect the swarm prevented colonies couldn't come to a consensus between preparing to swarm or preparing for winter. And so did nothing. This confused situation wouldn't exist in nature. They would swarm or not. And then colony activity is vigorously focused in the appropriate direction.

Could it be that increased colony activity associated with swarms is actually a normal activity level experienced by both the parent colony, and the swarm after the swarm departs? That's what I see. When I was running Russian bees, I let my best colonies swarm to establish a 'feral' population. And it was curious there wasn't a decrease in honey production with these swarmed hives. I suspect that standard swarm prevention techniques are more disruptive than is acknowledged. And I suspect that my swarmed hives are in a better situation for the main honey flow, the third week in July, than those that were swarm prevented.

Another interesting observation concerns small colony spring buildup and checker boarding. A small colony or nuc builds up faster in a non-checker boarded hive. I live in a cold climate and confining a small cluster, in a smaller hive volume, could have some environmental advantages. Maybe the hive warms up faster or the colonies heat is confined in a more useable space.

Overall, checker boarding is an elegant, non-disruptive and simple way to vertically manage a colony for maximum honey production with the least effort.