Drone plastic frame

01 · COMPATIBILITY

It is a Langstroth deep frame, and the name never says so

It measures 48.2 cm across the top bar by 23.2 cm deep (9 1/8 in), with Hoffman-style end bars, and takes the place of one frame in the brood box. On a 48 cm Dadant it still hangs, but sits some seven centimetres short. On a 47 cm Dadant Blatt it does not hang at all, and for that kit we stock the Dadant Blatt drone frame.

02 · HIVE HEALTH

Varroa enters drone brood eight to twelve times more often

The figure quoted most often is around nine times; one choice trial measured 8.3 mites per cell against worker brood and an invasion study reached 11.6. Two measured facts sit behind it: drone brood gets more nurse-bee visits — published in Journal of Insect Science — and stays capped for longer, so each female leaves 2.2 to 2.6 offspring in drone brood against 1.3-1.4 in worker.

03 · TIMING

Capped around day 10, emerging around day 24

This is the number that decides the outcome. Counting from the egg, drone brood is capped around day 10 and emerges around day 24: the frame comes out between those two dates, and it is unwise to push past day twenty. Pull it capped, freeze it, scratch it and put it back in the same slot. The green tells you which frame it is at a glance.

04 · FIRST USE

A wax roller first, then the edge of the brood nest

Plastic needs no foundation and no wiring, but the colony takes to it sooner if you run a roller of liquid wax over it before the first outing. Put it at the edge of the brood, next to the last frame with eggs: that is where a colony draws drone comb on its own. After each cycle you scratch it and reuse it, and unlike a wax comb, wax moth leaves it alone.

05 · BEFORE YOU BUY

This is a piece of kit, not a treatment. It only works while the colony is rearing drones, and it asks you at the apiary every two or three weeks so the removal is never late. It replaces neither your mite counts nor a health plan built on authorised veterinary medicines. Sold as single frames.