LindenNora · Uppsala, SE · Gear · Aug 7, 2026

Entrance reducers in robbing season — do your strong hives keep them on too, or only the weak ones?

Third year in Uppsala, five hives. After watching a neighbour's yard get robbed out last week I've reduced everything — but now I'm doubting myself on the two really strong colonies. They're boiling with bees, and with the reducer on the smallest opening there's a permanent traffic jam of foragers at the entrance plus fanning lines trying to move air on warm days. Part of me says a hive that strong defends a full entrance just fine and I'm only hurting ventilation and foraging. Other part says robbing season is robbing season and one bad afternoon can flip even a strong hive. What's your actual practice in August — reducers on everything regardless, or sized to colony strength?

#entrance-reducer#robbing#ventilation#gear

▲ 6 votes 💬 3 replies

3 replies

DrentseBij · Aug 7, 2026

Sized to strength, but nothing gets a FULL entrance in dearth season here. Strong hives get the larger reducer notch (10 cm or so), weak and nucs get one bee-width. A strong colony can defend a wide door, true — but why make them? Every guard on duty is a forager not foraging. The traffic jam looks bad to us; it costs the bees very little.

AbejaMiguel · Aug 8, 2026

The tool you want for exactly this dilemma is a robbing screen — full ventilation area, but the actual doorway is offset and small. Residents learn it in a day, robbers and wasps struggle with it for weeks. In Jalisco heat I run them on everything from the moment the flow ends. Solves the airflow-vs-defense tradeoff instead of picking a side.

SkaneBees · Aug 8, 2026

Fellow Swede: remember our robbing pressure also peaks right when wasp pressure does, late Aug-Sept. I keep the big notch on strong hives now and drop everything to small openings once wasps get serious. If bearding from heat bothers you it's mostly done by then anyway. Screens like AbejaMiguel says are the deluxe answer, I run them on maybe half the yard.

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