feeding frames of honey?

[tlynn]

All,

I have a hive I have been treating with Apiguard so I removed its winter super of honey, which they hadn't touched as of a couple weeks ago.  I am going to do an inspection this weekend and remove the hive spacer for the Apiguard and wanted to make sure in the meantime they had plenty of food before I put the super back.  So last Sunday I set out a frame of fully capped honey in the back yard.  After a couple hours the frame of course was covered in bees and they hauled off every drop by late afternoon.  I did notice there seemed to be a lot of fighting.  Layer upon layer of bees on the frame and little balls of bees rolling off to the ground and then tussles.  A lot of them seemed to be going back to my hives, but I wonder if I am bringing in bees from elsewhere and stimulating robbing.

So question is is this an OK way to feed them?  Especially since I also have a nuc and don't want to feed them sugar water.  Could I extract some of the honey and dilute it and put it in a boardman feeder for the nuc?

[Bennettoid]

Its an alright way to feed them, but you need distance from your hives. I usually put community feeders at least a hundred yards from the hives, whether I'm feeding sugar water or honey.

[Michael Bush]

The best way to feed a frame of honey is to swap it for an empty frame in the hive...

[tlynn]

What can I do for a nuc?  The non brood frames in it are mostly pollen right now.  Can I pull one of the pollen frames and put in a frame of honey?

[rast]

 How many frames of pollen are in the Nuc? How many frames in the nuc total?
 Thats why I personally prefer a hole in the cover and setting a feeder over the hole. I don't have the robbing problem with them like you are prone to have with entrance feeders. I also use a full size hive with a divider with several slots cut in it to expand frames out as they grow for nucs. This is a personal preference, is working better for me.

[Brian D. Bray]

Its an alright way to feed them, but you need distance from your hives. I usually put community feeders at least a hundred yards from the hives, whether I'm feeding sugar water or honey.

Or locate the community feeder near a current source of forage, ie in the orchard, near blackberry briers, amid the clover or dandy lions, etc.  If using a forage source to locate your community feeder it can be done successfully within 50 feet of the hives.  I know because I have all of those things within 50 feet of my bee yard and I only have to move the community feeder 10-20 as the forage cycle works its way through the year. 
I've experienced much more robbing amongst hives when feeding an individual hive internally over feeding them all.  My approach is to feed those that need it internally and all of them with a community feeder.  Since I started that I haven't had a single case of robbing, even with the close proximity to the bee yard.

[tlynn]

Nuc is a 5 framer.  outside 2 frames have lots of pollen and little honey on top perimeters.  Middle frame has brood.  Frames on either side were sparsely capped and empty celled.  Maybe I could pull one of those?

Yea, I have 2 covers with holes, and they leak and are delaminating the plywood on the underside.  That's why I decided not to cut a hole in my nuc covers.  Agreed, if you're going to feed, from the top is better over boardman, which seems to promote robbing.  I figured I'd not cut any more holes in the tops and if I needed to feed a hive I'd rotate tops.

[rast]

 "Frames on either side were sparsely capped and empty celled.  Maybe I could pull one of those?"
 I think you figured it out yourself.