Advice on making splits later this year

[enrico]

Not at all Enrico. Pre web I was well aware that a single Nat was not big enough for most bees unless they were Amm which at the time I had a good few of.

There was plenty of info flowing via lectures, books and meetings.

PH

Well you could have told me! I'm not saying it wasn't known I am just saying that knowledge and ideas were not passed around so easily as they are now. I learnt by mistakes, I had no one to ask other than a mentor when he was available. If he didn't tell me then I would have no reason to believe that my methods were questionable. Long live the free passing of knowledge on this site.
E

 

[olriley]

Swarm control involves taking the Q out and putting her into one of my 3 frame nucs with a frame of her brood & bees. I then requeen that production colony with a queen from one of my over-wintered 5x5 nucs. I use some of these over-wintered nucs to requeen my production colonies either for swarm control or to improve their characteristics. These nucs are then later requeened with my own reared queens or a queen cell depending how early in the season it is. There is no great rush in re-queening a nuc.

Thanks for this explanation. Does re-queening from one of your nucs reliably quell the swarming fever? (I guess you destroy any QCs at the same time)

 

[Eyeman]

Thanks for this explanation. Does re-queening from one of your nucs reliably quell the swarming fever? (I guess you destroy any QCs at the same time)

That't the tricky bit.
I think I posted on another thread what I do.
When the Q is removed into a nuc I 'lighten' the colony by removing 3 frames of brood/bees and 2-3 frames of honey (from the brood chamber). I also only remove capped QC's at this first visit.
One week later go back and remove all QC's, extract that honey so you can put the empty drawn comb back in and then requeen with you Q from your nuc. Last year I started using Michale Palmers push in cages for requeening and I'm sold on their value. Like most things with beekeeping it wont work all of the time- just hopefully more often than not.
This method suits the equipment I have available, I requeen with a known 'pedigree' and I still get a good harvest.