Aggressive swarm(s)

[Erichalfbee]

Dirty leather, then; chuck'em and buy these.

They sure have increased the price of these

 

[ericbeaumont]

I’ll wash and put nitriles over them

When leather is washed it hardens and as it's made of animal bees will go for it if in the mood; adding nitriles is a waste of time as what minimal sensitivity you have will be reduced further.

At our BKA we ban leather gloves; nitriles or bare hands improves concentration and handling (but we also keep good-tempered bees).

Despite the glove issue and your lack of respectful dexterity* it sounds to me that the defensive nature of your colonies (bees are not aggressive) is excessive.

Here's an idea: find the queens and cage them; hang the cages between top bars for a week, then remove and kill the queens away from the hives. Simultaneously, add a frame of eggs and young larvae from your neighbours' colonies into the centre of the brood nest of each of yours.

Leave for three weeks and check for eggs without a lot of smoke and fuss.

By this method - maintaining queen pheromone in the hive but preventing her from laying - you will avoid a lot of comb-shaking to remove emergency cells in two stroppy colonies, and avoid EQCs on genetics you don't want.

*

 

[BugsInABox]

thanks and I’m hoping that if this i the cause that I learn quickly …. It’s difficult to be super calm with all that‘s going on!

Maybe leave them a week then ask your neighbour to go through them for you - see how they are with him.

 

[Gilberdyke John]

I get one or two attacking immediately when I take the queen excluder off but then 10/15 once I take a frame out and then it’s fair constant from there on. I’ve tried working with smoke and without smoke but it doesn’t make much difference. My neighbour has noticed the behaviour as his bees are calm in comparison

I haven’t washed my suit since I caught the swarm so that’s something I’ll be doing today and for each visit. the suit and gloves have a noticeable amount of stings on them after each visit so that could be the cause.

I can’t see anything that’s attacking them but I’ll check again.

All good thoughts, thanks

I concur with others about the pheromone load in leather gloves. Try Ansell Marigold 37-520 G21B Blue Soft Nitrile Household Rubber Cleaning Gloves | eBay

 

[user 819]

I concur with others about the pheromone load in leather gloves. Try Ansell Marigold 37-520 G21B Blue Soft Nitrile Household Rubber Cleaning Gloves | eBay

Same ones I use John, pretty comfy and easy to get on and remove, with a thin nitrile over top they never get mucky. Dexterity is still good though.

 

[user 819]

Definitely go down the change of the glove route first Julian, then if still an issue re-queen. Checked three big colonies today no stings, no pouring out of the CB literally nothing to complain about they were chilled out again. Get some good bees /Q genes and what was once a chore becomes a pleasure to inspect.

 

[oliver90owner]

Even the new beekeeper’s demeanour can cause a problem. The bees can quickly sense sweating, etc.

I don’t tolerate feisty queens if close to other people. They may benefit from re-queening. One apiary where I used to keep bees were always poor mannered - a bee farmer had been in the area previously and his bees were (nearly) all bad tempered, so I expect those genes had been spread around any feral colnies.

 

[pargyle]

Same ones I use John, pretty comfy and easy to get on and remove, with a thin nitrile over top they never get mucky. Dexterity is still good though.

Yes .. I've just bought a pair of these - nice long cuffs and comfortable to wear .. pair of nitriles over the top keeps them clean and a few drops of Olbas Oil on the gloves before you start will keep the bees away from your hands as well ...

 

[Julian4983]

Update as of yesterday ! I washed my suit and went for marigolds no change in behaviour and so I opted for new Buckfast Queens.

The old Queens were killed 3 weeks ago and the hives inspected for a week for QC which were destroyed before the new marked Queens went in 11 days ago. I inspected the hives yesterday and although I couldn't find the Queens, I found new brood.

No real change in behaviour yet but not expecting this until at least 4 weeks after the new Queens were introduced.

 

[understanding_bees]

Here's an idea: find the queens and cage them; hang the cages between top bars for a week, then remove and kill the queens away from the hives. Simultaneously, add a frame of eggs and young larvae from your neighbours' colonies into the centre of the brood nest of each of yours.

I used the “Search” function on this forum, hoping to find information on how to deal with an aggressive colony. I have a friend who has bees which are very defensive, in a non-urban environment. The colony is quite strong, fully occupying three Langstroth (10 frame) hive boxes, with one box above a queen excluder, and two boxes beneath the excluder.
Eric Beaumont's comment seems to provide a helpful approach:
Here's an idea: find the queens and cage them; hang the cages between top bars for a week, . . . .

I would appreciate advice please, on how to ensure the well-being of the queen, for that period of one week, after she is in a queen cage which is hung between brood frames. I would propose using a massive amount of fondant/sugar in the cage so that neither the queen in the cage, nor the bees in the hive could eat it all and release the queen.

How many attendant bees should she have?

How can we guarantee that the queen and her attendants in the cage will have sufficient water for a week?

If we can be certain that the hive bees will provide water to the caged bees, then perhaps this is not a concern?

In another discussion thread in this forum (Workers wanted Notts Area), masterBK wrote a detailed comment (#37) about badly behaved bees, in which he included the comment “Years ago I came across a beekeeper that popped pieces of dried puff ball into his smoker (to anaesthetise them)”.

I wonder what information is known about “anaesthetic” smoke, (or some other method), to temporarily stupefy the bees and make them easier to inspect?

 

[ericbeaumont]

how to ensure the well-being of the queen, for that period of one week

No precautions are needed: cage the queen alone and leave the bees to look after her.

Dry ice (if you can get it) knocks out a colony. Take off the CB, tip a load in and put the roof on. Wait ten minutes, dismantle the colony, find the queen and kill her.

I put the colony & bees (before they woke up) back together and united a nuc with newspaper immediately.

Good outcome: strong colony of well-tempered bees.

 

[understanding_bees]

No precautions are needed: cage the queen alone and leave the bees to look after her.

Dry ice (if you can get it) knocks out a colony. Take off the CB, tip a load in and put the roof on. Wait ten minutes, dismantle the colony, find the queen and kill her.

I put the colony & bees (before they woke up) back together and united a nuc with newspaper immediately.

Good outcome: strong colony of well-tempered bees.

Thank you Eric for such a quick and relevant reply. I have a supplementary question (well, actually a few):
If the bees are temporarily anaesthetised, do they fall from the comb?
Or do they just cling to the comb in their comatose condition?
For how long (how many minutes) is it likely that they will be immobilised?
How easy is it to find a queen in these circumstances?
Do you have any suggestions to enable the queen to be found more easily in this type of situation?

I have thought of using the method where the defensive bees are moved in their hive boxes to a spot perhaps six metres away, and then placing a replacement hive base and new hive boxes onto the original hive location, to allow/enable the flying bees to return to their original location. I think that in this scenario the super from above the queen excluder could/(should?) be placed on top of the boxes at the original location.
My reason for thinking this is that the flying bees will return to the original hive location, and that there will therefore be a (much?) smaller number of bees to search through to find the queen. Do you feel that this is an appropriate way to undertake this task?

 

[Erichalfbee]

I have thought of using the method where the defensive bees are moved in their hive boxes to a spot perhaps six metres away, and then placing a replacement hive base and new hive boxes onto the original hive location, to allow/enable the flying bees to return to their original location. I think that in this scenario the super from above the queen excluder could/(should?) be placed on top of the boxes at the original location.
My reason for thinking this is that the flying bees will return to the original hive location, and that there will therefore be a (much?) smaller number of bees to search through to find the queen. Do you feel that this is an appropriate way to undertake this task?

That's the standard first method.
Leave the supers, or in your case the two lang boxes above the QX, on the floor in the original position and move the brood away a good distance

 

[ericbeaumont]

a supplementary question (well, actually a few)

If the bees are temporarily anaesthetised, do they fall from the comb?
Yes.

Or do they just cling to the comb in their comatose condition?
A few will cling.

For how long (how many minutes) is it likely that they will be immobilised?
More than enough to get the job done. We had them open for about twenty-thirty minutes and only a few began to crawl.

How easy is it to find a queen in these circumstances?
Relatively easy if you are methodical and use upturned roofs in which to spread the bees.

Do you have any suggestions to enable the queen to be found more easily in this type of situation?
Have at least one other pair of eyes on the job.

 

[understanding_bees]

If the bees are temporarily anaesthetised, do they fall from the comb?
Yes.

Or do they just cling to the comb in their comatose condition?
A few will cling.

For how long (how many minutes) is it likely that they will be immobilised?
More than enough to get the job done. We had them open for about twenty-thirty minutes and only a few began to crawl.

How easy is it to find a queen in these circumstances?
Relatively easy if you are methodical and use upturned roofs in which to spread the bees.

Do you have any suggestions to enable the queen to be found more easily in this type of situation?
Have at least one other pair of eyes on the job.

Thank you again, Eric, for a very helpful reply. I hope that your answers may be helpful to other readers as well

 

[understanding_bees]

During the week which has elapsed since I posted my queries, I have been doing “mental preparation” for the task of re-queening the aggressive hive. I think that it is now fair to describe them as aggressive rather than just “very defensive”, as they have chased a family member who had not come closer than about ten metres from the hive.

We had contemplated the matter of a replacement queen, and think that we could use the queen from a new nucleus colony which I created, and which is now raising new brood.

(I had used a frame of brood with a queen cell from a colony which had swarmed. The swarm had been caught, and has been progressing strongly. After the swarm had left the parent colony, three well-formed queen cells were found on three separate frames. One of these queen cells was left in the hive, and the other two were used to create two nucs, and it is one of these nucs which could now be used to provide its queen to the aggressive colony.)

I have given the above information to provide a background for the questions I now have:
- would there be any risks if the nuc was combined with the aggressive colony?
- or would the aggressive colony overpower and destroy the nuc colony?
- if combination of colonies is considered acceptable, is newspaper method better or worse than air-freshener method for achieving the combination?

Would it be safer to just introduce the new queen (in a queen cage), rather than thinking about combining colonies?

Are there any other factors to be considered, which we should be aware of?

 

[understanding_bees]

Please let me add a bit of supplementary information to my query, which may influence the advice which could be offered..

The nucleus colony (from which I am prepared to supply a queen) was established a little more than a month ago. There are enough bees in the nuc to cover two WSP frames (180mm high), and there is some new sealed brood in those frames.

The aggressive hive is housed in three Langstroth hive boxes (deeps) – which has one box above a queen excluder, and two boxes below the excluder. The top box is very heavily populated, and “boiled over” when the hive was opened recently. On that occasion the task to be accomplished was to place the hive tower onto a large concrete paver slab, because of the weed growth which had become established around the hive. This colony has not had a detailed inspection for at least a year, and at this stage it is not known whether the bottom box is populated as heavily as the second one. One other possibility which I have considered is that the aggressiveness may be the result of queenlessness. (This could be checked for by looking for brood – if there is no brood then they would be queenless, and vice versa. If there was a laying worker then they may have only drone brood.)

 

[Erichalfbee]

You can combine the nuc no problem. Newspaper might be safer than air freshener given the disparity in colony size....but that is just my opinion.
But you have to sort the recipient. Find the queen and kill her. Unite the colonies in th evening when both have stopped flying putting the nuc on top.
If however you have laying workers you can't unite as I suggest as the bees consider they are queen right and will kill your new queen.
You can sort laying workers by uniting with a queen right colony but the donor hive has to be pretty strong

I have considered is that the aggressiveness may be the result of queenlessness. (This could be checked for by looking for brood – if there is no brood then they would be queenless, and vice versa. If there was a laying worker then they may have only drone brood.)

No brood does not mean no queen
If you can't find the queen and there is no brood you need a test frame