- Joined
- Apr 8, 2017
- Messages
- 35
- Reaction score
- 0
- Location
- South Gloucestershire
- Hive Type
- National
- Number of Hives
- 2
Hi all,
Took on our buckfast bees last July and I felt we had been doing fairly well. They are in 14x12 poly hive and seemed to build up very quickly when it started to get warmer.
Should have lots of space but where I was hesitant to add a super so early, they managed to fill a good 4-5 frames of the brood box with stores. I think it was four weeks ago I added the first super but decided to not add the queen excluder as there really wasn’t much space to lay. Turned out to be a good idea as they quickly drew the super out and around 3-4 frames became brood filled.
After a couple of chilly days the week before last I decided that they must have used up some of the stores and made more room to lay so I added the queen excluder last weekend underneath the super. Inspection today showed eggs in the brood box but what looked like no space to lay and three/four queen cells, none sealed but with larvae in. The super has two frames of brood left and the rest absolutely full of nectar/honey and starting to cap. Added another super, left the brood frames together but distributed the store filled frames between the old and new super to encourage drawing.
Now, I squashed all but one queen cell and placed it back into the brood box.
Thought I’d be fairly calm but I’m panicking a tough. Thoughts are either to:
1. Perform artificial swarm tomorrow.
2. Squash queen cell and move one super below queen excluder again to let her lay.
3. Squash queen cell, remove any 14x12 frames of stores and replace with foundation in the hope that they draw it out quickly for queen to lay and leave two supers as they are.
The artificial swarm isn’t too daunting as I feel fairly confident with it, and it would be nice to have two colonies, but right now I really just want to make sure the bees are in the best possible position for a strong full season!
Any help much appreciated!
Took on our buckfast bees last July and I felt we had been doing fairly well. They are in 14x12 poly hive and seemed to build up very quickly when it started to get warmer.
Should have lots of space but where I was hesitant to add a super so early, they managed to fill a good 4-5 frames of the brood box with stores. I think it was four weeks ago I added the first super but decided to not add the queen excluder as there really wasn’t much space to lay. Turned out to be a good idea as they quickly drew the super out and around 3-4 frames became brood filled.
After a couple of chilly days the week before last I decided that they must have used up some of the stores and made more room to lay so I added the queen excluder last weekend underneath the super. Inspection today showed eggs in the brood box but what looked like no space to lay and three/four queen cells, none sealed but with larvae in. The super has two frames of brood left and the rest absolutely full of nectar/honey and starting to cap. Added another super, left the brood frames together but distributed the store filled frames between the old and new super to encourage drawing.
Now, I squashed all but one queen cell and placed it back into the brood box.
Thought I’d be fairly calm but I’m panicking a tough. Thoughts are either to:
1. Perform artificial swarm tomorrow.
2. Squash queen cell and move one super below queen excluder again to let her lay.
3. Squash queen cell, remove any 14x12 frames of stores and replace with foundation in the hope that they draw it out quickly for queen to lay and leave two supers as they are.
The artificial swarm isn’t too daunting as I feel fairly confident with it, and it would be nice to have two colonies, but right now I really just want to make sure the bees are in the best possible position for a strong full season!
Any help much appreciated!
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