Artificial swarm failure

[leonotron]

Just looking for some input and advice about my bee keeping issue.
A bit of background first. I opened them up two weeks ago and found they were doing well so added a super and gave them a feed to encourage them to draw out the foundation.
After leaving them for two weeks I opened them yesterday to do an inspection. Found the super all drawn out and about 20% sealed. When I looked in the brood box I found a number of queen cells with larvae in them. Closed back up to figure out what to do.
Started artificial swarm this afternoon. Opened up to find that they had sealed a couple of the cells. The number looks about the same to me so I would think they haven't swarmed. Also spotted very tiny eggs.
Despite a number of attempts I was unable to find the queen.
One of the queen cells is about a quarter of the way up the frame, is this a supercedure cell? The rest are on the bottom of frames.
So I put the new brood box in the old position, put the frame that contains brood and one sealed queen cell in as well and placed the supers back on top. In the new position is the old brood box with one unsealed queen cell.
Have I done the right thing? Is the queen still there and preparing to swarm or will the fact that I've split them make them think they have swarmed and they could tear down the queen cell if the queen is in there.
The queen is from an emergency queen cell from last September, perhaps she didn't mate that well and they are superceding her? The queen is also unclipped and unmarked. Myself and a very experienced beekeeper couldn't spot her last September and I haven't seen her this year either. She's proving quite elusive.

 

[enrico]

I think you may have opened a can of worms. It sounds as though you were happy with the queens performance so I would have tried everything to find her. In three days time you will definitely know which box she is in because you will have eggs, between now and then anything could happen, swarm, tearing down queen cell, emergency queen cells, who knows! You have not necessarily done anything wrong but..... It may work out ok and I hope it does for you
E

 

[leonotron]

With a queen cell in each hive they shouldn't try to make emergency cells should they? I'm happy with her performance but with swarm cells yesterday (then sealed today) , I didn't think anything other than AS was a good idea.

 

[enrico]

Sorry, missed that you had split the queen cells, that's not too bad, I think you did well in the circumstances, you thought on your feet, well done. I still would have persevered in finding the queen but I appreciate this can be difficult. I will be interested to see how it all works out! Keep us updated. Whatever happens you should end up with one new queen.
E

 

[beeno]

Hi Leontron,
My bet is that the part with the queen in will swarm. Check to see which part has eggs in it in three days time and try again to hunt her down.

 

[leonotron]

If she's in the old BB in the new location, most of the flying bees will have returned to the new BB in the old location, so not a huge amount that can fly away with the old queen. That BB has an unsealed queen cell. I'm not sure how close it is to being sealed though. The other, new BB in the old position has the sealed cell and most of the flying bees. Should I put a queen excluder under that one just in case? That way I'll know in three days by checking which one has eggs in it and then destroy that queen cell. Or maybe just put queen excluders under both?

 

[Madge]

If you really can't find the queen, then I think the best thing would be to brush all the bees into a new box with some drawn comb and food; put a queen excluder above that box; and then put the old box with brood on top (but reduce the queen cells). The nurse bees will move up to cover the brood while the workers will start to fill the bottom box with stores. They'll probably think they've swarmed. Separate the boxes after about three days, or separate them with a swarm board.

 

[leonotron]

So I would remove all the Queen cells? Would this quell their swarm impulse? I do want to increase to two hives so I'd like to keep the two hives going if I could.

 

[leonotron]

I'm also assuming they haven't swarmed even though I've never had a colony swarm. Is it easy to spot a swarmed colony based on there being very few flyers left and a general low number of bees?

 

[Madge]

So I would remove all the Queen cells? Would this quell their swarm impulse? I do want to increase to two hives so I'd like to keep the two hives going if I could.

I'm also assuming they haven't swarmed ...

No - reduce the queen cells, don't remove them all. Generally, I prefer to have only one queen cell in the daughter hive, but some people have two.

If the weather is fine tomorrow, and if they hadn't yet swarmed, then I think I should still do as I've suggested above. If all goes well, you should end up with two colonies: the mother colony (in the bottom box) and the daughter colony (above).

On another occasion, when you know where your queen is, you could create a smaller nucleus hive in addition to the daughter hive - but you'll have to know where the queen is.

As for quelling the swarming impulse, I've been taught that the best way to achieve that is to move the queen into a box without any brood whatsoever - so, as I've suggested above. If she is in a box with brood the colony might not be satisfied and might still try to swarm.

 

[oliver90owner]

Not read all the thread, but the queen is normally slimmed down for swarming - which means she will almost certainly cease laying if she is going.

Just one one of the probable missed points or clues.

 

[Chris B]

What you have done is almost as good as a "proper" artificial swarm. It's still possible you'll lose a swarm, but if so it won't be as big as the swarm you would have lost had you done nothing.
A slightly better option would be on original site: 1 brood frame with 1 unsealed queen cell but minus it's bees, then QX plus super including bees. 3 feet away: original brood next with all it's bees and all queen cells removed.

 

[Hivemaker.]

This type of reverse artificial swarm works well, usually done vertically, and giving the bees in the bottom box or original hive a frame of open brood with eggs, queen cells on this frame are destroyed after nine or ten days and another frame of open brood given from the box with the queen in, the slimmed down queen is now fed up for laying again by the much depleted box of mainly young bees, over the cycle of two frames of brood in the section with the older bees the numbers have declined and swarming impulse passed, they can now either be re united or one cell selected on the second frame of brood and a virgin allowed to emerge and mate. Have carried out this method on a few occasions but it was better described on the German IWF videos.

 

[nikca]

This happened to me last year... could NOT find HM in a STUFFED 14x12 with 2 supers. Bees were 2 deep on the frames and not as friendly as usual.

Put a frame with 1 sealed/1 uncapped on old site in new box with a few of what I hoped were young bees, HM somewhere on new site with old frames. She left anyway but both went on to do very well and were on 8/9 frames of brood with new queens in less than 2 months. Got a couple of supers off both...

 

[leonotron]

So is that basically the demaree method you guys are advising?
Think it might be tricky now as I've used both brood boxes that I have.
I had forgotten that she would stop laying to slim down alright.
Will she get through the excluder? What happens if I trap her in the hive with a queen cell?

 

[leonotron]

I have two supers at my disposal. Would it be a good idea if I used these as a brood box? Place them on the floor on old location, put a frame of stores and another frame of half drawn empty comb in and then brush all the bees into this box. The add qe, super and then the old brood box and frames of brood without the bees. These frames will have the two Queen cells also.
Or
I could rustle up a makeshift nuc and transfer the Queen cells into that for the time being.

Took a look this morning and the hive on old spot seems to be working hard as normal. Hive in new position has some activity and I've noticed pollen going in. A lot of bees fanning at the entrance too.

 

[leonotron]

If I mix the two today do I also have to worry about fighting?

 

[oliver90owner]

Will she get through the excluder?

Why would she? Could she get through before? If not, how could she now? Why do you want to exclude the queen?

 

[leonotron]

I wasn't sure if she could, once she had been slimmed down for flight. I had been thinking of keeping her in to prevent a swarm on the chance that they might realise they have the extra space and tear down the cell. Also that if she is still laying I might figure out which hive she is laying in.

 

[Cazza]

With a queen cell in each hive they shouldn't try to make emergency cells should they? .

If that was true there would be no need to go into an AS (brood + QC) again after the first move to knock down the new QC's which have been made since the original move, would there?

Cazza