Brood in super and other mess ups

[Curley]

Comprehensive muck up here. Have a laugh – tell me to take the bees back where I got them from as I am obviously too stupid to keep them, but any advice would be welcome.

Last weekend extracted my honey and put the super back on the hive on Monday.

Put one super with some honey (third fullish) under the brood box for overwintering , and one (fully extracted) above the brood box and QX. This for the bees to clean out and me to remove later before treating for varroa.
At the same time had a really thorough look for the queen as she is unmarked and very difficult (for me ) to find . The bees have been grumpy and I wanted to have the option to requeen if it got worse. Failed to find her. Also transferred a frame of brood to a nucleus colony where I had seen a dead queen on the floor the previous week (she had been a drone layer). Reduced the nuc to a single bee entrance as there were wasps lurking around and put a reduced entrance on the main colony.

Last night inspected again . Brood in the top super (arrrgh)above the qx obviously displaced HM when routing round looking for her – also in the process of the previous inspection we had moved the hive a couple of feet North and managed to put the floor (one with an under floor entrance) back upside down (!) so I had effectively reversed the entrance from the north side of the hive to the south side in a single move as well as leaving it wide open for wasps. Loads of bees had begged their way into the nucleus which was almost devoid of stores – no sign of a queen cell (or a queen but then my track record is I can’t find ‘em) no brood other than that introduced the previous inspection. I removed the queen excluder(which I now regret) turned the floor over and round thus keeping the entrance pointing the same way as it has been for the last week, fed the nucleus and shut up shop to retire for a think

So the status is :-

Main colony consisting of a brood box sandwiched between two supers with brood in the main box and the top super, plenty of bees and stores, plenty of room and somewhat better humoured bees than when I took the honey.

Nucleus – suspected queenless but not sure – rather more flying bees than it knows what to do with and a feeder on it – entrance reduced – bees queuing to get in.

My thoughts are running along the lines of :-

Leaving the main colony as it is for winter and carry on with treatment and then winter feeding.
In the spring – at a suitable time perform a shook swarm (the comb I inherited with the bees is extremely dark and aged.)

Thoroughly check the nucleus for a queen (the floor doesn’t come off so I can’t repeat that one) but can’t see where they would have got one from and if reasonably happy they are queen less then get a mated queen as quickly as possible.

Does this seem reasonable or are there better things to try?
As I say – any advice gratefully accepted.

David

 

[enrico]

I agree with your course of action, you should be looking for eggs and not queens, it is so much easier! Make sure when you take queen excluders off that you look for the queen on it and if you put them on top of the super that you have already taken off then always turn it upside down so if the queen is on it she does not run into the super! Common beginner mistake. I would leave the big hive alone now, wait until autumn and see if they are still in the bottom super. If not then remove it. If they are still there check again later in the year, if not in it then remove it. That will get you back to a brood and a half!
As for the nuc. Be careful, add another frame of eggs. Bet you she is in there so we here but if not there is still time for them to make another queen, it is only mid August, they sound strong so fingers crossed.
E
E

 

[Davelin]

For future reference if I want them to clean up a super for me I put it above the crown board with feed hole open; this way they think it is outside the hive and take the honey back in.

I agree with enrico, if they haven't tried making queen cells with the frame of brood you put in nuc there is probably a queen in there.

 

[Curley]

Thanks very much for the replies - regarding the nuc I guess I don't know how long the dead queen had been lying there. IF I only introduced brood last week and before that she had been producing only drones - where would the queen have come from? Bit puzzled by that. If there is a queen in there could it be a virgin and therefore I guess I should widen the nuc entrance a little so she can get out or will she get out of a single bee space (8mm hole)?

 

[Skyhook]

As regards the supers- putting supers underneath is a good way to get them cleaned out, so I suspect that by now they will have emptied the bottom super and moved everything up. If so, perfect opportunity to take that one away, move the one with brood to the bottom, and hey presto you are un winter configuration.

Some people like shook swarms, they always seem rather disruptive to me and I prefer to replace 1/3 of the brood frames every year. If you wanted to do that, this is a good time, they will tend to draw and lay frames quickly in September with a feed on.

And don't worry, most of have if not that particular tee-shirt, one very similar.

.

 

[beeno]

Some people like shook swarms, they always seem rather disruptive to me and I prefer to replace 1/3 of the brood frames every year. If you wanted to do that, this is a good time, they will tend to draw and lay frames quickly in September with a feed on.


.

 

[Curley]

Thanks folks - food for thought there - and in particular I hadn't realized the bees would draw out frames at this time of year.. The idea of the shook swam in spring was to kill two birds with one stone - ie get rid of the old comb and also get the hive back into a single brood box - or at least get the shallow underneath. I'm concerned that come the spring the brood nest will be spread right across the top shallow box and the deep box. Don't see how else to sort this part of the problem out.

cheers

David

 

[Curley]

Sorry Skyhook - didn't read your reply properly - you've told me exactly want I want to know - thanks again

 

[alldigging]

https://secure.fera.defra.gov.uk/beebase/index.cfm?pageid=167

Shook swarm leaflet there

When can I do it?
Mid-March to mid-July,

If carried out later than July then brood that would take the colony into the
winter is destroyed.