Collect 'lost' bees following unite?

[dlawr42103]

Did my 1st unite last night, 2 colonies using newspaper method.

Today I have around 100 bees circling the old site where there is no longer a hive. This is about 10m from the new site. It is raining pretty heavy so not many bees out yet.

There is lots of chewed up newspaper under the united hive so they have clearly combined already.

Is it normal to try and collect these lost bees or is it more normal to leave them to do their own thing? Any advice appreciated.

 

[Arfermo]

Leave them to find their way home wherever that may be. Putting out boxes on the site that was home would not make any difference and would merely mean that bees from the united hive would go back there too. Bad idea.

 

[theeggman]

If you could it would have helped to move the hive closer, preferably right beside the new hive before the unite, in small steps. That way they have a much shorter distance to find the new home.

Tim.

 

[MartinL]

Hi,
what is the distance between the hives?

 

[theeggman]

Hi,
what is the distance between the hives?

See post 1 , 10m.

 

[REDWOOD]

They will beg their way into other hives

 

[dlawr42103]

Thank you all for replies... I feel at ease now!

 

[enrico]

They probably won't all find their way to a hive. I always seem to find a handful that are intent on suicide at the old hive site. In the scheme of things it makes no difference, just a little sad.
E

 

[Rahere]

Might be worth leaving the crown board from the old colony out. We had a load of strays on the floor, they preferred to move onto the board than stay there, even though it led nowhere. If their colony's on top of the merge, you could probably just shake them onto the top of the box.
As I presume you've either taken or are about to take your honey crop, and as you've now got a strong colony with nothing to do bar raise the winter bees, losing them won't be a functional loss, they're redundant anyway.