Beanwood
House Bee
- Joined
- Sep 11, 2011
- Messages
- 331
- Reaction score
- 1
- Location
- Just North of Bristol
- Hive Type
- 14x12
- Number of Hives
- 5 - 8
Hello my wise friends - I need some more advice please.
In recent months I managed to combine two colonies into one, using the newspaper method, and those bees are now going great guns.
I now have another Q- colony, and a small colony about 50 metres away (Same site as the last swarm I 'captured'). The swarm had been resident in a nuc for about two weeks before I've had chance to move them, and on Monday I put them in a full size brood box (With LOTS of insulation as dummy boards) ready for the merge.
Unfortunately I don't have opportunity on this occasion to move them three miles away for several weeks, and really wanted to combine quickly with the Q- colony.
SO
I've thought this through as best I can, and have left the Q- hive in original location. I've placed the moved Q+ colony on top, separated by newspaper. Now, I know this may well work for the merge part, (Done it once - so now I'm an expert
) but my question is will the act of merging, and having to chew through paper also act to assist their relocation - i.e. stop them flying to the old site, or is there something else I can do to reset their navigation ? (Blocking the entrance etc). The Q+ entrance was originally facing North, but will now share the Q- entrance facing South if that helps.
All advice gratefully considered.
In recent months I managed to combine two colonies into one, using the newspaper method, and those bees are now going great guns.
I now have another Q- colony, and a small colony about 50 metres away (Same site as the last swarm I 'captured'). The swarm had been resident in a nuc for about two weeks before I've had chance to move them, and on Monday I put them in a full size brood box (With LOTS of insulation as dummy boards) ready for the merge.
Unfortunately I don't have opportunity on this occasion to move them three miles away for several weeks, and really wanted to combine quickly with the Q- colony.
SO
I've thought this through as best I can, and have left the Q- hive in original location. I've placed the moved Q+ colony on top, separated by newspaper. Now, I know this may well work for the merge part, (Done it once - so now I'm an expert
) but my question is will the act of merging, and having to chew through paper also act to assist their relocation - i.e. stop them flying to the old site, or is there something else I can do to reset their navigation ? (Blocking the entrance etc). The Q+ entrance was originally facing North, but will now share the Q- entrance facing South if that helps. All advice gratefully considered.
