Combining Nuc with Queenright Colony

[dlawr42103]

I have a 5 frame Nuc, bursting with bees with a young laying queen that I wish to use to re-queen one of my colonies.

The one I want to re-queen is a strong large colony, but the queen is quite old now and she has definitely started to slow down on her laying. Currently this colony consists of 1 deep body and 3 supers.

What is the safest method (most reliable, ensuring new queen survives) of combining these so the new queen takes over the large hive, replacing the old queen.

 

[oliver90owner]

The newspaper method has been bomb proof for me.

But you do not combine with a queenright colony! Remove queen, remove queen cells after a week, then unite.

 

[dlawr42103]

Thank you... which way around should I unite, it does it not matter?

If I remove queen, leave for a week, remoce Qcells... when I unite, should I put the Nuc frames on the bottom or top, it does it not matter?

 

[oliver90owner]

A nuc balances on top of a full box better than the other way round?

Of course you may have one of these modern nuc boxes which are not conducive to uniting, in which case you could transfer to a full brood box first, perhaps with it dummied down?

I normally put the larger colony on top (think here - more bees to chew through the paper. At the same time, I usually prefer the queen at the bottom (queen pheromones go upwards by convection). I doubt it really matters.

Sometimes the simple logistics dictate which way. Final hive position is one factor. The only time a paper unite didn't work for me was not down to the method, but down to me (and not unexpected) - the Q-cluster upstairs was so tiny, they made no attempt to even start to chew through.