bees knees
New Bee
- Joined
- Jul 25, 2010
- Messages
- 98
- Reaction score
- 3
- Location
- worcestershire, uk
- Hive Type
- National
- Number of Hives
- 3
We did a demaree on all 3 of our colonies 8 days ago to try and prevent swarming. One colony I think we were too late as there were already early charged q cells. Today it looks like they have swarmed leaving lots of q cells behind in both brood boxes.
The other 2 colonies look much better - definitely laying queens in the bottom brood boxes. What I'm not sure should have happened though is that there are a few capped q cells in both colonies in the top (old brood) boxes. We have removed these but why would they have developed? Is it because the old brood boxes are above 2 supers and therefore quite a way from the queen so the bees up top think they haven't got one? This is our first time trying the demaree method and I do hope we haven't messed up! All comments gratefully received.
The other 2 colonies look much better - definitely laying queens in the bottom brood boxes. What I'm not sure should have happened though is that there are a few capped q cells in both colonies in the top (old brood) boxes. We have removed these but why would they have developed? Is it because the old brood boxes are above 2 supers and therefore quite a way from the queen so the bees up top think they haven't got one? This is our first time trying the demaree method and I do hope we haven't messed up! All comments gratefully received.