First Artificial Swarm

[SwiftOtter]

We did our first Artificial Swarm yesterday evening and it all seemed to go well but now I am concerned that we did not do it correctly:

1: We added an extra frame of brood to the new brood box containing the old queen plus the frame she was on (which had stores and some brood) as well as two frames of drawn comb and seven frames of foundation. I'm sure there were no Queen cells we checked thoroughly. However I think we should have left the 'extra' frame of brood in the original box. Most of the forager bees will end up in the new box with the old queen, and the new nurse bees that are emerging will be required for the new colony. There are about six frames of brood in the old box so maybe they will be OK anyway. Should I just leave it now or move it back?

2: There were five unsealed queen cells and one sealed queen cell in the old brood box. I initially thought that we should destroy the sealed one but we chose not to. However I have now read that we should have done. Should I go back in and destroy it now?

Thanks a lot for any assistance...

 

[Mike a]

I would of removed all but two of the queen cells, preferably of different sizes or capped and uncapped to ensure if the first failed the second would produce a queen. Leaving lots of queen cells there is a strong chance that one or two could emerge and instead of killing all the other queens developing they may choose to swarm (cast swarm)

There is no reason why you can't take a frame of sealed brood from the A/S hive shaking off all the bees and giving it to the hive with the queen at any time, the queen should continue laying and they will balance up soon enough and in the mean time the frame brood you put in with the queen will emerge and look after her soon enough.

Don't expect the queen to lay at the same rate as she was previously. It will take time for the parent queen to get going again, monitor closely the amount of stores they have. Well worth using a dummy board as well to help condense them for awhile until the parent queen hive starts to expand again drawing out the frames of foundation.

 

[beeno]

Hi SwiftOtter,
I have not done an A/S myself yet, but be aware that it sometimes swarms, so look out for QCs. You may have had some young enough larvae or eggs on the frames (you gave to the 'old queen' for clarity).

 

[Black Comb]

I've tried "cheating" with AS in the past (in my case I left 3 frames of brood in AS) and they swarmed. Just follow the standard practice which has been honed by many many years of experience by our forefathers.
I would leave this 2nd brood frame in the AS but in future leave ony 1.

In the parent colony I ony leave 1'queen cell as I have tried leaving 2 and they swarmed. I think if you leave 2 it is important that you move the PC to the"other side" after 7 days as this denudes it of flying bees. Alt. you could remove one of these before it hatches, remembering they are sealed for 8 days max.

Always leave the youngest cell as it is more likely to been produced using v young larvae and will therefore have received more royal jelly, thus making a fully formed queen with nice big ovaries.

 

[SwiftOtter]

Right lesson learned! I assume then that the sealed cell (if still there!) should be removed and all but one of the unsealed. I was planning on moving the colony to the other side which I thought was the standard method.

I'll have to go in tomorrow, children's parties today! Hope they haven't swarmed...

Thanks a lot, very helpful.

 

[enrico]

The chances are the sealed cell will be open.....sods law.... If so,remove the others.

 

[SwiftOtter]

Yes that sounds about right! Cheers for the backup tip.
Chris

 

[SwiftOtter]

They hadn't swarmed and they are now down to a single cell - I was amazed how quickly they had grown!