Have I got it right??

[theeggman]

Case history!
Swarm hived end of June 2011 into 14x12.
Overwintered with a super on top 1/2 full of strong thymol sugar syrup.
No QX.
1st. week 2012 O.A.'d super nearly empty.
Today opened up with a view to removing super or putting under the brood box.
Today super 1/2 full of capped stores, 60% brood frames stores, some brood in frames (patchy) I'd planned to requeen early this year.
I've replaced the super frames with foundation to give them somewhere to store incoming food without thymol contamination, and have put the 'old' super frames into the freezer for next winter.
Put QX back on.
Just for info. we went through the brood box twice looking for the Queen, saw her once but too fast for us, but we didn't use smoke at all and not even any lady thinking about stinging. +14C at the time.

Have I got it right???

Tim

 

[For want of a better word]

I am leaving any manipulations for a few weeks until the Easter Bunny has been and gone possibly... thymolated syrup is still in supers under the double broods.. if they have not cleared it out.. I have not looked! IMO not quite warm enough.
Also if the colony is so good tempered why requeen?

I would not put a super on just now... wait for the OSR to bloom?

Temps here are barely peaking at 11 degrees even today with no wind and blue skys... temp 1 degree last night!

 

[oliver90owner]

You got it wrong with the half a super of stores for overwintering - a full brood is more than enough for mine - I have over-wintered on ten frames this winter. Was it full and how much is left? But that was not a big problem for the bees, obviously. They perhaps had a bit too much head space, but not a problem in this instance, in your area.

It may have been better to have removed some stores frames from the brood as you don't give any indication of how much laying space and how much stores, nor strength of the colony.

Certainly wrong to go chasing the queen at this time of the year - a lost or damaged queen would not be good for the colony.

I don't know what you have coming in but I think you need to concentrate on space in the brood box, if it is warm and they are that active.

For all I know, your brood box may be stuffed with thymol sugar syrup. Now you have a Q/E on they may move stores up to make laying space downstairs (especially if the cappings are damaged....) Think about what seven frames (60%) of stores is, in terms of weight!

So OK, but not entirely sure of what you have in, and coming in. Well done, that they seem to be doing well after the winter.

RAB

 

[theeggman]

Thanks for response RAB.
As they were a small colony going into winter, and our first winter, I left the super,1/2 full on for winter stores. Early Jan. it was nearly empty. We had a look in yesterday with a view to moving down or removing the super however they've refilled and capped 1/2 again plus a lot of fresh stores in brood frames that were empty at OA time.
We didn't plan a Q hunt but spotted her, for the first time ever, whilst checking brood frames for laying space. Still too fast for us to mark.
Brood was getting very patchy at the end of last season and I was advised by an experienced beek to requeen this year, hence need to find and mark.

Tim

 

[oliver90owner]

Still too fast for us to mark.

Another mistake. Note effect of loss of queen on hive at this time of the year - this being your only colony!

As they were a small colony going into winter

If a small colony, why all that extra space and extra stores? Not needed. You will learn from it,hopefully for subsequent winters.

plus a lot of fresh stores in brood frames that were empty at OA time.

The plot thickens! How much hafd they consumed by early Jan, this small colony? half a super and several brood frames worth? Add it up; comes to a lot of stores.

Before doing anything, please think of all the possible rammifications of your proposed actions. Slow down and don't try to rush things. There is no absolute need to mark a queen in early March for changing in a couple months time. It can easily be done without her being marked, or chased around the hive in early March!

RAB

 

[rae]

Another mistake. Note effect of loss of queen on hive at this time of the year - this being your only colony!

This is important, and why I leave well alone early in the season. If something goes wrong (and it often does), your colony is doomed. No one will have queens for about 3 months if you damage, drop, or cause your queen to be rejected by the hive. You can be far more cavalier when you have done swarm control and have a pile of nucs, all with mated queens laying away.

The only hive I'm going to open in the next few weeks is the psycho hive that was given to us last year: with the express intention of killing the queen so that we don't get any psycho drones this year. I have a small overwintered nuc (good tempered queen) that we will merge them with.

You colony will have more than enough space to lay (14 x12 + super, having consumed stores over the winter), leave them well alone! They will be unlikely to build comb at this time of year unless the weather turns really warm. As to the QX - that could kill them if the weather turns bad. If we get another spell of cold weather predicted, I'd take it out again.

 

[Hivemaker.]

No one will have queens for about 3 months if you damage, drop, or cause your queen to be rejected by the hive.

Not entirely true Rae,imported queens are usually available in about three weeks time,and many in this country over winter some queens in mini nucs, for the very purpose of having early queens to replace drone layers ect ,in fact i re queened a colony last week, after killing a virgin queen in it.

 

[rae]

Hmmm. We really needed a queen in March last year (drone layer) and there were none. Perhaps not "impossible" ...but "hard to get"....