Having a try

[Tremyfro]

After seeing the thread about a dwindling colony yesterday...it prompted me to make a post about it but rather than muddy the waters for the original poster I thought to start another.
My colony is small because my beautiful carniolan queen was superceeded last autumn....during the only bit of good weather we had. I had seen the cell and decided to let them do what they needed to do. The original queen was still there on our last inspection but I didn't see another...but there were a lot of bees so I wasn't surprised.
Having sat on my hands for as long as I could this last few weeks...I looked through the crown board and could see some capped brood. So I knew someone was laying. More time passed and yesterday we did our first inspection of the year. I had noticed the day before that there seemed to be fewer bees going in and out...and it was a lovely warm day...our first too.
The colony was in a double nuc. They had lots of capped stores, some pollen but not a lot and a hand sized patch of sealed brood on facing sides of comb. We also saw eggs and unsealed brood. The number of bees was definitely less than when I had looked through the clear top board....but sometimes that can be misleading.
I have one colony which has lots of brood, stores and bees. So I have followed the advice of Poly hive and swapped them over. I also gave the nuc a frame of emerging brood. Initially, there was consternation at the entrance of the moved hive...we could see reorienting happening and a couple of tussles at the entrance...but it soon settled down. The nuc started to receive foragers from the larger colony and these were going into the nuc after a quick look at it.
We will monitor how they go on over the next week or two. Hopefully the queen in the nuc will now be able to lay more eggs since there will be more bees in there. The brood in the larger colony will lose some foragers but has quite a few brood frames with emerging bees so will soon catch up again. The weather is at last improving here.
I had earlier in the year ordered a new carniolan queen for this colony ....she is due to arrive in May...so if the late superceedure queen is poorly mated I can replace her.
I am wearing my nuclear armour in readiness to repel the verbals that I am sure will soon appear. Ha ha.

 

[pargyle]

Well .. it will be interesting to see how you get on .. I wouldn't have done it. I think you risk ending up with two weak colonies. If you have a new queen coming in May I would have left it until then - by which time you would know whether the weak Nuc would survive on its own - and if it did you have an option to requeen either colony. If it didn't you take a split from the stronger colony - indeed, if you felt one of the queens was a duffer then I would have combined both Nuc and strong colony now to make a really viable colony and then split it (with less impact) when your new queen arrived.

Bit too late now ... but let us know how you get on.

 

[Tremyfro]

I will let you know how it goes. The new queen in the nuc looks a big one but how that bears any relation to how well she is mated remains to be seen.
If I don't try...I won't know. If it all falls flat on its face....I won't be doing it again in a hurry.

 

[Gribbee]

I wish you luck, however, in the past I have had the foragers from the stronger colony completely overwhelm the weaker one and even kill the queen. I always now go for transplanting emerging brood, even in small amounts.

 

[For want of a better word]

Trying to coax a weak colony into a 200 kilo honey producer is a bit like our attempts to grow our own asparagus.
Would get a few weak shoots, hardly enough for a meal, seems I do not have green fingers!
Gave up struggling with the dammed stuff... cheap enough to buy in Tesco's !!

Buy a few strong colonies of bees that have been locally bred and reared... like the Irish fisherman said... I could tell you the way... but I would not start from here!

Yeghes da

 

[Cussword]

Trying to coax a weak colony into a 200 kilo honey producer is a bit like our attempts to grow our own asparagus.
Yeghes da

Leave it alone and enjoy the ferns.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Leave it alone and enjoy the ferns.

The bees love the flowers which give red pollen.

 

[For want of a better word]

Thanks C and E 1/2 B!

I have not got the heart to dig it up..... now Jerusalem artichokes... I can grow them ... no problem!!

Yeghes da

 

[Tremyfro]

Asparagus is tricky...at our last house I was lucky enough to inherit a large bed of them....rather overgrown but salvageable.....we enjoyed them every year....yummy.
You don't want to dig up your plants and I don't want to lose my bees....seems we both suffer from a bit of sentimentality.
Yes it is the easy route to go and buy bees but I enjoy the husbandry involved with my own bees.
We will see...if the queen survives and the nuc prospers and the larger colony picks up quickly.....it will be good....or I will deal with the aftermath and learn from it.

 

[For want of a better word]

Honeybees and asparagus... must be something to be said about beekeepereresses or asparagus groweresses!!!

Yeghes da

 

[Obee1]

Well done tremy for giving it a go - as you say you never know till you try.
I visited my weak colony that appears queen less and took it a frame of eggs and emerging brood. Was surprised to see that now they have had their bottom brood box of empty combs removed there were 9 seams of bees in the remaining box. Not sure how they are so big - but will see if they draw queencells.

 

[drex]

At this time of year I always swap strong and weak hives. Never had a problem with it. Helps apiary management to have equalised colonies. Later on I can swap frames of brood if further equalising is needed. Assumes all colonies are healthy of course.

 

[gregior]

I swapped 2 of mine around two weeks ago,the weak one was on 2 frames with a golf ball size patch of brood,the strong on was on 9 frames with 5 of brood.There was some fighting initially in the weak colony (I think most of the workers from the weak colony were killed) but luckily the Queen survived.
Had a quick look in yesterday and the weak colony now has 4 full frames of young brood so it's been a great success as far as i'm concerned.

 

[Poly Hive]

It works yes. Oh and it is nothing new been around for goodness knows how long and it wouldn't surprise me to find out the skeppists did it.

PH

 

[Eyeman]

Swapping over strong and weak colonies is less risky when there is a strong honey flow on as the nectar loaded foragers are less likely to fight.
Alec

 

[Tremyfro]

Thank you all for the interesting comments. So far so good. The large colony were having some squabbles at the entrance with returning foragers from the nuc but the nuc was accepting the new foragers. They are all in for the night now so fingers crossed for tomorrow. It was interesting to see so many foragers from the larger colony reorientation get and there were lots going out and coming back...and straight in the entrance. I hope it works and the queen survives.....I am a bit sentimental about her as she is the last daughter of my wonderful carniolan queen.

 

[BeeJayBee]

I hope it works

I think we all do.

 

[Tremyfro]

So far all looks well. I don't suppose I will know for sure until I inspect again...and that will depend on the weather. They were out today...no fighting seen. Lots of bees in and out of the nuc and a fair few from the main colony too.....although the weather was cooler and only a few sunny periods....we didn't get the rain ...well only a short shower. The fencing man came again today.....it was supposed to be raining all day....so we put a few barriers up near the hives...it made him feel better...I don't suppose the bees even noticed him.....they have been so good what with him banging in fence posts, cutting down a pine tree, hammering, drilling etc.
I spotted some OSR today...I'm not sure if it close enough for my bees.

 

[Binge]

I'm afraid I feel the same way about this as I did about the other thread.
People asked the question there, so I'll ask it here too.
Why do you think the weak colony was failing to begin with?
Is it wise to weaken a stronger colony at its expense?
If you were likely to split the stronger colony later on when it comes to swarm prevention, why weaken it now?
I too hope it works out.

 

[Tremyfro]

I'm afraid I feel the same way about this as I did about the other thread.
People asked the question there, so I'll ask it here too.
Why do you think the weak colony was failing to begin with?
Is it wise to weaken a stronger colony at its expense?
If you were likely to split the stronger colony later on when it comes to swarm prevention, why weaken it now?
I too hope it works out.

There are a number of reasons to keep this small colony alive....my own personal ones being the queen in the nuc...which was a double nuc last year on 8 frames of brood(langstroth frames). So in reality it was a reasonable colony which had built up from 3 frames of brood. She was my original queen..so I'm a bit sentimental about her......she was very prolific...the bees were great to handle even when completely filling a jumbo poly and needing a super to expand into for the brood. I learnt a huge amount from this colony. There was always the possibility that she might not make it through the winter...she was getting old. I noticed a superceedure cell in the autumn but decided to let the bees do what they needed to do without interference. So I didn't know this spring what I had in the double nuc. Bees were flying...I could see through the clear board quite a few bees. Then the day before the spring inspection I noticed fewer bees flying from the nuc. During inspection...no old queen was seen but there was a small patch of brood on facing combs, there were stores and even some new nectar and pollen. However fewer bees...then I spotted a new queen...she was large. I assumed a superceedure had taken place. In the early autumn we had good weather here....so she could be well mated and just starting to lay but the old winter bees were dying off and I was concerned the crossover from old bees to new bees wouldn't allow the brood to emerge quickly enough. There was no sign of sickness in the nuc and, to me...sentimental or not they were worth saving. The larger colony which has donated the extra bees was healthy...there was lots of nurse bees and brood frames. There were whole frames of eggs and larvae too. Yes...I agree this colony will take a knock back but I think they have the resources to recover well. Please remember that I am not running a commercial concern...it is a hobby and the idea is to learn and keep it going not to maximise every spoonful of honey. In any case, living on a hilltop, exposed to the winds and weather from the Bristol Channel is probably only ever going to allow survival. So, in a nutshell, this colony was worth saving because of the genes...prolific, quiet to handle, honey makers, and non swarmy carniolans. Worth an effort on my part to find a way to support them....and I did have a back up plan as I had previously...back in the depths of winter...ordered a new carniolan queen to replace the old one....just in case.