Help! Sudden fighting & dead bees

[Ivor Kemp]

Thanks.

Yes I still think it's robbing but I hope you agree it seems my colony is fending them off, for the time being.

The bees I saw in the hive after dark must have been my colony must they not? In which case there is still honey there and lots of bees.

What I don't understand is why the robbing bees are continuing there attack as they seem to be being rebuffed and presumably suffering quite heavy losses.

Anyway, does everyone agree it would be good to whip off whatever honey I still have as quickly as possible or just leave everything as it is?

 

[Ivor Kemp]

Sorry and yes I did mean play cups.

 

[Hebeegeebee]

Best to have a 1 bee-way entrance and have the bees queing up to get in and out than let them get robbed to death.

+++

The best way to sort out robbing is to close up the hive with the robbers inside and move it to an out apiary 3+ miles away; that is if you can't move the robbers.

The robbers then become part of the robbed colony. Leave something on the old site like a manky frame with some stores in it in a box of some sort if you don't have a spare hive (if you have other hives in your apiary) to be robbed out otherwise the robbers will look elsewhere and find another hive to go for.

It works for me. (As advised by Ted Hooper).

 

[Ivor Kemp]

That's really good advice Hebeegeebee.

My brother-in-law has always been keen on keeping bees. Looks like he's about to get some!

I am still mystified and cannot find an explanation anywhere by the fact the robbers seem to have continued to 'attack' for almost seven days now without either gaining control of the colony or giving up. This doesn't seem to make sense to me particularly in the last week of July when they could find some easier source surely?

Has anyone else experienced this or disagree with this opinion?

 

[Polyanwood]

My experience is that once a hive comes under attack from whatever - other bees, wasps or hornets - then the attackers just carry on, and bring their friends until the hive is dead and there is nothing else worth stealing. They seem always to pick on the weakest one.

Have had success with moving such colonies - less success with reducing entrance size once it has started.

 

[Ivor Kemp]

A very strange end (we hope) to this saga!

Yesterday evening I called in on a guy with twenty years experience for advice and he just happened to have the Bee Inspector round.

I showed them the photos and explained everything and they both jumped in the car to have a look at my hive.

Bee Inspector started examining all the dead bees and then the innards of my hive.

Of course he realised straight away that almost all the dead bees were a different colour to mine and there was absolutely no signs of robbing in my hive and we drew off over 50lbs of honey!!

What baffled him though was, in all this time, there were still robbing bees flying around the hive although not attempting to go in. He said he had never seen this before given what had happened already.

His conclusions were either the attraction of so much honey was so great that the robbing bees returned every day even though they were getting nothing and suffering heavy losses or a cast swarm had tried to settle in my hive but had been denied access completely and the remaining bees from this swarm were homeless and spending their last days aimlessly circling my hive.

Anyway all's well that end well but any other theories gratefully received. It has been a most bizzare episode!

 

[Lois]

Phew for you Ivan! 50lbs of honey hey? nice one. I dont even have enough for a slice of toast.

 

[Ivor Kemp]

Thanks Lois. I realise I have been very lucky.

I'd let you have a jar or three if I knew where you were.

 

[Hebeegeebee]

Multiple robbing

I've got a case of multiple robbing. On Friday evening I put a couple of wet supers back on one hive and fed another which was very short of stores. (The syrup had been taken by Saturday monring). No problem on Saturday although there were plenty of bees at the entrances of nucs and mini-nucs to deter invaders - as there has been all week due to wasps. Today by 10 the fed hive was being attacked and is covered with bees. Several other hives have had episodes of attack - even one big one which should have been strong enough to defend itself. There are bees hanging around the back of a number of hives trying to get in. I can't move ALL the hives (a dozen or so). I will move the worst robbed tonight and leave a dummy in it's place (see my post earlier). All entrances are small. Any suggestions?

I was wondering about feeding all colonies but I don;'t know if this would make things worse.

 

[Arfermo]

Thanks Lois.

The pictures of the episode are now in the albums section.

I've looked in the albums section and it says there is nothing there from you!!! Are you sure you cannot just attach the to another post in this thread - providing they are not too large or can you reduce their size to fit anyway? Others attach photos easily enough.

 

[Mike a]

I've looked in the albums section and it says there is nothing there from you!!! Are you sure you cannot just attach the to another post in this thread - providing they are not too large or can you reduce their size to fit anyway? Others attach photos easily enough.

Pictures in the album.
http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/album.php?albumid=135