How long can you keep bees in Apidea?

[dlawr42103]

Following a little experiment, I now have 2 Apidea with queens.

1 has been laying for 2 days now, the other just hatched yesterday.

I am quite full of bees and need a little time to work out who / if I am going to re-queen. I cant even transfer to a Nuc as mine are now all now in use.

Any general rules / ideas on how long a laying queen can remain in an Apidea? There obviously is not much room and she is going to run out of laying room pretty quick. Do I just look out for swarm cells... or could they just abscond without making QC's? .... and also would it be harmful to suppress her laying by keeping her in there too long?

Any advice much appreciated as always

 

[fatshark]

They'll abscond if they get too hot and crowded. Can you give them a second floor? Either remove some brood and bees, and give them fresh comb to draw perhaps, or strap the frames together into a full frame and put them in a nuc.

You can keep bees for a long time in mini-nucs but they need careful management.

Unless you really want them in the Apidea I'd move them into a two frame nuc. At least you'll then be able to more easily unite the brood/bees once you've used the Q.

 

[dlawr42103]

I have a number of 5 frame nuc's, but they are all in use.

I do have a number of other mini-nucs apidea types that I have not used so I could strap these together, that should give me a bit more time. thank you.

 

[joe9052]

over winter..... easy...

 

[Apple]

over winter..... easy...

Just stack another apidea box on the bottom, have one going into second season, 5 high ! seem happy enough, but of course not suitable for Ferrari bees who want a 14 x 12 at least!





James

 

[dlawr42103]

Ive stacked... they have not yet worked out there is an upstairs to explore yet, but Im sure they will find it eventually.. and now I have a little breathing space! phew!

 

[clv101]

My four mating nucs started laying between the 14-16th July, so there won't be any new bees emerging until 4th August at the earliest. Until that time, the bee numbers will be gradually decreasing.

However, the queen is probably already short on laying space? What's more important, laying space or the number of bees?

 

[Apple]

Ive stacked... they have not yet worked out there is an upstairs to explore yet, but Im sure they will find it eventually.. and now I have a little breathing space! phew!

You need to stack underneath so that the draw comb down, the natural way, in the way of the Rev Warre !

Most bee breeders would want to get the queens out to market to reuse the mating nuc.


James