How long to trigger re-orientation ?

[Bucks_Boy]

Just a small question.
I have had to move a reasonably sized Nuc about 100 yards - I've put them in a well ventilated travelling box ( sides and top ) and made sure they have been tucked under a hedge, in full shade, with a spray of water every few hours. I put them in Sunday morning and want to trigger the re-orientation response so that the bulk do not return to the old site.

Question -- should I open them up tonight and leave a plug of grass for them to push out or should I give it another 24 hours ? I've done it with Apidea but not with a colony this size ...

For information, any bees returning to old site will not survive, I cannot even put a box there to capture any --- I put a nuc ( frames plus a q cell ) in the wilderness at the end of a neighbours garden to start them off as beekeepers but their daughter and grandaughter announced they were moving back into the house at the weekend and insisted on the removal of the bees ...... the daughter also had a moan about mine until I reminded her of some of her anti-social antics about 10 years ago as a teenager !

 

[jon]

Could you not move them a couple of miles away for three weeks and then move them back to your place. That would stop them returning. I'm sure someone you know would put up with a nuc at the bottom of the garden for a short time if you explained the circumstances.
I think at 100 yards you will get a lot of them going back if you just move them directly.

 

[jezd]

I would get them opened up, I moved a 9 frame hive to a new site 60m away and split into 3 nucs at the same time and all seems ok - I gave them a couple of knocks before I opened them (nothing too heavy) and placed some plants outside the entrances to make it clear things have changed.

Jez

PS having said that I dont have a neighbour issue as its just a big field