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So I’ve got a hive ready for bees to inhabit. I bought some swarm luring stuff from my hive supplier and a friend kindly gave me 3 frames with some old comb and a bit of capped honey on them, to hopefully convince passing bees that they’d be mad to pass up the chance of moving in.

I’m going to try to get something to put it up high on in the next couple of days. Is there anything else I can do to increase my chances?
 
FidoDido said:
So I’ve got a hive ready for bees to inhabit. I bought some swarm luring stuff from my hive supplier and a friend kindly gave me 3 frames with some old comb and a bit of capped honey on them, to hopefully convince passing bees that they’d be mad to pass up the chance of moving in.

I’m going to try to get something to put it up high on in the next couple of days. Is there anything else I can do to increase my chances?
Click to expand...

https://theapiarist.org/bait-hive-guide/
good summary here, and references Tom Seeley's Honeybee Democracy, which goes into the mechanics of the swarm procedure, but a bit heavy

Good luck!
 
See this is where it’s very confusing. I’ve been told:

Spray sugar solution around the inside of the hive.
Don’t do that.
Have a super on top.
Don’t have a super on top.
Have the honey frame in.
Don’t have the honey frame in.

Also the fellow who sold me the hives and lemongrass oil said to put a couple of drops on some kitchen roll towards the back of the hive.

So the only thing to do is just pick a method and go with it - except if you do that, you get told off for jumping in too quickly, before you’ve got any experience. But that only experience will teach you anything.

It’s like Boris’s “Stay at home unless you really need to go out, but even if you really need to go out you probably shouldn’t, unless you really need to, in which case don’t” Covid speech 😳

I mean even doing beekeeping courses, I’m guessing that the advise in one course will be different from another, depending on who’s teaching it?
 
I've posted here about what I use for a bait hive before, but briefly (hah!) I use a single national brood or two supers (when I've run out of brood boxes). Most of the (brood) frames are foundationless or just have a starter strip. As you're already familiar with David Evans' site, you can find the details for the frames there. I put one frame of skanky old comb at the back, if I have it. If you don't it's no big deal. I put a couple of drops of lemon grass oil on the top bar of that frame. Again, it's not absolutely necessary, but maybe it helps. Crown board and roof on top. The floor is a piece of solid sheet timber (or in some cases wall lining for a shower, because I had some left over and it's (obviously) waterproof, with walls 50-60mm high. Like an eke, really. In one wall there's a circular hole about 38mm in diameter (as far as I recall -- it was just a size that I had handy). I drill vertically down through the hole from the top edge of that side and then drive a nail through it to stop birds getting in.

Lots of people build bespoke swarm boxes and you can do that if you wish, but from my point of view it's just another thing to store. Having everything standard other than the floor makes my life easier.

I've put them on a shed roof where I can easily lift them down, on hive stands or even on a couple of old tyres stacked on the ground. Sometimes I try to face them roughly south, other times it's not practical. Putting them in full Sun has generally worked better for me.

Do read Seeley because it's useful information and explains where the ideas come from, but I think the most important thing is to get a space that the scout bees perceive to be of roughly the right volume. Pretty much anything else is optional. You don't have to offer them The Ritz. A Premier Inn is likely to be good enough if everywhere else they've found looks like a flophouse by comparison. Last year I caught around a dozen and a half swarms this way in a month. In a couple of instances I had two swarms trying to occupy the same bait hive at the same time.

And if you should get a swarm, put your next bait hive in the same place. If the site appeals to one swarm then there's a fair chance that it will appeal to the next.

Have enough kit ready to properly house a swarm, and ideally to treat it for varroa (because there is initially no capped brood, it's a good time to treat them). And have another bait hive ready to go too.

James
 
JamezF said:
I've posted here about what I use for a bait hive before, but briefly (hah!) I use a single national brood or two supers (when I've run out of brood boxes). Most of the (brood) frames are foundationless or just have a starter strip. As you're already familiar with David Evans' site, you can find the details for the frames there. I put one frame of skanky old comb at the back, if I have it. If you don't it's no big deal. I put a couple of drops of lemon grass oil on the top bar of that frame. Again, it's not absolutely necessary, but maybe it helps. Crown board and roof on top. The floor is a piece of solid sheet timber (or in some cases wall lining for a shower, because I had some left over and it's (obviously) waterproof, with walls 50-60mm high. Like an eke, really. In one wall there's a circular hole about 38mm in diameter (as far as I recall -- it was just a size that I had handy). I drill vertically down through the hole from the top edge of that side and then drive a nail through it to stop birds getting in.

Lots of people build bespoke swarm boxes and you can do that if you wish, but from my point of view it's just another thing to store. Having everything standard other than the floor makes my life easier.

I've put them on a shed roof where I can easily lift them down, on hive stands or even on a couple of old tyres stacked on the ground. Sometimes I try to face them roughly south, other times it's not practical. Putting them in full Sun has generally worked better for me.

Do read Seeley because it's useful information and explains where the ideas come from, but I think the most important thing is to get a space that the scout bees perceive to be of roughly the right volume. Pretty much anything else is optional. You don't have to offer them The Ritz. A Premier Inn is likely to be good enough if everywhere else they've found looks like a flophouse by comparison. Last year I caught around a dozen and a half swarms this way in a month. In a couple of instances I had two swarms trying to occupy the same bait hive at the same time.

And if you should get a swarm, put your next bait hive in the same place. If the site appeals to one swarm then there's a fair chance that it will appeal to the next.

Have enough kit ready to properly house a swarm, and ideally to treat it for varroa (because there is initially no capped brood, it's a good time to treat them). And have another bait hive ready to go too.

James
Click to expand...
That’s great thank you very much!
 
Erichalfbee said:
🤣🤣 I love you though, Philip. So do lots of others here.
Click to expand...
"You can please some of the people some of the time, all of the people some of the time, some of the people all of the time - what you can't do is please all of the people all of the time" ... Abraham Lincoln - and he knew a thing or two !
 
Last edited:
JamezF said:
I've posted here about what I use for a bait hive before, but briefly (hah!) I use a single national brood or two supers (when I've run out of brood boxes). Most of the (brood) frames are foundationless or just have a starter strip. As you're already familiar with David Evans' site, you can find the details for the frames there. I put one frame of skanky old comb at the back, if I have it. If you don't it's no big deal. I put a couple of drops of lemon grass oil on the top bar of that frame. Again, it's not absolutely necessary, but maybe it helps. Crown board and roof on top. The floor is a piece of solid sheet timber (or in some cases wall lining for a shower, because I had some left over and it's (obviously) waterproof, with walls 50-60mm high. Like an eke, really. In one wall there's a circular hole about 38mm in diameter (as far as I recall -- it was just a size that I had handy). I drill vertically down through the hole from the top edge of that side and then drive a nail through it to stop birds getting in.

Lots of people build bespoke swarm boxes and you can do that if you wish, but from my point of view it's just another thing to store. Having everything standard other than the floor makes my life easier.

I've put them on a shed roof where I can easily lift them down, on hive stands or even on a couple of old tyres stacked on the ground. Sometimes I try to face them roughly south, other times it's not practical. Putting them in full Sun has generally worked better for me.

Do read Seeley because it's useful information and explains where the ideas come from, but I think the most important thing is to get a space that the scout bees perceive to be of roughly the right volume. Pretty much anything else is optional. You don't have to offer them The Ritz. A Premier Inn is likely to be good enough if everywhere else they've found looks like a flophouse by comparison. Last year I caught around a dozen and a half swarms this way in a month. In a couple of instances I had two swarms trying to occupy the same bait hive at the same time.

And if you should get a swarm, put your next bait hive in the same place. If the site appeals to one swarm then there's a fair chance that it will appeal to the next.

Have enough kit ready to properly house a swarm, and ideally to treat it for varroa (because there is initially no capped brood, it's a good time to treat them). And have another bait hive ready to go too.

James
Click to expand...
Great info. I’m curious about the old brood frame and lemongrass oil being optional. I’ve always thought they were the most important…at least to have one or the other. Have you had success when using neither?
 
JamezF said:
I've posted here about what I use for a bait hive before, but briefly (hah!) I use a single national brood or two supers (when I've run out of brood boxes). Most of the (brood) frames are foundationless or just have a starter strip. As you're already familiar with David Evans' site, you can find the details for the frames there. I put one frame of skanky old comb at the back, if I have it. If you don't it's no big deal. I put a couple of drops of lemon grass oil on the top bar of that frame. Again, it's not absolutely necessary, but maybe it helps. Crown board and roof on top. The floor is a piece of solid sheet timber (or in some cases wall lining for a shower, because I had some left over and it's (obviously) waterproof, with walls 50-60mm high. Like an eke, really. In one wall there's a circular hole about 38mm in diameter (as far as I recall -- it was just a size that I had handy). I drill vertically down through the hole from the top edge of that side and then drive a nail through it to stop birds getting in.

Lots of people build bespoke swarm boxes and you can do that if you wish, but from my point of view it's just another thing to store. Having everything standard other than the floor makes my life easier.

I've put them on a shed roof where I can easily lift them down, on hive stands or even on a couple of old tyres stacked on the ground. Sometimes I try to face them roughly south, other times it's not practical. Putting them in full Sun has generally worked better for me.

Do read Seeley because it's useful information and explains where the ideas come from, but I think the most important thing is to get a space that the scout bees perceive to be of roughly the right volume. Pretty much anything else is optional. You don't have to offer them The Ritz. A Premier Inn is likely to be good enough if everywhere else they've found looks like a flophouse by comparison. Last year I caught around a dozen and a half swarms this way in a month. In a couple of instances I had two swarms trying to occupy the same bait hive at the same time.

And if you should get a swarm, put your next bait hive in the same place. If the site appeals to one swarm then there's a fair chance that it will appeal to the next.

Have enough kit ready to properly house a swarm, and ideally to treat it for varroa (because there is initially no capped brood, it's a good time to treat them). And have another bait hive ready to go too.

James
Click to expand...
That's all good advice and as with all your posts thankfully not at all patronising, thanks James !
 
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