More embarrassing newbie problems

[Icing Sugar]

Following my previous post (From starvation-concern to swarm-concern in 1 week!, 2 May) I ended up with two queenright hives following a split of the original hive on the morning of 3 May, in which I kept just one sealed queen cell in each half of the split. There was no egg-laying activity in either hive until last week. Please can I take you through what happened next in each hive for your views?

HIVE ONE

One week ago in hive one, some of the cells in the brood box had more than one egg in them. However, others did have just one egg in and these were always placed perfectly at the bottom of the relevant cell. All the cells with eggs in were concentrated quite densely on a single frame. I assumed that I had a newly-mated queen who just needed time to settle down. Today the brood box contained so much nectar and pollen that every single cell on 11 frames was in use and only about a quarter of one side of frame had eggs or larvae in it. The rest of the brood box was absolutely full of stores. The bees have simply not ventured into the supers at all. Furthermore, there were half a dozen open queen cells with larvae in them, all suspended underneath the frames and half a dozen polished but empty queen cups in similar locations. There there were no sealed queen cells anywhere. My assumptions were that: (i) I still had a new laying queen in the brood box, (ii) a lack of space in the brood box was encouraging the bees to prepare to swarm. This is what I did: (i) I went through every frame in the brood box twice after I had shaken the bees off and removed every queen cup/cell. (ii) To encourage bees up into the super, I put the Queen excluder on top of the super rather than between the brood box and super. At my next inspection I am hoping that quite a lot of nectar will have been relocated into the super and that the brood box therefore will have much more space for brood. Then, after ensuring that the queen is in the brood box and not the super, I would intend to put the QE back in its correct position.

I have already done what I have done, but does it seem reasonable? Should I also take out some of the frames from the brood box and replace with completely empty ones? If so, how many should I replace in this way?

HIVE 2

There was evidence of egg laying by a new queen 1 week ago, with just one egg per cell. Many more eggs had been laid in this hive and some of them had turned into tiny larvae. The super was being used and there was room in the brood box for more egg laying. Today there is still plenty of space for egg laying. There were 4 incipient queen cups (in the middle of frames rather than on the bottom of them) but no eggs/larvae in any of these. I found the queen and trapped her in a plastic trap so that I could clip and mark her. I didn't find it anything like as easy as some of those youtube film clips might suggest. For a start, rather a lot of workers would not leave her alone and this was rather disconcerting as I held her in my bare hands. As I transferred her from being held by her wings to all of her legs, I miscalculated my grip and held her by the very tips of about half her legs. She struggled a lot and I was worried that a leg might actually come off. I had to try and grip her all over again if she was to become still enough to be clipped and marked. As I loosened my grip she got free... and flew off! I am absolutely confident that I had the queen and not a drone. I thought that queen bees were supposed to be kept sufficiently fed that they could not fly without being moderately starved by the workers first. Did I get that wrong? What is the chance that the queen will successfully return to the hive?

 

[VEG]

I had a queen that flew off after I marked her she was back at the next visit.

 

[Tom Bick]

As for hive one I would have done the same but keep an eye on them.

I looked into a hive I mentor with a newly mated queen and a good many cells had three eggs and I lost count on the amount with two I will be checking this week to see if all has settled down and she is not a DLQ as she took her time to get going.

As for hive two all you can do is check in a couple of days and hope to see her and not emergency cells.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Can't comment on 2 as I've never had a queen fly off.
I'm not confident enough to hold her and use a plunger cage.

Hive 1
I would take out four stores frames and replace with foundation, give them some thing to do.
Better still...if you have drawn frames a couple could go next to the brood you already have and you could alternate the foundation frames alongside.

 

[Tom Bick]

They have plenty to do eric they have a super to work on and now the QX is removed should work it just fine.

The introduction of drawn frames is a good point.

 

[Icing Sugar]

Thank you for the replies. They were all very helpful. Here is an update on the situation following this morning's hive inspections. Again comments/reassurance would be gratefully received.

HIVE 1

All cells on every frame in the brood box are still in use. However there is much less nectar and many more eggs (just one egg per cell, clearly laid by a queen). However, the bees are still not using the super even though I moved the queen excluder as described in my last post. The bees were relatively passive during my inspection. There were 4 unsealed swarm cells with larvae and royal jelly in them, three on one frame and one on another. I did not see any sealed queen cells and I would not expect there to be any after my recent inspection described in my last post.

My "differential diagnosis" was:
1. The bees still want to swarm. They have filled themselves up with nectar and will be off as soon as the swarm cells are sealed. Eggs have been laid in every cell as it has become freed up from nectar storage.
2. The bees have swarmed. Against this, the density of bees in the brood box looked much the same as at my last inspection and none of the swarm cells were sealed.
3. The hive is being robbed. Against this, there was no activity at the hive entrance to suggest robbing. Furthermore, the colony would seem to be a healthy and strong one and I would have thought that it would have put up an adequate defence against would-be robbers.

What I did:
I went for differential diagnosis 1, "preparation for swarming". I therefore split the hive. Hive 1 now has no swarm cells and it has 5 frames of undrawn foundation in it.

The new "Hive 3" contains both frames with swarm cells on them (which also have some worker brood on them too) and some frames stuffed full of nectar/pollen from hive 1.

Hive 1 and hive 3 are eqidistant from the former hive 1 site, so I assume that the flying workers will distribute themselves fairly evenly between the two hives as they return from foraging during the day.

HIVE 2

The bees in this hive were less happy when I inspected them. There were more larvae and fewer eggs. All of the eggs were lying flat on the bottom of their cells, so I assume they were 3-days old. There were 5 emergency cells.

Diagnosis:
The queen bee did not come back.

Action:
Nothing.


QUESTIONS

Do the diagnoses and actions described above sound reasonable?

I don't really want 3 colonies at present baceause I still have a lot to learn about bees. However, I fully understand that having 2 colonies is very sensible. Therefore does the proposed line of action described below sound reasonable?

1. A queen bee from a swarm cell is preferable to a queen bee from an emergency cell.
2. Once I have swept all the bees off it, I can simply place the frame from hive 1 with a single unsealed swarm cell on it into hive 2. At the same time, I can destroy all of the emergency cells in hive 2. I can do this today.

3. If I re-examine hive 1 again in 3 days time and find eggs laid by a queen then I can be confident that I split the hive before it swarmed. This leaves me with a queenright hive 1 (whose stores have been plundered by me in order to prevent swarming) and three queen cells in hive 3. Should I simply destroy these swarm cells in 3 days time and reunite the bees in hive 3 with those in hive 1. What should I do with the plundered stores if I do this?