My bees have died..so sad

[Fibi]

Hello, I am new here and need some advice. Bought and old property that had bees living in an outside wall..very active and several swans so all was good. For the last week we have had little activity and now nothing, no buzzing behind the wall all quiet and no bees to be seen. Sadly they must have died. Do I pull the wall apart and remove the dead bees and take the honey ? Any advice would be great thank you. Fibi

 

[Erichalfbee]

It depends whether you want to interfere, really.
I'm sure another swarm will colonise the space next season and that possibly this has all happened before on many occasions. Such is life as a wild bee colony.

 

[Fritillary]

Fibi - Not knowing anything about your experience with bees: You are sure that they were actually honey bees? - And not another species of wild bee which'd naturally disappear at this time of the year?

 

[Gilberdyke John]

Hello, I am new here and need some advice. Bought and old property that had bees living in an outside wall..very active and several swans so all was good. For the last week we have had little activity and now nothing, no buzzing behind the wall all quiet and no bees to be seen. Sadly they must have died. Do I pull the wall apart and remove the dead bees and take the honey ? Any advice would be great thank you. Fibi

Perhaps you meant several "swarms"? Not unexpected from an unmanaged colony but the outlook wouldn't be good by any means. If the swarming depleted the colony to the extent it became defenceless or no virgin queen left behind was mated the colony would be doomed.
Any honey left in the wall might be old, crystallised, contaminated or even been left unripe and gone mouldy. Can't tell without looking but I'd be inclined to remove it and rebuild the wall in a beeproof manner. If you want to keep bees an accessible, framed hive would be the way forward in my opinion.

 

[Arfermo]

Perhaps you meant several "swarms"? Not unexpected from an unmanaged colony but the outlook wouldn't be good by any means. If the swarming depleted the colony to the extent it became defenceless or no virgin queen left behind was mated the colony would be doomed.
Any honey left in the wall might be old, crystallised, contaminated or even been left unripe and gone mouldy. Can't tell without looking but I'd be inclined to remove it and rebuild the wall in a beeproof manner. If you want to keep bees an accessible, framed hive would be the way forward in my opinion.

Definitely the best solution. Colonies within house walls are not ideal for several reasons. Keep 'em out.

 

[Fibi]

Well I opened it up today and found no bees but have spent all day removing the honeycomb and extracting the honey.....27 kilos of it and it's beautiful. Thanks for advice.

 

[Fibi]

Thank you. Bees have left sadly but left all the honey, did find wasps in there and a few moths!! Lovely honey though but would rather still have my bees.

 

[Fibi]

Hi, yes I did mean swarms...never could spell! Opened it up today and found no bees but a few wasps....spent all day removing the honeycomb and have collected 26 kilos of beautiful honey. I do have 2 hives but inherited these bees in the house and was waiting for the right time to remove them. Thanks for your help. Kind regards Fibi

 

[Fibi]

Honestly I had an idea because of all the pollen they were collecting but to day we opened up the wall and found only a couple of wasps! But loads of beautiful honey....26 kilos of it. Have spent all day removing it from the comb. Thanks for answering my post, I am new at this and need all the help I can get!. Regards Fibi

 

[Fibi]

It depends whether you want to interfere, really.
I'm sure another swarm will colonise the space next season and that possibly this has all happened before on many occasions. Such is life as a wild bee colony.

Thank you , you are most probably right. Funny thing was we were waiting for the right time to move these bees as we are needing to renovate the old house but now they have just left.....they left us 26 kilos of honey!! Many thanks for answering, Fibi

 

[B+.]

I am new at this and need all the help I can get!.

How are you separating the wax from the honey?
You could crush and strain it but you'll be left with a lot of stiky wax when you're done. Probably the best way to collect the remaining honey is to gently melt the wax which will for a "cake" on the top of the honey. Then, simply lift the solid cake of wax off and let the honey drain off the bottom

 

[Swarm]

How much honey did you collect?

 

[Robbo8916]

How much honey did you collect?

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

When you have extracted the honey and rendered the wax, keep some of the (stinky) slum-gum and if you decide to keep bees, put it in a bait hive wherever suits. The smell is apowerful attactant. (Try rendering wax out of doors...)