Good afternoon everyone
Guess what happened to me today?
I looked out into the garden this afternoon between the showers & saw a swarm of honey bees heading for our huge conifer tree which is a couple of feet away from my hive.
I went out to have a closer look & it was settling nicely onto a very high branch.
I called my husband to get his bee suit on & get a tall ladder. Armed with a box, we managed to get most of the bees in it & put them into the new hive that believe it or not, my husband only finished making the hive stand for this morning.
We left the box propped up at the front of the hive & the remaining bees went into the hive after about half an hour. I've been sitting watching and all seems well.
So, I’m feeling lucky to have caught my bees but, I thought I’d done a good job of controlling a swarm? This is what I done:
8 April
7 out of 11 frames had brood and the box had a ton of bees so I added the first super.
19 April
8 out of 10 frames drawn in the first super, some capped honey & full of bees so added a 2nd super
29 April
I removed 7 queen cells from the bottoms of the frames in the brood box, assuming that if the queen cells are at the bottom, they’re swarm cells? These were all capped. I left 2 capped queen cells which were at the top of the frames. I left these because I thought they were supersedure cells, not swarm cells? Have I got it wrong? Should I have removed all of the queen cells? Were there more queen cells that I missed? There was lots of capped brood and the outer 2 frames were still being drawn. 2016 marked queen seen.
7 May
Couldn’t find the 2016 marked queen but fairly sure I saw at least one queen fly out when I opened the hive. Carried on inspecting a saw a queen dashing about. Ok, I’m thankful I have a queen albeit not the marked one but assumed that the supersedure cells had done the job of requeening the hive with a better queen. Nice even brood pattern of workers & some drone. Didn’t see any eggs but it’s a cloudy day & I’m a newbie. Only a handful of bees in the 2nd super. I did hear I high pitch intermittent buzzing noise. I think this means that there’s more than one queen in the hive, but I’m hoping someone will correct me if I’ve got it wrong.
14 May
Swarm day! What did I do wrong?
After we re-homed the swarm, I opened up the original hive. Only a few bees in the 2nd super. The first super has all 10 frames drawn most of them filled with honey not all yet capped. Brood box didn’t have very much capped brood. Found another 4 queen cells at the bottom of the frames so I removed them. Found another 2 capped queen cells at the top of the frames. So I’ve left those ones. Couldn’t see a queen. Didn’t see any eggs or lavae.
I have the standard deep brood box. Should I have the bigger one or should I have a double brood box. Would this have stopped the swarm? In other words, should I be providing more brood box room rather that super room?
Any help appreciated. Please be kind if I’ve done it all completely wrong.
Eileen
Guess what happened to me today?
I looked out into the garden this afternoon between the showers & saw a swarm of honey bees heading for our huge conifer tree which is a couple of feet away from my hive.
I went out to have a closer look & it was settling nicely onto a very high branch.
I called my husband to get his bee suit on & get a tall ladder. Armed with a box, we managed to get most of the bees in it & put them into the new hive that believe it or not, my husband only finished making the hive stand for this morning.
We left the box propped up at the front of the hive & the remaining bees went into the hive after about half an hour. I've been sitting watching and all seems well.
So, I’m feeling lucky to have caught my bees but, I thought I’d done a good job of controlling a swarm? This is what I done:
8 April
7 out of 11 frames had brood and the box had a ton of bees so I added the first super.
19 April
8 out of 10 frames drawn in the first super, some capped honey & full of bees so added a 2nd super
29 April
I removed 7 queen cells from the bottoms of the frames in the brood box, assuming that if the queen cells are at the bottom, they’re swarm cells? These were all capped. I left 2 capped queen cells which were at the top of the frames. I left these because I thought they were supersedure cells, not swarm cells? Have I got it wrong? Should I have removed all of the queen cells? Were there more queen cells that I missed? There was lots of capped brood and the outer 2 frames were still being drawn. 2016 marked queen seen.
7 May
Couldn’t find the 2016 marked queen but fairly sure I saw at least one queen fly out when I opened the hive. Carried on inspecting a saw a queen dashing about. Ok, I’m thankful I have a queen albeit not the marked one but assumed that the supersedure cells had done the job of requeening the hive with a better queen. Nice even brood pattern of workers & some drone. Didn’t see any eggs but it’s a cloudy day & I’m a newbie. Only a handful of bees in the 2nd super. I did hear I high pitch intermittent buzzing noise. I think this means that there’s more than one queen in the hive, but I’m hoping someone will correct me if I’ve got it wrong.
14 May
Swarm day! What did I do wrong?
After we re-homed the swarm, I opened up the original hive. Only a few bees in the 2nd super. The first super has all 10 frames drawn most of them filled with honey not all yet capped. Brood box didn’t have very much capped brood. Found another 4 queen cells at the bottom of the frames so I removed them. Found another 2 capped queen cells at the top of the frames. So I’ve left those ones. Couldn’t see a queen. Didn’t see any eggs or lavae.
I have the standard deep brood box. Should I have the bigger one or should I have a double brood box. Would this have stopped the swarm? In other words, should I be providing more brood box room rather that super room?
Any help appreciated. Please be kind if I’ve done it all completely wrong.
Eileen
