Not sure if I should feel incredibly lucky or incredibly stupid

[HoopersHouse]

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

 

[Brigsy]

I'm also new to this but it sounds like you may think that you can judge what sort of queen cell you have by its positioning on the frame? If you have swarm cells on the bottom of the frames at the same time as queen cells on the middle of the frame, they are all going to be swarm cells I believe.

Well done for catching the swarm.

 

[Brigsy]

What is your intended method for artificial swarm? Have a Google and read of Wally shaws "There are queen cells in my hive" asap.

If the swarm is hived in a new box, you will need to consider reducing the remaining queen cells in the parent colony asap to one or they will swarm on emergence as well.

And add a super.

 

[pargyle]

29th April was where you went wrong ...

Queen cells in the hive ... Needed to do an Artificial swarm ...You don't get swarm cells and supercedure cells in the hive at the same time ... more than one queen cell, regardless of where they are on the frames (totally unreliable indicator) you HAVE to assume they are going to swarm.

Knocking down queen cells will not stop them swarming, it might delay for a few days but they WILL swarm and probably earlier than the usual 'capped queen cell' point. Leaving or missing one queen cell will be enough for them to be off ..you were lucky to catch them so well done on that.

You need to read Wally shaws pamphlet tonight or you will risk losing the rest of your bees as the virgins head of with post prime swarms ...

 

[HoopersHouse]

Thanks Brigsy, I'm now in possession of Wally Shaws 'there are queen cells in my hive' and the 'swarm control guide'. Really wish I'd had these in the beginning. I had planned to do an artificial swarm using the new hive but sadly I wasn't prepared. As the saying goes 'fail to prepare'......

Thanks Pargyle, I didn't realise I couldn't have supersedure and swarm cells at the same time. The Wally Shaws guides are great. Thanks also for recommending.

Thank you for your help, looks like I won't be losing my 'L' plates for a while yet!!

 

[Brigsy]

I'm still in the same boat as my bees haven't read the book either!

 

[pargyle]

Thank you for your help, looks like I won't be losing my 'L' plates for a while yet!!

Your L plates never come off in beekeeping ... always a new trick to learn or something the bees are doing that needs some thought !