On double brood and need to AS

[Glenviewbee]

I did a late unite late in the season last year so the colony was left on double brood over the winter. I had expected that when I was able to do my first inspection HM would be laying in the top box and I would be able to remove the bottom box and go back to single brood.
So - the bees decided against my well thought out plan and HM has been liberally laying throughout both boxes. Ok I thought, they'll have plenty of room and should be fine and dandy without wanting to leave....... oh and they had a super with new foundation that I added last week as there were loads of bees.....
Today I found charged Queen cups in the top brood box (1 pretty central in a frame, but the others, about 8, were along the bottom edge of the 3 of the brood frames)
I haven't a hope in finding HM but feel I need to do an AS in the next couple of days.
As per the NBU info on doing an AS without finding the queen I am thinking of moving the double brood parent colony to a new site, leaving a couple of brood frames without QC in a new box on the original site, with the rest of the frames a mix of drawn and foundation, thus separating HM from foragers. The leaflet doesn't specifically say that the QC's need to be removed from 'parent' colony on the initial manipulation, as if HM IS there then the QC's will be pulled down as the reduction in bee numbers will reduce the swarm urge. Have I read this correctly?
Also - does this sound like a reasonable plan or am I asking for trouble?
Thanks in advance!

 

[Finman]

.
Yes, remove the hive 10 feet.

Put in old place two food frame, one brood frame with queen cell and the rest foundations.
After 2 days look again the queen. It should be easy to find, when bees are less. Put it into foundation hive.

 

[Glenviewbee]

Thanks Finman. So what you are suggesting is actually a version of a Pagden AS but delaying putting HM into the new box by a couple of days once I can find her in the old box on the new site as the foragers will now be in the new box?

That is different to what is being advocated by the NBU unit leaflet - but if you think it has a better chance I will give it a go.

 

[Finman]

Thanks Finman. So what you are suggesting is actually a version of a Pagden AS but delaying putting HM into the new box by a couple of days once I can find her in the old box on the new site as the foragers will now be in the new box?

That is different to what is being advocated by the NBU unit leaflet - but if you think it has a better chance I will give it a go.

I put foragers and queen together, because foragers bring pollen to the bees and it accelerates brooding.

And I put foundations to the swarm. It kills allways swarming fever and laying queen inspire foundation drawing.

I do not mind, is that Demaree or Pagden or AS. It is all the same. Ridiculous debating what is the name.

Padgen did not even have movable frames or foundations.
What ever. Peace to his soul.

 

[The Gardener]

We're in the exact same position as Glenviewbee. If I've followed the advice correctly, we move original double brood to new site without out finding the Queen. On new site, we have food frames, a brood frame (with QC) and drawn comb and foundation.

What is the best time of day to do this? Before foragers take flight?

Good to know there is someone out there in same position, Glenviewbee. Let me know how it works out.

And thank you Finman for helping us

 

[Finman]

What is the best time of day to do this? Before foragers take flight?
us

It is best do when it is warm and bees are flying.

You put one brood frame there, which has one or more queen cells. The scent of brood and queen cells calm down the bees when they are wondering, what heck happened to our hive.

In good weather beeshave time to verigy, where are they going. Home bees come to cleanng flight about 2 a'clock afternoon, and it would be better if operation is done then.

 

[Swarm]

Put two brood frames and the rest foundation or drawn comb on original site. Make sure there are no queen cells on those frames.
Move the other to a new site, the bees will tear down the queen cells and foragers will return to original site which will make finding the queen easier.
Take a look at Wally Shaw's guide to reactive swarm control, the procedure can be carried out by moving the hive to a new location or vertically with a Snelgrove board.

 

[Finman]

.
Yes, but swarm has gone.

 

[Glenviewbee]

I did the 'AS' on the double brood yesterday. Weather quite warm (16 deg) but a bit windy. Bees were out and about.
Moved the double brood hive to a new location (about 20 yards from original site)
Place new brood box on original site.
Put brood frame plus QC frame (making sure queen not on either) and stores in brood box, rest of box filled out with foundation.

At new site with double brood did nothing as such - wasn't 100% sure about leaving the queen cells in this colony but am working on the premis that they will get torn down....watch this space!

Later in the afternoon I spent some time watching the outside of the hives - the original, double brood box had some bees on the landing board nasanov gland scent fanning - which I take to mean that HMQ was in there (good) and at the new site there was still quite a bit of activity with the foragers coming and going.

The weather is pretty rubbish today and forecast no that great for the next week or so, fingers crossed everything settles down.

I have done quite a lot of reading about this particular manoeuvre (Wally Shaw and other blogs/fora) and there does seem to be conflicting advice regarding either leaving NO QC on original site, or leaving a QC there . So I've done it this way this time and we shall see!

Thanks

 

[Finman]

Moved the double brood hive to a new location (about 20 yards from original site)
Place new brood box on old dite

I have done quite a lot of reading about this particular manoeuvre (Wally Shaw and other blogs/fora) and there does seem to be conflicting advice regarding either leaving NO QC on original site, or leaving a QC there . So I've done it this way this time and we shall see!

Thanks

Difficult to join hiveparts if they are 20 yards apart. 3 yards is good.

Yes, there are different opinions how to do it "exactly". I got an advice from English beekeeping book 40 years ago. Afterwards I noticed that foundations are necessary to kill swarming fever.

.

 

[Glenviewbee]

Ok, so I got to have a look at the 2 parts of the double brood AS today.

Original hive (double brood) in new location:
Queen laying like a trooper in the top brood box - I had been advised to put an excluder between the boxes in an effort to help to find HMQ so at least I could narrow her down to one of the boxes. However, she has proved to be a complete Houdini and I simply cannot find her. I went through the box twice, left it a little away from the colony spot to bleed off flyers (there are LOTS of bees as there was a lot of brood that has emerged in the last week) and tried to create shady places between frames to no avail. I have stopped short of shaking everything out onto a queen excluder as I have decided that as she is there and laying well I might as well just let her get on with it.
In the bottom box there was a fully capped queen cell......I am thinking along the lines that because HMQ was restricted to the top box the queen pheromone was reduced down in the bottom box so the bees were just continuing with what had been going on. What I did do was remove the queen cell and this I have put into an apidea with nurse bees and food.
I have now removed the QX from the double brood setup and left HM full run of both boxes.
I am aware that the swarming impulse may still be bubbling in this colony - although the original foragers, who were presumably the driving force for swarming originally - are all gone, back to the original site with the foundation frames and the QC in the new box. In this box they are drawing out the frames and I reckon the QC is about 3 days emergence.
So - not a finished scenario but am very interested in watching it all unfold.

 

[Finman]

.
Next you see, does brood hive make emergency cells. If not, the queen is inside

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Or alternatively she's not. No emergency QC's is not proof positive of presence of queen

 

[Finman]

Or alternatively she's not. No emergency QC's is not proof positive of presence of queen

But in this case it is.

 

[Eyeman]

No emergency queen cells because:
1. No eggs or young enough larvae
2. The swarm cells are suppressing the development of emergency queen cells.

 

[Finman]

No emergency queen cells because:
1. No eggs or young enough larvae
2. The swarm cells are suppressing the development of emergency queen cells.

Puzzling or beekeeping?

 

[Glenviewbee]

When I inspected the double brood box (on new site, with queen, and QX between the boxes but now without original foragers as they are now back at old site) there was lots of new eggs in the top brood box. The brood in the bottom box was pretty much all sealed, some remaining older larvae at approx day 7 and 8 - all the older stages having now emerged and the queen restricted to the top box by the excluder.
So now the queen has free run of both brood boxes - is it likely that the new flyers who have oriented to the new site would still be influenced by the original swarming impulse that was driving the older flyers?