Planning 2013 season ( managing apiary size?)

[goodbobby]

Hi Beeks (2nd Attempt)

I am currently overwintering 6 colonies , all on 14x12s and have another couple of spare empty hives plus a couple of 6 frame nucs in that format.

Planning ahead for next year, 6 colonies is really an optimum size for me to manage physically and I would prefer not to A/S and reunite because of equipment restraints and the room I have available would be quite tight.I have read up about the demaree method but I still can't quite get my head around this process! To further complicate matters I really need to do a comb change (bailey?)on some of the 6 colonies as well!

Have any of you experienced guys some guidance for me or can you point me in the direction of a good clear set of instructions (demaree or otherwise) for effective swarm control that might fit my circumstances.

 

[Chris B]

One method tucked away in both "Beekeeping at Buckfast Abbey" (Adam)and "Bees and Honey" (Hooper):

clip all queens
destroy all queen cells found in honey production colonies on 10 day cycle
ensure you have spare young queens available (e.g. mini-nucs)
If a colony becomes queenless, give a new queen once there is no open brood.

It's a technique I've never really adopted full scale due to the need to have enough spare queens at the right time, but planning to try it a bit more in 2013.

 

[Pete D]

It might be that you have to unite your 6 down to 3 (or 2 or 4 etc) after the winter to boost your colonies and maximise their potential and therefore have plenty of equipment to do normal AS swarm control. This would also allow you to change plenty of brood frames (ie box at a time) after combing the best ones together.
I have 19 at present and am not expecting to have more than a dozen by April, maybe only 8 or 10 after over wintering, possible queen problems and uniting to make the best of early honey crop.
Depending on your queens they may not want to swarm this year.
Many factors to take into consideration, sorry cant offer you a solution but its good that your are looking for a plan already.
I am not aware of any 100% method of ensuring 6 hives in spring dont become 7,8,9,10 etc at some stage without extra equipment or maybe buying in 6 new queens........
I am new to this (2 years this April) so will watch your thread with interest when the experienced beekeepers have answered
Good luck

Pete D

 

[REDWOOD]

Baileys comb change/swap is a good method and works for me and an AS is a really easy way of swarm control if done right, you could re unit or make a split with a nuc but be careful of robbing if keeping the nuc in the same apiary
You could also re-queen every hive

 

[goodbobby]

Solution?

My underlying issues are that I don't have the room to have more than 6 /8 colonies long term,don't want to build and store more brood boxes and find 6 colonies physically enough to handle. Also, I am not convinced there would be enough forage around.

I have therefore decided to make up some simple ekes from available scrap timber in order to turn 4 spare supers into temporary 14x12's. Then with my 2 available empty 14x12's I can Artificially Swarm the 6 colonies, eventually newspaper reuniting once the colonies have built up sufficiently.This overcomes the need for additional new brood boxes.

When re-uniting, I presume I can put the 'new comb' hives on the bottom of each "amalgamation" having removed the individual top box queens and once everything has completely settled down transfer the new combined colonies into their old 14x12 bb's ? This would then resolve the comb change issue.......

If I have overlooked anything or am making any fundamental errors in my plan please give me a nudge in the ribs!

 

[goodbobby]

solution extra

Forgot to say that equipment wise I have spare roofs ,floors and crown boards

 

[isc26]

Swarm control may always be hit or miss if you have a limit you don't want to exceed.

You could always consider selling on some colonies in the Spring then any increase would take you back to the numbers you want.

Fringe benefits are helping new beekeepers & some extra cash.

 

[MuswellMetro]

Forgot to say that equipment wise I have spare roofs ,floors and crown boards

in a emergency a 14x12 hive can be made with three bricks ,two sheet of ply , two supers and and three bits of 25mm strip wood

two brick on the ground and level them

add a ply sheet for base of floor

arrange three bit of strip wood in a U to form the floor up-stands

two supers on top

add frames

ply on top of the supers

last brick on top

improvise..some of my AS roofs are 500mm square plastic potting shed trays that double up as trays to carry full supers in the back of the car ( and stop honey getting into the boot of the car)

who did i learn that from...my grandfather who managed 150 hives in the 1960s with his small morris oxford van...carried only floors roofs and crown boards and frames ..always used two supers from the stack of supers at the out apairies .

seen one made with a 20,20,10 fertilzer sack found in the hedge tied on with baler twine as the roof and two supers resting on 6" fence post direct on the groundas a floor The frames in that one was intially just two 14x12 foundation either side of the queen frame...the rest super frames... returned next day with more14x12 frames...they had drawn out the 14x12 and we replaced the super frames but not the roof etc

 

[itma]

...
When re-uniting, I presume I can put the 'new comb' hives on the bottom of each "amalgamation" having removed the individual top box queens and once everything has completely settled down transfer the new combined colonies into their old 14x12 bb's ? This would then resolve the comb change issue.......

If I have overlooked anything or am making any fundamental errors in my plan please give me a nudge in the ribs!

Ummm.

If you are wanting the colony to establish on the new comb/frames, shouldn't you be putting that on top?

As per MM, a few (more!) spare supers might be more generally useful to have in your limited storage, rather than those ekes. Sales, quick!

 

[Black Comb]

Stay at 6 colonies and gradually change combs as necessary. Do a bailey if you think it necessary on some hives.

Leave the 6 colonies as is and when you see queen cells pop the queen plus one frame of brood and one frame of stores into a nuc box and leave one only queen cell to develop. After 9 days check again and remove all new cells except the one you originally left. This should then hatch and then mate and you always have the old queen as a back up.

It's called the nucleus method of swarm control.
There is a download on the BBKA site, also a thread on here.

http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=11399&highlight=Nucleus+method

 

[busybee53]

Redwood: When do you do your Bailey comb change?

I'm hoping to do some in the spring when queens are laying well but want to be completed in time for me to put an early super on each hive. Timing will be the problem.

Last year there was new honey being stored at a time when I should not even have been inspecting - the weather was so crazy.