Question re Uniting

[Beverlyp24]

Hi everyone,

Would be really grateful for your views on whether my plans are mad, stupid or may just have a feint chance of success please! Situation is this:

We have a queenless hive. The bees were very aggressive and so we removed the queen on 27 May and subsequently put in a frame of brood from a friendly hive, letting two queen cells reach maturity. I am pretty sure the queen hatched as I heard piping, but there is now definitely no queen and no brood. (Test frame has been added.)

So, I would like to unite a collected swarm of gentle, healthy bees, with laying queen, which I've had for about a month with this hive, now nicknamed 'angry' by the whole family! The gentle hive is currently located about 10 metres from the 'angry' hive. My plan is to put the queenright brood box on the floor, add newspaper and QE, then 'angry' brood box above. I also have some lemongrass oil and may add a few drops. However, I would ideally like to locate the united hive in 'angry's' location, but am concerned that the gentle hive's flying bees will not find there way to their new home.

My other concern is that the 'angry' bees, outnumber the gentle bees. Is this likely to cause a problem in uniting them?

Any advice or tips would be very welcome! Thanks so much for your help!!

Beverly

 

[Millet]

I am in a similar predicament if the Queen cell on the test frame fails to produce or the queen does not get mated in my angry hive they will be written of and left to die as i have tried for a good while now to try and save them.

Another reason and the main reason i will leave them to dwindle away if the Queen Cell fails IS there is no way on earth would i risk uniting angry bees to my nice colony, me personally and what i'm doing from now on is just concentrate on the nice bees and maybe reclaim my spare equipment when the angry colony dies of.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Angry hive on bottom
2 layers of newspaper under QX on top.
Loosen queenright brood box from floor.
Go back when the bees have stopped flying and pop the nice bees on top of the horrid ones. In my opinion angry bees are best on the bottom with the queen on top where she is safer
PS all this presumes you absolutely know there is no queen

 

[Millet]

The carry on and bad luck i have went through Erica over the past couple of months the last thing i would do is risk any of my new calm Queens with the angry bees, that is my personal choice though as the risks far out weigh any benefits of uniting for me.

 

[Erichalfbee]

The carry on and bad luck i have went through Erica over the past couple of months the last thing i would do is risk any of my new calm Queens with the angry bees, that is my personal choice though as the risks far out weigh any benefits of uniting for me.

I know and I sympathise. I think you have made the right decision.

 

[Beverlyp24]

Thank you so much for the replies!

I will do as suggested, angry bees on bottom and yes I am sure there is no queen. I put a test frame in last Sunday and they have tried to make new queen cells on there. I have now removed these. I am guessing the virgin queen never made it back from her mating flights.

Millet, I sympathise, I know how you feel. These were terrible. Followed you away from the hive and hung around for 20 minutes just pinging the veil trying to sting. My poor son came of worse, he would be stung playing even while some distance away. I am just hoping to give them one last chance.

 

[Beverlyp24]

Millet, just seen your second reply. I totally understand where you are coming from and you are making me have some second thoughts. I guess, as the nice bees were a swarm that just moved into my bait box I felt that I haven't really lost anything if it fails.

I will keep my fingers crossed for your colony and hope they manage to raise a new queen that has a more gentle nature.

Thankfully, I managed to extract last weekend and my son's first comment on tasting it was, 'all the stings were worth it.'