Robbing Big Scale

[Millet]

Well i finally got to open the Nuc today with the new Queen, she has been released from the cage and accepted i spotted her, however the Q- colony has hammered the Nuc and they was no stores at all left, the bees where just clustering around the Queen in a docile state (gutted is an understatement).
They where roughly on a two bee space entrance but obviously that was not good enough so i stuck a 3in long piece of hose pipe through the entrance to form a tunnel, i then robbed a full brood frame of uncapped honey from another stronger hive and put it near to the cluster of bees.
After that i put a homemade ventilated traveling crown board on strapped it up and stuck the roof on to stop and upward drafts while they are still at this spot, the entrance will be closed up tonight and i will move them to another spot tomorrow.
I'm also going to block the Q- laying worker hive entrance and let them die inside there as i'm sick to death of them, they have been nothing but stressful trouble that will not die.
Do you lot think the Nuc should pull safe if i have fed them a brood frame of uncapped honey as that is all i had to use at the time, i can feed them on sugar syrup when i get them to another spot if they survive until tomorrow.
Thanks
Steve.

 

[Wingy]

Ok I may have missed something here, being new to this hobby of bee keeping, but why would you want to kill off a colony? It sounds like a strong colony and being Q- why don't you buy in and re queen? If I'm right (from my study as I've not yet over wintered a hive) there would be enough time for a new Q to produce enough, good, bees to over winter, the ones you have now which you seem to hate will die off as winter approaches. Come spring you will have a nice new hive of good bees. Just a thought
Wingy

 

[Millet]

Ok I may have missed something here, being new to this hobby of bee keeping, but why would you want to kill off a colony? It sounds like a strong colony and being Q- why don't you buy in and re queen? If I'm right (from my study as I've not yet over wintered a hive) there would be enough time for a new Q to produce enough, good, bees to over winter, the ones you have now which you seem to hate will die off as winter approaches. Come spring you will have a nice new hive of good bees. Just a thought
Wingy

The angry Laying worker colony Q- may well attack the next Nuc when i remove this weak Nuc, also a laying worker colony is a nightmare to re Queen, i did not want to shake them out in this apiary of nice bees.

Just a thought is all i have done over the past several weeks with this laying worker colony, the three new Queens two of which i have bought in are not going to be risked in anyway, if you followed any of my previous threads you would understand.
Thank you for your input it could have helped..

 

[Wingy]

Yes since posting my reply I have read some of your previous threads and had a look into laying workers (not something I've encountered yet) sounds like a bit of a pain

 

[Millet]

Yes since posting my reply I have read some of your previous threads and had a look into laying workers (not something I've encountered yet) sounds like a bit of a pain

You are not wrong there, this is my second one and i hope you never get one, they are a nightmare and a waste of equipment and time, even worse when they are bees from hell

 

[mjt68]

Why not shake out the laying worker hive and give populations a boost? You could reuse any stores in there straight away rather than waiting potentially weeks for bees to die. Alternatively unite them to a Q+ colony.

 

[Erichalfbee]

The angry Laying worker colony Q- may well attack the next Nuc when i remove this weak Nuc, also a laying worker colony is a nightmare to re Queen, i did not want to shake them out in this apiary of nice bees.

Just a thought is all i have done over the past several weeks with this laying worker colony, the three new Queens two of which i have bought in are not going to be risked in anyway, if you followed any of my previous threads you would understand.
Thank you for your input it could have helped..

Steve, I know you've had lots of trouble. Have you got a strong colony to unite them with? The Q less colony that is. One more try perhaps?

 

[Millet]

Well i have moved the Nuc to a safe spot for the bees hopefully they will be left alone now to do there thing.

On the Q- laying worker hive i opened up with all intention to shake them out on the grass, however i think there is still far too many bees to shake out near one Nuc that has enough bees already and one double brood hive that also has enough bees in there, so i left them be and i did not block them in, after i had slept on it i thought it would be a bit rotten to let them slowly starve to death so i will just leave them to die of old age.

 

[Erichalfbee]

one double brood hive that also has enough bees in there,

There you are....stick em on top of that with a snelgrove board between them and take it away in three days

 

[Swarm]

There you are....stick em on top of that with a snelgrove board between them and take it away in three days

A tenner says they'll sigh deeply and calm right down.

 

[Millet]

I don't have a snelgrove board but i could easily make one if that would suppress the laying workers pheromone, is it worth the risk though on a healthy colony with a 2017 Queen building up nicely for winter.

 

[Karsal]

Not a fan of shaking out laying workers. Having done it and seen the chaos and carnage that ensues at the hive they are trying to get into. Is it really worth it?
It was like a battlefield with hundreds and hundreds of bees in combat, flying off with dead bees and dropping them in and around the area.
I opened the hive several days later and really did not notice any significant increase in numbers in the doner hive.

 

[Millet]

Not a fan of shaking out laying workers. Having done it and seen the chaos and carnage that ensues at the hive they are trying to get into. Is it really worth it?
It was like a battlefield with hundreds and hundreds of bees in combat, flying off with dead bees and dropping them in and around the area.
I opened the hive several days later and really did not notice any significant increase in numbers in the doner hive.

Exactly my thoughts, the hive with a good Queen is pretty mellow. the laying worker hives bees are wild and very aggressive and very defensive, i know they may well loose the defensive side of things when shook out but imo the aggression will always be there. and like you have stated after the fights and death's at the entrance the doner hive will be no further forward, just the same basically with a pile of bees dead that did not need to happen.
I have put the laying worker colony onto one shallow/super box today that will be too small for the amount of bees in there. so the odd one may beg there way in here and there slowly, the remainders will die.

Thank you Erica for the Snelgrove board option but is not going to happen i am done with them, they can happily rear as many drones as they want in the super i gave them.

 

[Swarm]

There wouldn't be any carnage, you put a sheet of fine mesh (OMF) on top of one box and the box with laying workers above. After a couple of days, unite.

 

[Beefriendly]

If my understanding is correct these laying workers are on their last legs, there haven't been any new worker bees (except drones) from Millet's Q- colony for over 6 or 7 weeks now.
I can't really see much benefit of creating work to save some laying worker bees (that are literally on their last legs) and adding a load of scrounging drones to another colony. Plus there is always a risk that the remaining workers will not take kindly to a queen of a different genetic background.
There is a time to attempt to save a colony, if you have the resources, which from my reading Millet didn't have at the time or his attempts failed....and there is also a time to admit defeat and move on.
Our love of bees should not preclude a bit of culling when necessary. Nor taking unnecessary risks with smaller nucleus colonies.

 

[Millet]

There wouldn't be any carnage, you put a sheet of fine mesh (OMF) on top of one box and the box with laying workers above. After a couple of days, unite.

Thank you for that Steve i have all the available equipment to do that but i'm definitely just going to leave them to dwindle, i do not need the hive they are in at the moment so i will just leave them be, the bees will be upwards of seven weeks old now probably older so surely they should not have too long left.

 

[Millet]

If my understanding is correct these laying workers are on their last legs, there haven't been any new worker bees (except drones) from Millet's Q- colony for over 6 or 7 weeks now.
I can't really see much benefit of creating work to save some laying worker bees (that are literally on their last legs) and adding a load of scrounging drones to another colony. Plus there is always a risk that the remaining workers will not take kindly to a queen of a different genetic background.
There is a time to attempt to save a colony, if you have the resources, which from my reading Millet didn't have at the time or his attempts failed....and there is also a time to admit defeat and move on.
Our love of bees should not preclude a bit of culling when necessary. Nor taking unnecessary risks with smaller nucleus colonies.

Spot on N and a lot of them could be even older.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I can't really see much benefit of creating work to save some laying worker bees (that are literally on their last legs) and adding a load of scrounging drones to another colony.

The point in my apiary would be to give the bees something to do apart from robbing a weaker colony....
Not casting aspersions on Millet.

 

[Beefriendly]

The point in my apiary would be to give the bees something to do apart from robbing a weaker colony....

I suspect it will most likely be Millet's strong colony doing the robbing, the disorganized rabble in the Q- are unlikely to be the robbers, more surprising is they haven't been robbed themselves...
If by giving them something to do for their last few days by uniting and they take exception to their new queen? Remember many of these aggressive bees have been pseudo-queens for a long long time now, much longer than most "normal" laying workers.
Potentially a lot of progress lost by taking an unnecessary chance.

 

[Millet]

The point in my apiary would be to give the bees something to do apart from robbing a weaker colony....
Not casting aspersions on Millet.

Its ok Erica i have moved the weaker colony 60 mile away to my middle location where i am at most of the time at this time of the year and it is now under my watchful eye most of the day, there is a big Balsam flow on not more than 500yrd's from where the Nuc is so if they find that it will be happy days, the other two colonies one nuc and one double brood have enough bees to defend themselves, so the laying worker colony will be left to do there thing.