shaking out

[itma]

My question was.........with so many workers i could buy a queen and be in hive by tuesday. A risk i know but surely worth a go rescuing. Only question is will enough workers survive three weeks or more to see new offspring take over.

Please someone must read the question and understand what i am saying.

I would be utterly astonished if the reported large number of workers did not survive until the new Q's brood emerged.
I actually expect that a viable number would survive the longer period required for a new QC to be created, her to emerge, get mated and her brood emerge.
If you have a local, mated Q available, go for it.
The only concern is the usual one of successfully introducing her.

"To clarify i cannot add a test frame i have no spare i have no brood no eggs

I hope you actually do have some in your nucs. Otherwise things are grim indeed. Or should that be Grimm?

...
My two nucs are a result of a weak colony that i split yesterday as introduced a new queen into one and original queen into the other. ...

 

[Finman]

Children children please. this bickering is not answering my question

We are trying who is cock on dung heap.

 

[Madge]

Children children please. this bickering is not answering my question

!? Nobody is bickering!

 

[itma]

Due to me doomed drone laying queen colony i am wondering if i should shake out remaining bees in front of my two nucs in the hope some of the workers will join those small colonies in nucs.
Is this a known practice?
My two nucs are a result of a weak colony that i split yesterday as introduced a new queen into one and original queen into the other. So far they appear to have settle. but a few more bees would not go a miss
Suggestions appreciated thank you

Just to repeat that you've made things more difficult for yourself than need be.

1/ Don't split weak colonies.

2/ That new Q could have (should have) replaced the DLQ.


Please remember for next time!



//// I'm not advising that you try to undo what you have done - I suspect it may be too difficult/late for that. But if you were feeling confident with your Q-catching, Q-introducing and nuc-combining skills, it would put you in a better position.

 

[Madge]

Children children please. this bickering is not answering my question

As for your new question: you've split a weak colony into two even weaker colonies, and you have a strong nucleus without a queen (as you've killed her because she was a drone layer). I might consider uniting the nucleus with one of your weak hives - but it may not help much as the workers in that nucleus will probably not live much longer.

 

[Madge]

Test frame? The owner wrote that he found a queen and killed it.

If you have drone hive, where you need test frame?

Test what?

I mean that is ridiculous to try to rear queen in this kind of hive from test frame.
It would be midd June when new workers will emerge.

My mistake. I should not have used the words 'test frame' - sorry - and Itma did not say that either. He suggested creating a new queen from a frame with larvae (if I understand him correctly - I'm prone to skim-read long posts and make mistakes). I agree with your point that it will take too long for this particular colony.

 

[Finman]

I would be utterly astonished if the reported large number of workers did not survive until the new Q's brood emerged.
I actually expect that a viable number would survive the longer period required for a new QC to be created, her to emerge, get mated and her brood emerge.
If you have a local, mated Q available, go for it.
The only concern is the usual one of successfully introducing her.

I hope you actually do have some in your nucs. Otherwise things are grim indeed. Or should that be Grimm?

How long you have nursed bees?

 

[Finman]

He suggested creating a new queen from a frame with larvae .

So I understood perfectly. And I answered that you cannot invent worse habit to rear a queen. I know enough about queen rearing and I have seen how it goes. Nothing new to me in that issue. Waste of time and nothing to learn in this case.

If you rear queens, recommendations are that you shake just emerged bees a box full. And nothing 3frame box.

What idea is then rear queens in the hive where been have propably born in September.

And you cannot either rear queens in the nuc, which has one frame of new bees. That is fact too.

 

[beepig]

I appreciate that i may have acted too late through lack of knowledge however, i am doing my best to rectify a bad situation
I also realise i should not have split an already weak colony but i was left with little choice having had a new queen delivered and then advised against adding to my drone colony.
It is done i shall pay the penance...i
If Drone do not go through a queen excluder maybe i can filter out the workers and reintroduce them to my nucs?
Else they sit there and slowly die which i find distasteful and wasteful.

 

[domino]

2/ That new Q could have (should have) replaced the DLQ.

When I first started I had a hive swarm on me and in my panic I bashed down all the closed queen cells. Only afterwards did I work out I'd made a ****.

I'm sure it's a common mistake.

 

[BeeJayBee]

Why don't you just try it and see what happens?

Or, and another idea. Assuming, from what you say, there is no worker brood left in the bigger colony and if all your hives are in a line, or are quite close together you won't need to shake out the workers. If they're all foragers they will be out during the day, so yuo can just move their hive away and they'll have to go somewhere else when they get back with their pollen or nectar. If more go to one nuc than the other you can balance them later by changing their position, the same way as balancing after an artificial swarm.

The drones will hang around until they get hungry, then they'll go somewhere else. They will not sit and starve!

 

[Madge]

... If Drone do not go through a queen excluder maybe i can filter out the workers and reintroduce them to my nucs?
Else they sit there and slowly die which i find distasteful and wasteful.

I like to save colonies too - even ones with mostly old workers. You don't have to filter out the drones - they're welcome in all colonies. I would unite with a newspaper - no shaking out. Do you know how to do that?
Kitta

PS: or do as BJB says if there is no more brood in the colony.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Just to repeat that you've made things more difficult for yourself than need be.

1/ Don't split weak colonies.

2/ That new Q could have (should have) replaced the DLQ.

Point 1 we agree on - OP was advised this at the outset, but on another thread which he started http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=33279 ; which brings us to the DLQ colony as reported in the original thread. By the way the OP described it it wasn't just the colony needed sorting, it was terminally doomed - bees dying halfway out of cells, very little brood and the consensus was (not just one person's opinion) that it was doomed therefore OP was told shake it out and sell new queen on.
I think this sudden report of a booming colony full of healthy vigorous workes is wishful thinking more than anything else.
IMHO faffing around with a 'test frame' to raise a scrubby third rate queen from is particularly bad advice for a beginner, no wonder there are so many lacklustre colonies (and maybe beeks) around.

 

[itma]

...
I think this sudden report of a booming colony full of healthy vigorous workes is wishful thinking more than anything else.

Maybe.
Or maybe the previous report was too pessimistic?
As I said, way back in post #7 in this thread

Sure, a ready-made new Q would be better/quicker ...

But the only immediate source of a ready-made Q seems to be one of the splits.
Combining with that would be yet another option.
...
There are several different plausible scenarios.
Without seeing the detail of the situation, I don't think anyone can say which would be best.
...

IMHO faffing around with a 'test frame' to raise a scrubby third rate queen from is particularly bad advice for a beginner, no wonder there are so many lacklustre colonies (and maybe beeks) around.

Firstly my suggestion ("You could ...") was offered as something terribly simple that could be done by a novice to save the colony, which I then believed to be a straightforward DLQ situation that the novice was about to unnecessarily shake out.
Secondly (but probably for other threads), I'd take issue with the contention that an emergency queen is necessarily "a scrubby third rate queen". In that same post #7 I did actually mention selecting for a cell started on a young larva. The poor reputation in some quarters of emergency cell queens seems to be based on the omission of that poor-quality-prevention step. Yes, that doesn't ensure a quality Q, but leaving it out practically guarantees a poorer-than-needbe one.

By the way the OP described it it wasn't just the colony needed sorting, it was terminally doomed - bees dying halfway out of cells, very little brood and the consensus was (not just one person's opinion) that it was doomed therefore OP was told shake it out and sell new queen on.

1/ I admit to being unaware of that discussion.
2/ I note that the OP didn't even follow that advice, and has deepened the problem further.
3/ The consensus was based on that single (perhaps inaccurate and over gloomy?) posting reporting the dying bees.
3/ My concern was that the OP was posting in the beginners' area apparently about about shaking out a DLQ colony and asking

if i should shake out remaining bees in front of my two nucs in the hope some of the workers will join those small colonies in nucs.
Is this a known practice?

Which sounded to me as though the wires had got crossed somewhere.
Turns out they were probably much more crossed, and differently to what I had imagined.


Immediately after completing this post I shall rectify my own major mistake and reinstate the self-styled "cock of the dung heap" into my 'Ignore' list.



What way forwards for the OP?
Since doubt has been cast upon the OP's own reporting (and it is at best inconsistent between the threads - the nucs being described both as having "plenty of bees" and "very weak") and this being what all other opinions have necessarily been based on, my principal suggestion would be to get, ASAP, someone that knows what they are looking at, to assess the strength of the various remnants of these colonies first hand, and ONLY THEN based on that objective assessment, for them to decide how best to put the pieces back together.

Which is a fuller version of pretty much what I had indicated in post #7 ...

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

I'd take issue with the contention that an emergency queen is necessarily "a scrubby third rate queen".

I can sort of agree with you there but as it looked like a colony made up primarily of older bees and possibly on the wane then my feeling would be that they wouldn't be up to scratch on the royal jelly producing front thus the queen wouldn't be up to much. Different in a cloony of newly emerged/young vigorous bees.

 

[Finman]

.
What is so difficult in this case that one should think about "all scenarios".


Workers are really old. At least 2 month.
When the last have borne then?
End of February
Did UK had brooding boost in February?
Eggs should be layed at the beginning of February that they emerge at the end.

Propably workers are from last autumn.

 

[Finman]

.
To buy a new laying queen?

If you do not have strong hives, from where you can take frames of emerging bees, forget it.

To weaken a weak hive more is not wise at all. Of course you can do what ever, but what idea is to ask advices.

 

[beepig]

Thank you all for your opinions. I have made my decision now as what to do. I will inform you all of progress in a few weeks.
Finally though, although i have made mistakes. i am working to improve through these . My colonies were all rescued from near extinction last year, moved around and continuously needed re-queening. Now that they are all in demise i am going to take a hive home to my garden and buy a nuc of bees and queen. Here i can use as a control and observe on a more personal level. i will of course be using two completely separate equipment and clothing.
In the meantime i shall continue to try and remedy my apiary problems. If not successful i shall sterilise and start over. I am not one to give in. I thankyou all for your opinions, varied as they are.
I am not afraid to ask questions or go it alone, i shall however, think about joining a Bee group in the future although i am not a great club lover or lover of committees for that matter.
If any of you are from North Somerset and are ever in my area please get in touch

 

[itma]

I can sort of agree with you there but as it looked like a colony made up primarily of older bees and possibly on the wane then my feeling would be that they wouldn't be up to scratch on the royal jelly producing front thus the queen wouldn't be up to much. Different in a cloony of newly emerged/young vigorous bees.

No dispute whatsoever that the best-performing Qs will come from colonies best able to nourish their QCs.
My instinct however is towards trusting the bees in how they allocate their resources. A strong youthful colony will raise lots of emergency cells (they can nourish lots) whereas a weaker colony will concentrate their more limited resources on fewer QCs. Nothing remotely like ideal, just a viable remedy.

Certainly raising QCs with an excess availability of both pollen and nurse bees would be the way one would choose to go about things.


As a philosophical approach, I'd rather novices were shown whatever possible means they have for getting themselves out of the holes they might dig for themselves, - a "learning experience" - rather than resorting to the chequebook as the cure for all problems.


In this case, it seems as though the OP might not be in close contact with the local Association, and the hands-on support that should bring. If so, that is a mistake that could be quickly and easily rectified.

 

[beepig]

Here here. i shall swallow my pride and join asap