Split advice

[yeha]

First time so be gentle....

I have 2 hives on my allotment.

I got Hive A through my local association, Hive B was donated from another plot holder who was retiring.

Hive A had great queen who decided to swarm last week. I caught the swarm and managed to rehouse in an old brood box but they did a runner 3 days later. I now have 3 frames with at least 2 sealed queen cells, one has 4. The swarm departed 9 days ago.

I'm in the process of a Bailey comb change on Hive B, so have 5 frames under the queen excluder. 2-3 are brood and the other 2 are stores.

I'm wondering if I can somehow make 3 nucs, or 2 nucs and Hive A, using the 15/16 frames that are currently split between the hives. Hive A was so much more livelier then Hive B so it would be nice to make the most of the opportunity.

 

[snelgrove]

personally I think your bees have enough work to try and build up, with a bailey comb change, and the other losing a swarm. I would stick with just two for now.

 

[enrico]

I agree, don't run before you can walk!
Bees are hard work and you need to know how to look after them first. As you can tell, one hive can quickly issue numerous swarms. Your first job is to destroy all but one queen cell in the hive or you may lose yet more of your bees.
Best of luck
E

 

[Erichalfbee]

Concentrate on the two you have, remember Hive A is not going to have any new bees for a month at least so will diminish.
Reduce those QCs to one or you will lose more bees.

 

[BeeJayBee]

I'm wondering if I can somehow make 3 nucs, or 2 nucs and Hive A, using the 15/16 frames that are currently split between the hives. Hive A was so much more livelier then Hive B so it would be nice to make the most of the opportunity.

You could, but should you? Combining bees from two colonies will take a couple of days using a sheet of newspaper between boxes to let the pheromones equalise, otherwise they may fight each other and some bees will be killed.

I agree with the others that you'd be better off learning how to look after these two colonies this year, and get them through next winter, before trying to increase the number of colonies you have to look after otherwise you may end up being overwhelmed by it all.

You've got one good colony, keep that as your 'reference' colony, and try not to lose another swarm from the other one.