Supersedure to delay swarming?

[Blunt Spike]

The idea in itself may have some truth to it, but, and I stand to be corrected, it would be far less work to manage the space the colony has and deal with any swarm cells as they appear.

I am clearly missing something so im keen to understand... sorry for being thick.
Why would you want to create QCs to drop into a colony... which are not guaranteed to emerge just to delay something that may not be an issue if you add space on at the right time. If they do decide to swarm you can split or demaree to effectively manage the issue in most cases. If you are creating QCs for genetics, knock the colony ones back and introduce your queen of choice when they're hopelessly queenless and keep your 1 yr old queen who up until now you were happy with.

Direct lift from the article

Practical app: In short, keep these facts in mind: a colony tends to swarm if it has an aging queen, is in the best nutritional shape, has an abundance of stores (has filled the combs), is crowding the cavity with bees, and the queen has filled every available cell with brood. You can minimize swarming by manipulating the hive to change any of these factors during the relatively short seasonal swarm window.

 

[Sutty]

I can't really see the utility for swarm prevention, but I can see the point if it works to requeen an already hostile hive without removing the existing queen and making them worse!

 

[BaconWizard]

The idea in itself may have some truth to it, but, and I stand to be corrected, it would be far less work to manage the space the colony has and deal with any swarm cells as they appear.

I am clearly missing something so im keen to understand... sorry for being thick.
Why would you want to create QCs to drop into a colony... which are not guaranteed to emerge just to delay something that may not be an issue if you add space on at the right time. If they do decide to swarm you can split or demaree to effectively manage the issue in most cases. If you are creating QCs for genetics, knock the colony ones back and introduce your queen of choice when they're hopelessly queenless and keep your 1 yr old queen who up until now you were happy with.

Direct lift from the article

Practical app: In short, keep these facts in mind: a colony tends to swarm if it has an aging queen, is in the best nutritional shape, has an abundance of stores (has filled the combs), is crowding the cavity with bees, and the queen has filled every available cell with brood. You can minimize swarming by manipulating the hive to change any of these factors during the relatively short seasonal swarm window.

It's extremely simple: I am asking if it works. Not whether it is the best option or anything else. People seem to be determined to tell me I shouldn't want to know for various reasons including lack of practical application so far as they can imagine. Well I DO want to know. Sorry!

 

[magor]

Here is one source I found useful:
https://scientificbeekeeping.com/the-primer-pheromones-part-4-reproduction-and-survival/

although i ve my own understanding/theory about swarm, mid age bees and them wax glads jep you ve found one of best net pages about bees, jep R.Oliver 's Bee Behavior and Biology all articles(try study them form the start/the oldest) also all his Bee Nutricion articles are all amazing also all references at the end of each article studies,texts, books , researches are amazing too if you have time so as dive in ,and not just stay in the diagram or not just stack in him page for varroa only cause all his other work about bees is really phantastic, also books like TD Seeley's books for example wisdom of hive and bee democracy or Tautz's book The Buzz About Bees are also amazing and i belive they all should be essential teaching material in all beekeeping schools

and last my advise is that swarm is not bad , all your best colonies will do swarm attempts so try avoid it before flow starts and also try avoid loose those Queens

 

[BaconWizard]

although i ve my own understanding/theory about swarm, mid age bees and them wax glads jep you ve found one of best net pages about bees, jep R.Oliver 's Bee Behavior and Biology all articles(try study them form the start/the oldest) also all his Bee Nutricion articles are all amazing also all references at the end of each article studies,texts, books , researches are amazing too if you have time so as dive in ,and not just stay in the diagram or not just stack in him page for varroa only cause all his other work about bees is really phantastic, also books like TD Seeley's books for example wisdom of hive and bee democracy or Tautz's book The Buzz About Bees are also amazing and i belive they all should be essential teaching material in all beekeeping schools

and last my advise is that swarm is not bad , all your best colonies will do swarm attempts so try avoid it before flow starts and also try avoid loose those Queens

Cool, I am glad it is well regarded. It had all the hallmarks of being respectable.
Regarding middle-age bees and wax production, something in Snelgrove (admittedly very old now) which I've just read also has made me wonder about that. So I would be delighted to hear your theory.

We are kind of getting off-topic, but I think anyway this thread has generally got to the end of its usefulness re the title, so I don't mind.

 

[Erichalfbee]

WAIT, so you are saying this is actually something that is done on a mass scale?? How am I only now hearing this?

On the premise that new queens are less likely to swarm many commercial outfits replace their queens early every year. It’s why there is such a market for early queens which can be fulfilled only by importing them

 

[BaconWizard]

On the premise that new queens are less likely to swarm many commercial outfits replace their queens early every year. It’s why there is such a market for early queens which can be fulfilled only by importing them

I had no clue. Pargyle was saying I think that they are on pretty shaky ground with that premise though. Do you agree with that?
But then again, a massive operation is going to want/need to turn everything into a production line, they won't be interested in treating each colony according to separate needs unless forced-to.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Sorry no idea. Would they do it if it wasn’t cost effective? I’m just a hobby keeper and not a good one at that. I’ve always been keen to try new stuff and have come adrift a few times. I’ve learned that short cuts for me don’t work. That’s not to say you shouldn’t explore. If you have enough colonies a few mistakes don’t matter

 

[pargyle]

I had no clue. Pargyle was saying I think that they are on pretty shaky ground with that premise though. Do you agree with that?
But then again, a massive operation is going to want/need to turn everything into a production line, they won't be interested in treating each colony according to separate needs unless forced-to.

I think there's LESS risk from first year queens swarming but it's not a guarantee that they won't. A lot of beefarmers do replace queens annually as a matter of course but whether this is about a measure to reduce swarming or a matter of a younger, well bred, queen being more fecund than an older queen.

I've heard, apocryphally, that some imported queens run out of steam prematurely and whilst this may not be in the first year .. if it's early in the second year then that would give the keeper with a lot of hives a bit of a problem. Considering what bought in foreign bred queens purchased in bulk cost it may be simply a matter of economic certainty spending a few pounds on a new queen for most colonies to generate the maximum crop with the minimum of risk ?

I don't know ... we have enough large scale beekeepers on here to get a more enlightened view ?

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

A lot of beefarmers do replace queens annually

When I was with ChrisB at Saltway bees he was replacing them after their second year

 

[pargyle]

When I was with ChrisB at Saltway bees he was replacing them after their second year

That would make more sense (to me anyway) than changing queens annually ...

 

[Blunt Spike]

It's extremely simple: I am asking if it works. Not whether it is the best option or anything else. People seem to be determined to tell me I shouldn't want to know for various reasons including lack of practical application so far as they can imagine. Well I DO want to know. Sorry!

Ok thanks

 

[magor]

https://beekeepingforum.co.uk/threads/research-into-swarming.53471/post-835589
https://beekeepingforum.co.uk/threa...misunderstood-swarm-control.53581/post-837718
thats my theory but i would advise as you already found that page to read all R.Oliver page articles mention above so as understand bees behavior and biology(is a must) or and any of the books or any other book,text,resource.... you can find interesting and you can find also logic behind it , personal i dont find that Q as Q pheromone play such important role in swarming as you can see from my posts as i dont belive she leads or run the hive she cant even feed herself or take care the brood she can only lay and pass half the genes(she is mother not a Q) so nurses run the hives as them only ones can feed with jelly all the others(brood , foragers , Q) and mid age bees as them only complete bees that can do everything if needed with less cost and time(draw combs , receive/store crops , become either nurse or forager) kinda like a reserve army population inside colony and when them reach the peak on demography population inside a colony bees swarm without that means that in bees as superorganism are not eveyrthing connected each other and each one thing(pheromones, organs and nutrition) plays its role for that to happen

as said and above posts for me swarm attempts colonies means healthy good colonies and if bees decide supercedure un old enouf Q around her 10-11th? lay wave or even more old then supercedure is also good and welcome meaning that those years done her job or and i did the right decision if had ''graft'' from her swarm cells those years but if they try supercedure youngers like 1st or 2nd year Q that means there was something wrong with those Q or i did something wrong in my introduce new Q or cell method in colonies divide preswarm and reunite on flow


dont worry everything about bees is on topic and also its a talk and is good when different aprroaches posted

 

[BaconWizard]

https://beekeepingforum.co.uk/threads/research-into-swarming.53471/post-835589
https://beekeepingforum.co.uk/threa...misunderstood-swarm-control.53581/post-837718
thats my theory but i would advise as you already found that page to read all R.Oliver page articles mention above so as understand bees behavior and biology(is a must) or and any of the books or any other book,text,resource.... you can find interesting and you can find also logic behind it , personal i dont find that Q as Q pheromone play such important role in swarming as you can see from my posts as i dont belive she leads or run the hive she cant even feed herself or take care the brood she can only lay and pass half the genes(she is mother not a Q) so nurses run the hives as them only ones can feed with jelly all the others(brood , foragers , Q) and mid age bees as them only complete bees that can do everything if needed with less cost and time(draw combs , receive/store crops , become either nurse or forager) kinda like a reserve army population inside colony and when them reach the peak on demography population inside a colony bees swarm without that means that in bees as superorganism are not eveyrthing connected each other and each one thing(pheromones, organs and nutrition) plays its role for that to happen

as said and above posts for me swarm attempts colonies means healthy good colonies and if bees decide supercedure un old enouf Q around her 10-11th? lay wave or even more old then supercedure is also good and welcome meaning that those years done her job or and i did the right decision if had ''graft'' from her swarm cells those years but if they try supercedure youngers like 1st or 2nd year Q that means there was something wrong with those Q or i did something wrong in my introduce new Q or cell method in colonies divide preswarm and reunite on flow


dont worry everything about bees is on topic and also its a talk and is good when different aprroaches posted

I think I follow most of it. I still need to read about the function of ethyl oleate properly.

On a different thread I asked someone if they had tried using Ocimene to change swarming behaviour, and what you have posted is exactly why I asked: Signal that there is plenty of young brood rather than older brood, while also moving young nurse bees into wax-producers and middle-aged bees into foragers (as long as they have room to build comb and for incoming stores) unless restricted by something else (incoming ethyl oleate?)

But also, a study showed that with crowded brood-nests and/or with an older queen, the queen's various pheromones do not make it to the edge of the comb in enough quantity and so the workers begin building swarm cells there.
If you artificially smear queen pheromone on the edges, they will tear-down those cells and won't swarm, nor begin any more.
Both Mandibular Pheromone and Tarsal Pheromone (ehtyl palmitate aka Ethyl hexadecanoate) are required for that to work.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0022191081900779
So it seems to me that there are 3 possible strategies:
1) Remove the surplus bees from the brood nest (you say these are middle-aged bees? Or very young nurse bees with not enough brood to care-for after Queen's laying-peek has passed?)
which is what we seek to achieve when manipulating a colony to prevent swarming

2) Provide extra queen pheromones during swarm season such as TempQueen strips plus some ethyl palmitate to reach parts of the colony that don't otherwise get enough due to overcrowding or age of the queen.

3) A brood break, perhaps? So that middle-aged workers are not inhibited from becoming forager.

Some will be more or less convenient depending what the keeper is trying to do. For most, that is get honey. I myself am happy to take whatever honey I can but I don't mind if it's more one year or less another.

I agree, a colony that wants to swarm usually means its a healthy colony.
But I am much less certain that it is healthy for them to do-so in the modern age, given loss of habitat, encroachment of urban areas where swarms are troublesome, modern intensive farming practices re pesticides and mono-cultures over larger areas, the potential to spread things like AFB or EFB, And of course, varroa which they will remain untreated-for after swarming.

 

[BaconWizard]

.

Ok, so are you saying that you would ideally want to move young nurse bees up to middle-aged bees which produce wax, and then give them plenty of room to build new comb so that they are employed away from the brood-nest, thus alleviating one of the triggers for swarming?

If so, I imagine nadiring the colony warre-style without giving them much/any comb would be the way to go.

 

[Sutty]

If if if congested nurse bees are a trigger for swarming then possibly putting ocimene on the top bars in the supers could bring nurse bees out of the brood nest and prevent swarming.
If anyone tries it please report back!

 

[BaconWizard]

If if if congested nurse bees are a trigger for swarming then possibly putting ocimene on the top bars in the supers could bring nurse bees out of the brood nest and prevent swarming.
If anyone tries it please report back!

Precisely. I guess this has now become "BaconWizard's Nutty Ideas Thread" but that's one of them.

If it works at-all, I think it would still require giving them plenty of space for new comb and incoming stores which I THINK Magor is advocating-for anyhow, without the ocimene.
I'll let him confirm or deny that.

 

[pargyle]

This thread is all well and good but, in some respects, some of it comes under the auspices of 'bee fiddling' in my book...

I'm a low impact beekeeper ... I do inspect, regularly, not as much as some on here recommend, but I know my bees, they are in the garden, I look at them daily - often several times a day and I get an almost sixth sense feel that I need to look in a colony. Perhaps it's just subtle differences that my subconscious notices or do the bees communicate with me on a level I don't appreciate ? It's surprising that when I open a colony up because I feel the need that I find something that needs attention ... but then open up others and it's business as usual ...

Anyway, I rather think that, sometimes, we spend too much time and effort tearing their home apart for no really good reason. Bees will swarm given the right conditions and giving space, at the right time, is often enough to reduce the swarming urge. I'm of the opinion that swarming can also be triggered by upsetting the colony equilibrium ... intensive inspections, searching for queens unecessarily, pulling every frame out of the brood box, keeping the hive open for long periods all disturb the natural order of a colony.

I'm sure that bees have become conditioned, over the millennia, to appreciate what is a good safe home for them and if they found a hole in a tree where a bear arrived every week to try and get at their honey - do you think they would stay there ?

My bees, this year, have made no attempts to swarm .. well, one colony made a few play cups then tore them down. There's a mixture of queens in the colonies, I've had a couple supercede and I guess I'm lucky - but, it's been a swarmy year down here and I'm the exception.

If you watch a beefarmer doing inspections .. they are quick, light and look only for essential information. We amateurs could do well to take a leaf out of their book.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I get the impression that the OP is looking deeply into possibilities and theory just because he wants to but probably has little intention of actually practicing any of it? Some people like to theorise and explore as their sole goal.

 

[Erichalfbee]

But I agree on the fiddling. Essential info only. I’m checking all my colonies are queenright today. The minute I spot eggs that’s it. I’ll close up.