swarm from an apidea

[adrian wilford]

went to retrive some queens from my apideas, on one frame a well developed, capped, queen cell and yes couldn't find any trace of a queen, no eggs but sealed brood. my only thought was has she swarmed, try to find that in an orchard with 120 trees!! anyone else known of a similar experience?

 

[MJBee]

Yes I have that "T" shirt.

I now check weekly and as soon as I find eggs (mated and laying?) I slide the queen excluder over the entrance trapping her in until I can confirm she is laying worker brood. She is then introduced to a colony or Nuc asap.

The one that did swarm produced a cluster about the size of a tennis ball - I did find it and "hive" it into an empty Apidea

 

[Polyanwood]

It has happened to me a few times too. Timing is critcal in queen rearing.

Last year when I wanted to put a queen into a bigger mini nuc with a super on it the whole lot of them got fed up and absconded straight inot a queenless hive where they settled straight in with no dead bees - I still think that was a miracle.

 

[Poly Hive]

"Timing is critcal in queen rearing."

Never a truer word.

PH

 

[DanBee]

anyone else known of a similar experience?

Had the pleasure of walking with just such a swarm at head height, right across our 25 acre field, until it disappeared over the hedge. A couple of paces to either side and I was out of the swarm, a couple of paces and right back in the middle. I threw my veil back and just enjoyed the sight and sound of joining the swarm, worth losing a queen for the experience

 

[Finman]

went to retrive some queens from my apideas, on one frame a well developed, capped, queen cell and yes couldn't find any trace of a queen, no eggs but sealed brood. my only thought was has she swarmed, try to find that in an orchard with 120 trees!! anyone else known of a similar experience?

My menthor teached 40 years ago, that if I use normal frame size mating nucs, I do not need worry about leaving of just mated queens.

I give to mating nucs brood/bee frame, food frame and a foundation.
First the nuc has one frame of bees. Then 10 days later the queen start to lay. I give next brood frame and the nuc will be full of bees and it can nurse those 3 frames.

The mini hive can be in the nuc next 4-5 weeks. Then it will burst ot.
.

 

[Finman]

.
To devide a normal box into 3-4 mating nucs with boards is really bad idea.
Losses of queens is huge. Máke them solitary nucs when you make.
Yes I had them 35 years, I know.

 

[Teemore]

My menthor teached 40 years ago, that if I use normal frame size mating nucs, I do not need worry about leaving of just mated queens.

I give to mating nucs brood/bee frame, food frame and a foundation.
First the nuc has one frame of bees. Then 10 days later the queen start to lay. I give next brood frame and the nuc will be full of bees and it can nurse those 3 frames.

The mini hive can be in the nuc next 4-5 weeks. Then it will burst ot.
.

Like a lot of people I had several instances of bees absconding out of apidea last year and in the current season we have had bees abscond from around 1/3 of the apidea/apidea sized mating nucs: this despite taking great care to select young bees to populate these mating nucs and to close them in for a day or two to accilatise them to their new homes. I have yet to have bees abscond from a kieler or a 5 or six frame Nuc.
I am in the process of making up extra 5 and 6 frame Nucs and dummy boards to reduce my reliance upon smaller mating Nucs.