Swarm housing variances

[John R]

Just wanted to say that I had a swarm off one of my hives a few weeks ago and it took 4 attempts to rehouse them............had a really tough time with them tracking back to the old hive 3 times on varying days. In the end i moved the new hive to old site whilst they swarmed in a tree and it worked a treat.
Had another swarm from another of my hives over a week ago, caught and rehoused it first time into a new Deep BB on new site. It just goes to show that you never can explain why they do what they do and behave so differently. But I'm pleased that I've gone from 3 to 5 hives and all are doing Very well indeed, looks like a good year and after 3 years of no honey and building from 1 colony I may get a bit of honey for me and leave them with a 2 xDeep BB and lots of honey over winter, as that worked for me last year

 

[ratcatcher]

the 4 times they went back, could it be because they were queenless?

 

[John R]

It may be that I didn't catch the queen amongst the swarm, but they certainly had a queen that ended up with them when they did settle into the last hive i put them in.

 

[Arfermo]

Another classic case of failure to clip (and mark) queens. What is the problem with it !!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[oliver90owner]

Another classic case of failure to clip (and mark) queens. What is the problem with it !!!!!!!!!!!!

That appears to be a ludicrous suggestion.

OK, a fairly good way to go from a Q+ swarm to a Q- lost swarm in double-quick time.

Would they go back if absconding, as opposed to swarming?

Not a lot of point in clipping a virgin, is it?

There are at least a couple problems with it!