Swarming urge

[Dadnlad]

How long does the swarming urge last in a colony ?

If I have performed a Pagden AS correctly and the Q is merrily laying up her new box of foundation, and I have returned to the other half 5 days later and removed all the new emergency cells leaving the chosen QC on a pinned frame. Normally I would wait for that virgin to emerge, mate, get into lay then make a decision whether mother or daughter (or both) is kept

Instead, if when I return to the QC half at 5 days, I remove all QC's including the chosen one (making them hopelessly queenless), I can combine them back onto their mother - is this enough time elapsed (a week 'ish) for the colony as a whole to have got their swarming urge out of their system ?

 

[masterBK]

Not usually.

 

[enrico]

You are making them back into the same size colony when they wanted to swarm. Is there a rush to re combine them? The only difference maybe if you put them on a double brood!
E

 

[Dadnlad]

I'm trying to reduce my number of colonies. If the mother is only last years and still laying well, and the daughter gets off and running likewise, unless one is squished I'm increasing
The split colony is also distracted rebuilding brood comb or on a brood break - missing the bulk of the summer flow

Would waiting until the last of the brood has emerged (ie 3 weeks) be long enough before combining ?

 

[The Poot in Somerset]

I find it difficult to keep colony numbers static in this game!
I would have thought uniting now wouldn’t lead to swarming, given we’re in mid July, with forage availability reducing.

(And the bees escape committee would think “look what happened last time we tried this”)