Swarming?

[Will Kevans]

Yes - never leave space in a hive.



Maybe, but probably not. You will next year though, because you will be better at swarm prevention and control.



You need to destroy all queen cells except one capped queen cell in each hive.

By definition, if a queen call was capped on the 19th, she must be just a few days (or minutes) from emerging. Do you know how long queen cells are capped for?

No idea! I barely know what I'm looking at now. What you've pointed out to me i all good and I can work from that information.

 

[Boston Bees]

You say that the original queen has almost certainly fled. So I'm literally going to have about 5 frames in each separate hive, to which I will add empty waxed frames. Do I need supers on each?

No

 

[Boston Bees]

No idea! I barely know what I'm looking at now. What you've pointed out to me i all good and I can work from that information.

No offence, but you have taken up a hobby which requires you to care for a colony of animals. You shouldn't be doing this without making some effort to learn about them, and I don't mean just asking questions on internet forums when the sh*t hits the fan. The lifecycle of bees, including how long they spend in cells before they emerge, what queen cells look like, and how swarming works, is absolutely basic, fundamental knowledge that you should have before even ordering a hive. Buy books. Read them. Make notes. Go on a course (a proper one, not a one day "bee experience"). Learn about these animals properly.

EDIT - I appreciate that this is the beginner's forum, and I apologise if the above seems harsh. It was written in as restrained a manner as possible, and is meant to be constructive, but if a moderator feels it isn't suitable, please delete it.

 

[Will Kevans]

It appears to me to be almost certain that the queen that was in the hive has already left, with a large swarm. A further cast swarm may have also left, but let's assume not.

The honey super, at the moment, appears to be a distraction. Your hive isn't going to be filling a super with honey during this process, as a lot of the foraging bees have just left. So I would probably just take it off at this point to be honest.

I don't know what spare equipment you have. If it was me, I would probably split this hive into two as an insurance policy, with half the brood frames in each one (I would use nuc boxes, but you can use hives) leaving one undamaged capped queen cell in each one (pick the largest, knobbliest one for each). I would put the two new boxes next to each other, on the same location as the existing box, facing the same way, so that flying bees have a pretty equal chance of choosing either hive when they return to the location they know. That will divide the population fairly evenly between the 2 hives. Then leave them completely alone for a month to allow the queens to emerge and get mated.

If both do so, you have two hives. If only one does, you can merge them back together. If neither does, that's bad luck.

I wouldn't hang around in doing this - I don't know when those QCs are due to emerge but it can't be long.
[/QU

No offence, but you have taken up a hobby which requires you to care for a colony of animals. You shouldn't be doing this without making some effort to learn about them, and I don't mean just asking questions on internet forums when the sh*t hits the fan. The lifecycle of bees, including how long they spend in cells before they emerge, what queen cells look like, and how swarming works, is absolutely basic, fundamental knowledge that you should have before even ordering a hive. Buy books. Read them. Make notes. Go on a course (a proper one, not a one day "bee experience"). Learn about these animals properly.

Point taken. Ive got a few books which Ive dipped into. Its difficult in France as French is not my native language so going on a course here would be difficult. I'm hoping to find a local mentor who I can work with. The farm I bought traditionally had bees here, so Im hoping to keep that going. Obviously more to this than meets the eye and I seem to be making a lot of mistakes.

 

[Boston Bees]

Point taken. Ive got a few books which Ive dipped into. Its difficult in France as French is not my native language so going on a course here would be difficult.

Fine, and to be honest I didn't find the local BBKA course much use.

Books then - Amazon deliver the Haynes Bee Manual and BBKA Guide to Beekeeping to France. Many others are available.

But from now on, don't dip in, study them from front to back like you are doing an exam.

 

[Will Kevans]

Fine, and to be honest I didn't find the local BBKA course much use.

Books then - Amazon deliver the Haynes Bee Manual and BBKA Guide to Beekeeping to France. Many others are available.

But from now on, don't dip in, study them from front to back like you are doing an exam.

Yep, realising that!I have the Haynes manual. Lurching from crisis to crisis is not the best approach.I'll not to plague you with anymore questions. Thanks for the help its been very useful. Im going to tackle this head on tomorrow and hopefully salvage something from the situation.

 

[StephenT]

When I started about 3 years ago I found the Wally Shaw booklets to be great, practical reading especially around swarm prevention and control.
https://wbka.com/wbka-publications/

 

[Will Kevans]

When I started about 3 years ago I found the Wally Shaw booklets to be great, practical reading especially around swarm prevention and control.
https://wbka.com/wbka-publications/

Thanks for that Stephen.

 

[Will Kevans]

My plan tomorrow, is to split my hive, cut any underdeveloped queen cells from frames and spread the brood and honey frames between the two. The original hive will have one queen cell that looks in a good condition and the other hive will have one good queen cell in that and be 3 feet away from the original hive.I will then put waxed frames in each to make up the 5 frames missing from each.

 

[0bee-1]

Yep, realising that!I have the Haynes manual. Lurching from crisis to crisis is not the best approach.I'll not to plague you with anymore questions. Thanks for the help its been very useful. Im going to tackle this head on tomorrow and hopefully salvage something from the situation.
[/QUOTE]
keep at it though never be afraid to ask... Black Mountain Honey Youtube channel useful too. Agree as recommended - never squash or roll the bees and remove an end frame to make space to move frames in the brood box. slow an gentle movements
Also on your youtube vid at 2.10 there's what looks like an Apivar strip in the hive that needs to come out too.
all the best
Steve

 

[Will Kevans]

Diolch yn fawr iawn!

Thanks for that Stephen.

!

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

So bearing in mind that I will break this hive up which frames should I focus on that I showed on the video to build two separate entities?

personally I wouldn't split the hive now, it's been depleted enough as it is, leave them raise a new queen and build up in strength again.

 

[Will Kevans]

personally I wouldn't split the hive now, it's been depleted enough as it is, leave them raise a new queen and build up in strength again.

So should I cut out the queen cells to stop further swarming? If you saw the hive video they seem very abundant and feisty, would that not sustain a split?

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

So should I cut out the queen cells to stop further swarming? If you saw the hive video they seem very abundant and feisty, would that not sustain a split?

I wouldn't say they were very abundant, you have just lost up to 40% or more of your bees, there's not a massive amount of brood and remember there will be no more until the new queen emerges, gets mated and starts laying (and then another three weeks before the first of the brood emerges)
Reduce the QCs to one good one. check a few days after to see if there's any new ones, then leave them alone for a month.

 

[Will Kevans]

I wouldn't say they were very abundant, you have just lost up to 40% or more of your bees, there's not a massive amount of brood and remember there will be no more until the new queen emerges, gets mated and starts laying (and then another three weeks before the first of the brood emerges)
Reduce the QCs to one good one. check a few days after to see if there's any new ones, then leave them alone for a month.

OK , so change of plan, no split , keep the best queen cell and cut and kill the rest of the queen cells? There does seem a lot of room for extra brood. I guess cutting the queen cells will also stop swarming?!

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

OK , so change of plan, no split , keep the best queen cell and cut and kill the rest of the queen cells? There does seem a lot of room for extra brood. I guess cutting the queen cells will also stop swarming?!

Yes, some say, if they're all sealed to leave two but I think that's always a bad idea, it just means another cast swarm. if you can, an open cell with a good fat grub in is best. With only one QC they will stay.

 

[Will Kevans]

Yes, some say, if they're all sealed to leave two but I think that's always a bad idea, it just means another cast swarm. if you can, an open cell with a good fat grub in is best. With only one QC they will stay.

A bit cheeky, but do you see one in the video you'd keep, there seems quite a few especially at the bottom of some of the frames.

 

[pargyle]

Yep, realising that!I have the Haynes manual. Lurching from crisis to crisis is not the best approach.I'll not to plague you with anymore questions. Thanks for the help its been very useful. Im going to tackle this head on tomorrow and hopefully salvage something from the situation.

No No No ... feel free to ask ... books are great but sometimes they don't contain everything that the bees do and occasionally you need to know what to look for in a book. Better to ask the question on here than to panic - always someone around to give you some sort of answer. The Haynes Manual will get you though most things in the first year or two but a bit of personal reassurance never goes amiss - even when you think you have the answer ...

 

[B_north]

Yep, realising that!I have the Haynes manual. Lurching from crisis to crisis is not the best approach.I'll not to plague you with anymore questions. Thanks for the help its been very useful. Im going to tackle this head on tomorrow and hopefully salvage something from the situation.

Your questions help the rest of us new beekeepers and others who will follow in the coming years. At some point I might have the same question and a quick search will lead me to the answer simply because you did ask already. Besides misery loves company my beekeeping year has not yet started but I am sure it will be full of mistakes and missteps.

 

[drex]

Brush bees off frames. Carefully look for queen cells. ( they are good at hiding them). Best to choose an open cell, heavily dimpled, in a fairly protected situation ( cells left on bottom of frame are easily accidentally squashed). Mark the chosen frame. After having chosen one, bees can be shaken of combs. Destroy ALL other cells. ( you do not want to shake the chosen frame in case you damage the larva.
Good luck. Keep going. Keep posting. It will all fall into place in time, faster if you study about beekeeping