Mushy Bees
New Bee
- Joined
- Jun 15, 2010
- Messages
- 30
- Reaction score
- 0
- Location
- Hampshire
- Hive Type
- 14x12
- Number of Hives
- 4
Hello
Yesterday I combined two colonies and think I may have got it wrong...
Colony 1.
Found it queenless on it's first inspection. There were queen cells being made and no definately no eggs or larvae (I was told there was a laying queen in there!). Four frames of bees on 14" x 12"
Colony 2
A small caste swarm with a 1 full frame of emerging brood. Two and a half frames of bees on standard DN4 frames housed in a swarm box (like a nuc).
I sprayed all the frames and bees with light syrup containg a little lemongrass oil. Then put the brood frames and bees in the middle of the queenless 14 x12s and moved the hive to the space between where the two hives originally were (about 2 foot away from each).
After a few hours there were about 10 dead bees outside and though this wasn't too bad. Then to my horror I found a little further away baby "furry" bees being dumped!
I haven't managed to check today how they are doing and dread looking in there. Will they kill the queen after the baby slaughter!!!
What are my chances???
Pete
Yesterday I combined two colonies and think I may have got it wrong...
Colony 1.
Found it queenless on it's first inspection. There were queen cells being made and no definately no eggs or larvae (I was told there was a laying queen in there!). Four frames of bees on 14" x 12"
Colony 2
A small caste swarm with a 1 full frame of emerging brood. Two and a half frames of bees on standard DN4 frames housed in a swarm box (like a nuc).
I sprayed all the frames and bees with light syrup containg a little lemongrass oil. Then put the brood frames and bees in the middle of the queenless 14 x12s and moved the hive to the space between where the two hives originally were (about 2 foot away from each).
After a few hours there were about 10 dead bees outside and though this wasn't too bad. Then to my horror I found a little further away baby "furry" bees being dumped!
I haven't managed to check today how they are doing and dread looking in there. Will they kill the queen after the baby slaughter!!!
What are my chances???
Pete