Uniting colonies

[greenfinch]

Hello everyone,

I've been reading with interest for a while, but this is my first post. I want to unite a queen-right colony with a queenless colony using the newspaper method. What do I do with the queen excluders? Leave them off till I rearrange the brood boxes after a few days/week (well, how long, the books differ!) or leave them on. What about honey supers? Where do they go?

Thanks in advance for any advice!

 

[Busy Bee]

YOU MUST ESTABLISH FIRST FOR DEFINATE YOU DEFINATELY ARE Q-
and can find this out by placing a frame of eggs minus the bees into the BB from another hive, if they make a QC or QC's they are queenless but if they donot they may have a queen of some sort.

I would use the paper method this being placing sheet of newspaer on top of the supers with some very small holes in it put BB on top close up. After 7 day you can move the BB onto the top of lower BB and you can decide wehter you want double brood or single brood depending on which box you place the QX.


Busy Bee

 

[greenfinch]

Thank you Busy Bee.
I am pretty certain they are queenless. There was a huge swarm from this hive on Saturday. I had removed some queen cells on the Friday (some to a nuc and destroyed the rest) in a panic move to prevent the swarm, as I had no spare equipment to do another artificial swarm (I already carried one out on this hive mid-April, which is probably why I was not vigilant enough this time round ). But too late, obviously.
And they have gone absolutely vile, which seems to indicate that there is no queen. But I will check for new queen cells before uniting.

 

[Midland Beek]

If I read this correctly: your bees swarmed and in destroying all the queen cells you have hopefully made them hopelessly queenless so that they can be united.

The danger with this scenario is that the bees would not have liked this situation and may have raised emergency queen cells after you broke down the queen cells. Depends if they had any young-enough larvae available.

Leave out queen excluders when uniting. You must make starter holes in the newspaper.

 

[Poly Hive]

You need to use a test frame to be sure they are queenless.

I normally unite with the Q+ part on top, two layers of newspaper with a couple of pricks through it with the corner of my hive tool.

If you must include supers in the situation, (I clear mine off) then they go on top of the Q+ bow with an excluder to keep HM where she should be.

PH

 

[greenfinch]

Belated thanks for your replies and advice, Midland Beek and Poly Hive.

 

[Stiffy]

You need to use a test frame to be sure they are queenless.

I normally unite with the Q+ part on top, two layers of newspaper with a couple of pricks through it with the corner of my hive tool.

If you must include supers in the situation, (I clear mine off) then they go on top of the Q+ bow with an excluder to keep HM where she should be.

PH

Is there a reason for putting Q+ on top Poly? I have combined many times with Q+ on bottom, thinking being that the bees within the 'foreign ' hive will have to pass through 'settled' Q+ one?
Cheers
S

 

[Otleybee]

Just a note on using making holes in the paper first. I am sure it is good practice but I forgot to do this the first time I united colonies with paper. It made no difference they still chewed through the paper pretty quickly and it was almost all gone by the next inspection.

 

[Poly Hive]

The Q+ on top means they are keen to get through the paper and carry on supplying the brood plus they carry the queen substance through the q- ones below.

PH

 

[greenfinch]

Thank you for all your comments so far. Further to my uniting questions:

Having left the colonies to chew through the newspaper (I forgot to put holes in but it has all been removed... ) I checked today and there are no eggs. Looking on the bright side, might the queen, who is/was very young, have gone off lay due to the upheaval and be expected to get going again or is it more likely she has been killed? There were definitely eggs and BIAS before I united. If the colony is queenless, can I put in a frame from a nuc with a queen cell on it?

Secondly, the books say make up 11 frames of brood for the "new" colony. What do you do with the stores of which there are several frames?

All advice and comments gratefully received.