Spring Divides (gypsi, you readin?)

Thank you Riverbee!

My goals: colony health and honey production, swarm prevention. I am at 5 hives, plan on selling at least one, possibly more, to reduce the number I am feeding this summer.

So I want strong healthy but preferably not swarming off into the distance. And I have never had honey, so I would like honey.

I will be looking in the hives around noon tomorrow, well between noon and 2, to see what I find.

If I see queen cells I obviously need to do something but I am not sure quite what...

Gypsi

 

going to need to learn to make queens. And yes, I have big fat sassy drones!

 

I have now got a queen clip in my bee jacket pocket. I found a queen outside hive 3 last winter, and couldn't get her back in the hive, and she didn't go home. some queen laid fertile eggs in the top box afterward, but they failed to have enough bees to cover them, and I lost the darned hive.

So I have a hive to replace, and I would like young queens from my strongest hive, which also happens to be crawling with drones. (actually all of the 4 remaining hives seem to have drones..... I was afraid of doing too much damage in opening the hives deeply, so except for the dead one, I didn't. Not yet. Perhaps I should but right now there are a lot of confused bees looking for that hive they were happily robbing out.

 

I thought maybe I could just steal a couple of frames of brood and a couple of frames of stores and a fair number of bees and put them in a nuc and they would make a queen? I have PLENTY of stores all of a sudden. Plenty of comb.

All my hives are deep plus medium, except hive 5 which is a double deep. So I lost a deep plus medium, I have 8 frames of deep comb with some stores, 10 frames of medium comb loaded with capped sugar water except 2 the robbers had gotten to. And the hive was healthy.

I'm pretty sure the queen the took off froze instead of making it home. We were out insulating the hives when my neighbor spotted her with a small circle of attendants outside. And a winter queen would be poorly bred. If at all.

So I figured a frame of capped brood from any hive, a frame of eggs from number 2, my best queen, and 3 frames of stores, and bees, from say the one I get the capped brood from? How am I doing?

 

Now Iddee, that idea has the ring of brilliance to it. I think I will have to do it tomorrow. Workers are coming back into the hive. I have accidentally ended up with this week off I think.

Works for me.

 

Hive 1 - deep on bottom, medium on top, Queen Sept - October 2012 so less than 1 year old, VSH eggs for queen, bees calm, quiet, she is still catching up but she is catching up. My former "hot" hive. had 3 frames full in the bottom box midday late January, appear to have more bees now (I moved Hive 2 to help this one catch stragglers)

Hive 2 - Medium on bottom, deep on top, switched the boxes In late January 2013 as the top box was looking very crowded, and the bottom was empty. Photos later, but I think she is laying near the top. Again. VSH requeened itself Late Sept early October 2012. heavy on propolis

Hive 3 - dead-out, lost queen in late November, she was outside, I had no queen clip, tried and failed to get her back in hive, cold front on the way. (no idea why she and her attendants were taking a stroll before a cold front) (sept 2012 queen)

Hive 4 - last year's cutout, queen approx end of March is the young cutout queen, swarm had left, unless they requeened on their own. good population in top medium box, bottom deep box appears busy with a lot of bees. but haven't pulled frames. queen age right at one year unless they requeened themselves.

Hive 5, purchased VSH queen July 2012, started her in a Nuc, stepped up to a deep In late Sept / early October, merged 2 nucs in a deep on top after screen period after they were hit hard by robbers, dual deeps since early November 2012. Good population, removed frame syrup feeder today and added 2 deep frames. They are notorious burrcomb lid gluers. Very heavy propolis too.

All were fed fondant with doubled pollen substitute today. no one has syrup except in cells from last year. All still have fairly good stores, taking more hard candy than syrup from cells.

I have about 2 deep 10 frame boxes available, 1 good 5 frame nuc (a couple of awful ones), about 9 empty medium 10 frame boxes, plenty of frames, including a 50 count case unassembled, I mainly use wax coated plasticell, the bees do well on it. Have 5 summer migratory covers with feeder jar spot (not in use now), all bees have inner covers and telescoping covers for winter right now. If I'm short on anything it is decent bottom boards, I need to pick some up, having trouble finding time to build them.

And there is now a queen clip in my suit pocket. I knew I was in trouble when she took off...

I have one hive sold, and would like to maximize honey production as I get some flow (won't be much if we don't get more rain, but I do have a chinaberry tree that is good sized.)

Gypsi

 

How do I get the queen to stay in the nuc? Clip while I move her, but then turn her loose with a queen excluder? And I guess I bring some of her bees with her? I'm going to do this tomorrow. I have about 2 weeks before the oak quits dropping its pollen stringers and I get heavily involved at work.

 

All I'm doing is reading until at least tomorrow afternoon.

Ok, a walkaway split is started with my mature and mated proven queen, 3 frames of capped brood and a couple of frames of stores, screen them and put them somewhere cool for 24 hours? It's hot tomorrow, will be cool on Sunday.

Also I have a 2 year old here tomorrow, and 2 helpers working on the lot. I have learned if I need repairs done out there to do it BEFORE I annoy the bees. Going to be hotter Saturday, when my daughter intends to drop me her 8 year old and 12 year old. Cools off on Sunday. Then I could put the nuc somewhere cool for 24 hours, then set it up in the bee yard

Then 10 days after that, or 11, is when I go through the robust but now queenless hive and remove queen cups, leaving them 2, starting nucs with the rest as I grab bees from other hives? You have a couple of days to educate me, I'll try to crack a book, but this evening I learned that the bathroom floor will hold a half inch of water if that child is unattended.

 

It helps River, but I'm just not comfortable buying package queens from any old place, I have just about perfect quarantine going around here, and Tom (my queen supplier) won't have any for awhile, probably late April earliest, by which time I will likely be popping off swarms. I have so much money into bees it is looking a lot like scuba-diving, nice hobby if you've got the cash. (I ended up with an aquarium service making my fish buy their own food)

Additionally I don't know that I have buyers for nucs. Might happen, might not. I have x for cash this year, and the a/c ductwork is shot, at minimum I have 2 circuits to add, a nice thick layer of insulation and change those ducts.

I need to make it pay for itself at least somewhat. I can't even get a livestock tax exemption out of my situation.

So if I were going to get them to requeen themselves, is Iddee's suggestion common practice? Tecumseh, will it work in Texas?

Gypsi

 

I'm used to having money in fish and trucks and bees. Went down to one truck this year. reducing fish and making part of them the ones I eat. And I will be reducing my hive count somewhat, so I don't have to feed them. making ready to move means lighten the load.

 

However, I'm not sure if I should do splits this week. We have highs in the 50's, lows in the 30's, for the coming weekend. I have drones but do not wish to harm my colonies by being in a hurry.

 

I'm setting up a 10 frame swarm trap. Have a funny feeling we've had so many 70's, that the bees may be about to split themselves. It's 70 today, but I killed some brood trying to do a checkerboard early last spring. 9 frames of it, not willing to take that kind of risk. So a swarm trap and more research..