At our local beek meeting tonight, the speaker talked about something I had never heard of, so I looked it up when I got home. It is called a Taranov Board. It is used to create an artificial swarm. >>>>>This method produces a quantity of bees with the old queen which mimics a swarm (and can be treated as such). It is intended to have a higher proportion of 'Young' or 'nurse bees' than can be achieved by just shaking.<<<<< http://website.lineone.net/~dave.cushma ... ovswm.html I am wondering if it could be used to find a queen in a very large colony by creating a swarm, then looking through the new, smaller colony and combining them back after she is found.
I've been to Dave's site many times. I never heard of a Taranov board either. Not sure what the advantages are of collecting the bees in this manner. I think removing a few frames of brood, which not only help alleviate the bees/congestion Taranov points out, but allows a couple frames of brood/honey for the artificial swarm to get a start with. I do artificial swarming all the time by means of frame and bee removal along with the old queen. I don't find the advantages (if any) of the Tranov board compelling to change the way I'm doing things now. Did the speaker actually use this method, or was this just something interesting he dug up and added to the talk?
It was just lightly mentioned. That's why I had to google it when I got home. Even Dave says it's not the best way to create an artificial swarm. Recently, I have seen the question asked several times, "How do I find a hot queen in a 3 story hive, to replace her"? I'm thinking this may be a way to segregate her from the main colony and return the swarm to the original hive when she has been found.
