Is there any way of saving a weak queen or do we have to sacrifice one as we combine the weaker hive to the stronger hive, and can we transfer frames from the weaker hive directly into the stronger hive without using the newspaper method. Also we are trying this in early December, so would it even be wise to perform this transfer? the weaker hive has only 1 frame of honey stores and the other frames have little to no brood and only 2-3 thousand bees in the hive.
Welcome to the forum.
My first question is why is the colony so weak? Before any thought of combining colonies, make sure the weak colony is free of pests and diseases. You don’t want to transfer something like AFB.
Combining this late heading into winter might do more harm than good. Your strong colony is preparing for winter with resources and fat bees to hopefully make it to spring. Adding a few thousand bees of dubious quality might consume resources instead of building them.
How old are the bees in the weak colony? Young bees will be accepted into the strong colony, but old bees tend to be less tolerated leading to fighting and casualties. With less time left to work, they might not contribute much if anything.
To answer your question about saving the queen, no. Combining hives means the weakest queen must go. While two queen colonies do exist, it’s rare and there’s always the risk that when they fight, the better one doesn’t survive.
If it were spring, I’d probably combine them, but heading into winter I wouldn’t risk setting back the strong one.