Hi Gerry, if you spot swarm cells, it can be harder to prevent the colony from swarming because the colony has switched into swarm mode. The trick is to split the colony before it clicks into such mode.
If the bee numbers build up really strong, the job becomes more challenging on account of multiple layers of bees on the brood frames, making queen cells harder to spot, plus the queen harder to find. Also more challenging if the bees have a little bit of attitude. This is why I like a 1 brood/1 honey super combination hive.
This video of mine shows a preemptive swarm control split.
cheers
PS. I watched my video to refresh my memory. In case you canât understand my accent, I took 3 frames of brood, with bees, minus the queen from one colony & 3 frames with bees from the honey super from a different colony to combine into a strange box, base & lid to each colony. That will prevent fighting. I locked it up & took it far enough away so that no bees return.
Thanks for posting the video, finding the queen is always difficult for me, an experienced commercial beekeeper I know can pick the frame the queen is on nearly always the first time. With twin deeps, that job is more difficult. In central Canada the winters are similar to Siberia, hence we go with double deeps and plenty of insulation for winterizing a colony outside if heated storage is not available. See picture of the hive with the massive population in January (Iâm taking its temperature). Inside the hive it was approaching 85 deg F, while outside it was around -15 deg C.
Youâre welcome Jerry. If you do a preemptive swarm control split & you donât see the queen, itâs not all that bad because all you need to do is inspect the split about 4 days later, for either new eggs or emergency queen cells. That will give you an idea of where she is. That happens to me sometimes. I donât see the queen on the frames I take for the split, so I assume sheâs still in the parent hive, while I simply missed seeing her on one of the frames. That will be confirmed about 4 days later.
There IS an argument for marking queens, however Iâve never done it.
I see your point. I can spot new eggs or swarm cells pretty easily 4 days after if I attempt the split in the way youâve described and miss locating the queen. The swarm cells will be allowed to run to maturity and the first queen to emerge will take over a hive. I may try this.
Hi Gerry, this way you get a queen by natural selection, not random selection as in the queens you buy.
Sometimes if the conditions are perfect for swarming, the split, as I found out will swarm after the emergence of the first queen. What I do to overcome that is break the split down into two smaller splits after the queen cells a made. Because I take mostly sealed brood with the splits, the population of the splits will rapidly increase, making it necessary to do that split, which gives two good sized nucs.
I wish to try your method of swarm preventionâŚhowever complicating matters right now is a freak cold weather front has moved in, forecast highs in the day for at least a week is 5-8 deg C. -ridiculous, I dare not open up a hive below 10-12 C temperatures too long or at all to prevent chilling the brood. I may put the winter cover back on for the coldest night. Its supposed to be 13 deg C today, Iâll have a look today and see what that hive has been upto.
Lifting the roof all the warm air will rise up out of the hive and suck cold air into the brood. Not something I would do Gerry. The risk is too high.
Cheers
I totally agree and wonât try it. This bizarre weather system will last a week and prevent me from doing anything about the hive until it warms up. So, what will be will bee.
Iâm not sure if a hive would swarm in 8C Celsius weather anyway. There is no forage around until like it warms up.
It is too cold for the bees to swarm, so you have some breathing time to make ready for when it warms up again. Keep one eye on the thermometer and the other on an increase in foraging. A marked increase in colony size and bees hanging out in the roof cavity making comb are all good indicators of potential swarming. Cheers
Itâs still too cold to inspect the hive, -7C today in the morning, it should be 8C. Weather is supposed to moderate in 48 hrs. Very curious as to the broods fate. I wrapped the hives with insulation before the cold snap.
I did an inspection of that hive today, the unofficial start of summer weather. The super I added to increase space is occupied (but not overcrowded) with bees storing honey, the first and second brood boxes have much capped brood and larvae in various stages. No queen cups were found anywhere, BUT there was much drone comb built as burr comb on the bottom edges of the 5 middle frames. I removed most but not all of it.
You will get an increase of drone comb being made now in your location, it is swarming season.
Thanks for the update Gerry, it all sounds like the hives are powering along well.
Cheers
Its been two more weeks since I posted last. Weâve had very terrible weather with large temperature swings with days and days of high winds with gusts to 70 km/hr. Looking at the hives today shows the super hive is progressing nicely, but my other hive was ravaged by a skunk for several nights it seems. Iâve taken care of the skunk, but Iâm wondering could I transfer capped brood from the super hive into the one beaten up by the skunk?
Well thinking I am going to bee ahead of the game I try to get my new boxes in preparation to split. Well as things happen swarm and it goes to my swarm bush , a bush where all my swarms go, so I put together what I have and my order comes and that swarm took my intended split box. So, I finally add my flow super and yesterday another swarm and I think it was the flow. It is raining today but they were filling and capping the super. Well I only have a cardboard NUC box that I had set up just in case a swarm and yesterday I put them in the box. They went in but it was a large swarm and a small box and they left to my next tree. Too tired I called my friend to come get the swarm. So they take it away and a bunch of bees now moved into that box. Maybe I need to try save these. At least I would have time to get more boxes. Here is my April swarm (painted box) and the July swarm(cardboard) before they left, they were under neath the metal ramp I used to walk them in. My April swarm is happy. Hard to keep ahead of the game.
for next time: if your hive is about to swarm imminently- you can do a Taranov split. This type of split closely resembles a swarm- and the bees think they have swarmed. It is perfect for a hive that has queen cells already and is going to swarm sometime in the next few days or week. It enables you to ensure the old queen goes into the new split without having to find her. Though it looks quite dramatic in practice it is easy and the bees do not get upset.
I prefer to do a walk away split myself rather than a Taranov split but when swarming is eminent then it is a possibly better option.
Shaking the bees outside of a hive isnât a âbig dealâ, sometimes you have to just do what is best for the colony. It will upset you more than it will the bees, but you just have to do it.
From your pics you really need to figure out why there is so many bees outside the hive and either add a super or do a split or increase the hives ventilation. I look at it this way - doing nothing is not good for the bees you have, the environment or for you.
Cheers
