This is what somebody here in the uk found in his bait hive this month
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Hi Dee,
It really depends on the colony.
Sometime one or two times is enough, sometimes it is a neverending story 
In this last case the bees are asking for a new queen, probably because she is old and not laying enough eggs, so I replace her with a new one.
However Iâm now in the midst of renovating my very small apiary. Here we all use Dadant Blatt hives, really donât know why, but I will move to Langstroth by the end of this season.
So Iâm quite confused! Lol
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I was taught that repeated queen cell removal really demoralised the colony and that you would have to go in every three days. The bees are able to create queen cells from three day larvae and therefore cap the cell two days later.
Taking the queen out and replacing her with a queen of the current year would likely work and be much less effort
Thatâs how the commercial guys do it
After a couple of weeks of replacing an old queen is often enough to stop queen cells being built and greatly reduces the risk of swarming. I was taught to re-queen every year at the first sign of spring by a commercial bee keeper, he was all about honey production.
Bee keepers tend to stay with what they know and from experience and tradition, I guess most hives in Italy are Dadant Blatt hives and the design probably from an Italian. Here in Australia I doubt you would find one. Most are Langstroth or at least based on that design. They are certainly in favor with the commercial guys and that is a good recommendation to use them.
Cheers
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Yep. Requeen with a current year queen does it. Hence why there is so much aggro in the uk about imported queens.
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I think that is an emotion more for the beekeeper constantly cutting out the queen cells and not an emotion we can really tag onto bees, with an old queen the bees seem so single minded making queen cells.
I still have thoughts of a virgin queen standing in front of a heater before going on the mating flight at your apiary, and icing up on her wings. 
Now youâre taking the mickey
A demoralised colony is a well known and described condition. The bees hang around doing little and foraging drops off. Itâs not an anthropomorphic term. A similar state of affairs occurs when bees are constantly having to fend off robbers
Perhaps unprofitable may be a less emotive term.
My bees are not pets, nevertheless I do have a duty of care once I aim to profit from their endeavours.
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Sorry Dee, I didnât read the whole context of the thread. I agree that filling the box with frames will make it appear smaller.
Itâs interesting to see the birds nest inside of a swarm lure box. Itâs usually the other way around. The entrance size is another thing to consider. Also another thing that swarm scouts look for is if the potential home is safe from predators.
They like the wall cavities behind brick veneers of houses. They probably feel safe behind a brick wall.
Interesting, so where do you sauce your queens from? What is the reason you canât get them in the UK.?
Cheers
We can easily make our own queens. That is no real problem but time is of the essence.
UK mated queens are not usually available till mid May at the earliest simply because we do not have the weather for them to mate and prove themselves.
First you get the panic hobby keepers who â need a queen now!â They get theirs from the big beekeeping suppliers who in turn are sourcing their early queens from countries like Argentina before the warmer countries of Europe come on stream. Argentina has AHB and Southern Italy has SHB.
Commercial beekeepersâ swarm control is largely achieved by replacing with current years queenâs so they have to get them somewhere. The big outfits graft their own and send the virgins to Europe for mating. What a game !
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I donât feel short-changed of information. I just ask questions when I want to know the reason I think it helps me to remember things when I know the why, not just the how.
If you donât ask you canât learn is what I believe.
I understand what both you and Dee are saying about size of the box being important in attracting a swarm, and also foundation left in an empty box could cause problems.
It is interesting that Luca is in Italy, and doing what I was told to do also (maybe something to do with Italy in general, the seasons being different, or is it just a different way?..)
To restate my particular situation:
- New queen in by brood box.
- Brood box almost full
- Added Super
- Was told to cut-out queen cells if I saw them, and also to inspect every week, like Luca does.
- The beekeeper was/is doing active swarm control - splitting hives, changing and marking new queens, building up the brood boxes of the new hives, and cutting out queen cells and drones (if there are too many drone cells).
- I would be very happy not to have to cut-out queen cells if I didnât have to⌠etc., but was following the advice of a local beekeeper. I am always open to new ways to do things if it works.
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If you are doing all those then there are indeed instances when you cut out queen cellsâŚ
My point was that it doesnât work if that is all you do
Too many drones? I donât think a colony can have too many. They make what they want.
I know @JeffH will disagree but that is how he controls SHBâŚwhich the UK doesnât have
AnywayâŚthe forum algorithm has warned me off so Iâll leave you all to it
Let others join the conversation
This topic is clearly important to you â youâve posted more than 33% of the replies here.
Are you sure youâre providing adequate time for other people to share their points of view, too?
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This is another case where the 2 beekeepers I have worked with here, cut out drone cells.
Thatâs what they do to prevent Varroa. (We donât have SHB)
Itâs up to you if you want to listen to the algorithm, or keep discussing.
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I usually ignore it. After all, what the hack does it know about bees? 
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Continuing to cut out queen cells alone wont suppress a colonies urge to swarm. You need to do it in conjunction with removing some brood & or brood with bees. Preferably frames containing the most sealed brood, then replacing those frames with fresh foundation or empty frames. I prefer fresh foundation. Even with doing that, you still need to check in a weeks time, just to make sure.
The ultimate method to adopt is preemptive swarm control. Thatâs something you do before they start preparing to swarm. Then keep that up every 4 weeks, until swarm season is over.
What I find by doing preemptive swarm control is: The colony still produces honey. You make lots of new saleable colonies. Plus you are not chasing swarms or upsetting neighbors, if that applies. Itâs a win, win, win situation. On top of that you finish up with all fresh, A1 brood frames.
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I donât think that is @JeffH Jeffâs reason for cutting out drone comb and canât see that controlling SHB, it is two different issues. Both Jeff and I cut out drone comb as they consume the honey so we work on the theory of the more worker bees the better and regardless the colony will always produce enough drones.
Jeff and I rely on the bees to control SHB and do the squash treatment to any that we find in weekly inspections. Neither of us use traps and prefer to let nature control the problem of SHB.
Regards
And I see that as a major function of the forum, to pass on knowledge gained from experience. Dee and I do have differences, but the end results are probably the same. We are all capable of learning more.
My prior bee keeping was in a different climate, much colder than here, and I was taught by a commercial bee keepers that while they have the same goal there approach was more cut and thrust with hive management, I have adjusted to the climate ( I hope) and adopted a lot of Jeffâs ideas.
Luca has come a long way in a short time from basic questions and feeling up to his heck in water, up to knowing what is needed for hive management and just wanting to confirm what he is doing is on the right track.
Regards
I just thought I would note that splitting sometimes can cause issues for the less experienced (because of chalkbrood) and you donât necessarily end up with healthy colonies. Just worth watching that issue.
Also, in case it hasnât been mentioned, you can merge the split back into the hive you took it from after the swarm season is overâŚperhaps after the solstice. This is what I have done, rather than sell hives or have more hives in the apiary.
Hi Jeff, it was suggested to me by an old time beekeeper to (preferably) use drawn comb rather than flat foundationâŚI assumed it was because there was somewhere for the queen to lay almost immediately, but I guess then you donât get the fresh comb.
Hi Peter, I do encourage folks to reduce drone comb as a means of reducing the risk of SHB infestation. I just havenât talked about it in the time weâve known each other.
I made the observation a few years ago on one particular day, I noticed SHB damage on drone comb in 2 separate hives. Luckily for me the bees had cleaned it up after overwhelming the damage. On that day the penny dropped for me that drones donât do any work in the hive, including defending. Therefore a large piece of drone comb that can be covered in newly emerged drones, will be an open invitation for mated beetles to lay eggs in the base of the unemerged drones. If a colony is low in worker numbers, it may not necessarily be able to overwhelm the beetle damage, hence a slime-out.
So removing large areas of drone comb has a 2 prong effect. You get more workers plus reduce the risk of SHB damage.
Now for all those interested in your bees producing honey sooner rather than later: Even if SHBâs arenât active in your area, there canât be anything wrong with a colony having a strong worker population.
Hi @Dan2, during spring, youâll be amazed at how quickly a colony can draw foundation, theyâll draw it overnight. The queen will commence laying while they are building it. Not to mention the available cells for the queen to lay in the brood frames left behind.
Remember that a queen can lay up to 3k eggs a day, therefore it will still take her 2 days just to lay on one frame. That gives the bees plenty of time to prepare foundation frames for her to lay in.
The other thing is that I found that a colony draws comb much better while it isnât in swarm mode than a colony that is in swarm mode. Thatâs been my observation. The trick is to keep a colony out of swarm mode, stay one step ahead of them.
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Hi Jeff, wow that is amazing! I have to confess my limited beekeeping experience is restricted to Tasmania, and my bees certainly seem to be the opposite here, in that they are frustratingly slow to draw comb at any time. It could just be my beekeeping 
. Given this and given what the old commercial beekeeper said (he was only talking about here in Tassie of course), Iâve been reluctant to give purely flat foundation frames to a hive as a replacement for removed ones, but perhaps from what you have seen and experienced, he was being overly cautious?