Hey Rodderick, Sorry to beat this into the ground, but I had a thought. If the fellow beekeeper brings over new bees (along with the brood), won’t they fight with the ones already in the hive?
Hey Becky, There will most likely will be trouble. I don’t think he would be that silly. But if it does happen, you could use the “Newspaper Method” to combine them. Put the new brood and bees into a super and place this on top of the existing hive with a sheet of newspaper to separate the two boxes, make one or two small tears in the middle of the newspaper (make sure the bees cannot pass through) this will allow their scents to mingle and in a day or two the bees will eat a hole and combine. You should see bits of newspaper being thrown out of the entrance. After they have combined (give it a few more days) you can re-arrange you brood frames back down into the original hive box and remove any remnants of the newspaper. Does that make sense?
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Yes, that makes a ton of sense and what a great transition plan too. Thank you again, very much… 
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Hey Rodderick, Well, now I just cross my fingers and wait for bits of newspaper! My friend brought four frames with an insane amount of brood. I attempted to take a pic, but his angry bees wouldn’t let me and stung me 4x to teach me a lesson. I have crossed yet another milestone…hehe.
Oh Wow! … there’s just no way to make you feel better about stings… they can really hurt. The hive is looking good though. I didn’t think your friend would be bringing any bees with him but this is a good thing to boost your numbers whilst waiting for the brood to hatch and then the new queen to start laying. By the way, has she turned up in the post yet?
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That was the original plan, but I held off on the queen, because the folks that I bought my nucs from looked at the pics that I posted and think a queen may have already hatched. If in a week or so, when I have to take the newspaper out, if I don’t see an active queen, I’ll have one sent to me. Its been a long, but educational process.
With that new influx of bees from your friend if you don’t have a queen now, in a week or so you may have one regardless if they make an emergency cell. Once they combine you should be able to check and see if you have eggs and larva.
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I really hope so Adagna. I have to think a queen will emerge, if not already. I checked the hive from the outside and the activity of the bees flying in and out of the hive improved substantially. I wondered if the bees got through the tiny holes in the newspaper already. Maybe they did, maybe they didn’t, but improved activity is a good sign. In a week, I will inspect it again. Fingers crossed.
Hey Rodderick…A status report of the merging experiment. Well, its just under two weeks since I did the newspaper thing and hive activity is still very light and there are no shreds of newspaper outside the hive. I guess I will inspect the hive soon to see what’s going on.
Oh right! Better get in there ASAP and see what’s going on. Have a really good look for a queen, if she’s not there but there’s lots of bees then order one.
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Hi GB, what you can do if you can’t find the queen is simply introduce a frame of brood as long as it has some fertile eggs in it. It’s handy if you have another healthy hive of a friend with a healthy hive who is willing to share a frame with you. You might be able to return the favor one day. Don’t worry if the bees don’t make a queen the first time, just repeat that process every couple of weeks. The bees will eventually make a new queen if the hive doesn’t already have one. The addition of the frames of brood will also help with the population. As long as you have the bee numbers to look after the brood, you can add as many frames of brood as you like, if you have them to spare.
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Hi JH, I did exactly that a couple of weeks ago. My friend gave me three frames LOADED with brood and fertile eggs. I did see queen cells too. On the advice of another member on this page, I put them in deep super separated by a sheet of newspaper with some small cuts so the new bees on the donated frame could smell the existing few bees left in my queen-less hive. I’m supposed to see bits of newspaper outside of the hive as an indication that they have merged. I don’t see that as of yet and was hoping to inspect the hive to see what’s going on, but its been raining cats and dogs over that last week, so I couldn’t. I hope to do it tomorrow or the next day when its not pouring outside.
I hope you get a clear day soon and can check. I am waiting to hear how your hive is doing!!
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Hi Becky, if you had frames of brood without any bees, you can simply slot them in with the bees without newspaper. Uniting bees with newspaper is ok when the weather is fine with plenty of honey coming in. I did that once when the weather wasn’t good & the bees united: fighting. The result was a lot of dead bees on top of the newspaper, not enough bees to stop the beetle from laying eggs in all the dead bees, the result was A MESS:):)!!! So that was a lesson well learned. I put a few videos on youtube last year of me rescuing a really weak beehive. I think the title is “beekeeping: rescuing a really weak beehive”. There could be 2 or 3 videos about that beehive. I have one video about the newspaper method & lots more. If your into growing your own food, I have plenty of videos about that also, not to mention my backyard wildlife. ok, bye
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Thank Jeff, I did have bees in the lower super, just not too many, hence the separation of the newspaper. I’ll check out your videos later tonight!
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Please keep posting your progress Becky. I am cheering for you 
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Hi Beck, I took a look at those rescuing videos, I changed the titles to make them easier to find, hopefully. I hope you can understand my Ausie accent. I hope you have a clear day so you can look inside the hive, I think at this point it’s best for you to remove the paper & consolidate the frames. Anyway, whatever the outcome, it’s a valuable learning experience for you. take care, bye
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Thanks Gayle, I hope the weather clears enough for me to take a peek inside the hive tomorrow…fingers crossed.
Hi Jeff, Great videos. I don’t know what was more amazing for me to see, that awesome, old 65-ish Ford Scout (?) or the fact that you were so calmly inspecting your hives with just shorts and flip flops on!
Hi Beck, thank you:) it’s an 83 Toyota Land Cruiser Tray Back. I made a video of it by request if you want to take a look. Shorts & flip flops is quite rare for me while attending bees, those hives were all weak in numbers so with a little smoke, you can normally work bees like that, especially if the weather is fine. I’m a big sook & hate getting stung. My newspaper uniting video was uniting a cranky hive with a placid hive, could be worth a look, in that case most of the newspaper was gone within 24 hours. If you can understand what I’m saying, there’s little bits of information that could be helpful in all of my beekeeping videos. There’s only 3 of my beekeeping videos your best not to watch, you’ll understand what I mean when you read the titles, I wont say any more. take care, bye
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