Out of curiosity, at this time of year say you feel you have surplus honey
stores ( say 3 medium supers worth) and you want to start another hive
with the bees inside those supers, can you do this successfully?
Can you even order a queen this time of year? If so how is the general quality
of queens supplied now as compared with other times of the year?
Thanks
fall queens are generally superior to spring queens do to less problems with the weather during mating flights. Is there really that much of a surplus of bees in your hive.
Remember a lot of these bees will probably bee dead in the next month as they are used up foraging bees. Dont weaken the colony too much just before winter.
It's getting a big late for a split. It's possible they could build up enough for winter, but it's pushing it. The first week of August is about as late as you can get them built back up around here, and I'm further South than you.
To do a split it takes more than honey. You'll need all the things that make a hive a hive.
http://www.bushfarms.com/beessplits.htm
Thanks for the information, I will not attempt the split this year. But
was curious about the possibility of it working this late in the season.
Hey Yall!
I just saw a place advertising Australian packages and queens from"Beeweaver.com"..Theyre supposed to be ready after Sept 17th I think. I'm gonna get some of these and try them out. Of course I'll probably feed them through the winter here as I'm in the Wichita Falls Tx area and we usually have a week winter I said "usually"....With climate change and global warming and all those other things "THEY" dont want you to know about we could be under 6 ft of snow by October! ;)
your friend,
john
Johnnybigfish,
Just a note since I was reading the forums. Read the "LA Times" in the colony collapse forum. It talks about bees being imported into the US have the CCD and the Israeli virus. Just thought I would let you know incase you did not see the post.