I bought two 4-frame nucs from a local gentleman and put them in two 10-frame deeps about a week ago. I feed each of them 1:1 sugar water from a boardman. There is a decent sized citrus grove right here, and there seems to be a strong nectar flow.
I noticed that one of them ("hive B") had much less outside activity, but was consuming the sugar water about twice as fast as hive A. I opened both of them yesterday and found almost no capped brood in B, and some queen cells high on the frames (abt. 3-4). I found the queen; she appeared healthy.
In the remaining 6 frames, I had bare duragilt foundation. I noticed that they had done a decent amount of comb drawing on 2 or 3 of their new frames, and were also making a bit of burr comb. Then, after doing some work on their hive yesterday, I noticed that they drastically ramped up their outside activity, with levels comparable to hive A. They are still consuming the sugar water about twice as fast as A also.
What's going on with this hive? Are they about to supersede? Swarm? Should I do anything?
Maybe they are being robbed...
That exact thing happened this spring to a friend. One hive was taking syrup hand over fist. When an inspection was done, the hive was all but dead (and ultimately absconded). He thought all the while that because it took more syrup that it was the healthier. Quite the reverse was true.
okay, so should I remove the boardman feeders and put entrance reducers on both hives?
Also, we'll have a cool night tonight (around 35, which is cold for N Fla). Maybe removing the feeders would be a good idea anyway.
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesrobbing.htm
Quote from: charles on April 07, 2009, 10:45:26 AM
okay, so should I remove the boardman feeders and put entrance reducers on both hives?
Yes, or robber screens if you have them.
QuoteAlso, we'll have a cool night tonight (around 35, which is cold for N Fla). Maybe removing the feeders would be a good idea anyway.
If you're using boardman feeders on a new package of hived bees you are begging to get them robbed. Using an internal type of feeder is better and it gives the bees within the hive a better chance to defend their food source.
I make it a rule that if I'm feeding a newly hived package, split, nuc, or swarm, that I also community feed the entire bee yard to prevent robbing of the hive being feed internally. With a community feeder all the hives go to it, including the one being fed, and overlook the hive being fed. But if using a community feeder it is important to place it at least 50 feet from the bee yard in a direction opposite that of where the new hive is located in the bee yard.
I removed the front feeders and reduced the entrance of hive B. I'll take a look in a few days to see how they're doing.
The nerve of some bees!