I took 2 frames of brood eggs and bees out of a hive, put them in a empty super, closed them up for an hour with an opening for the field bees to get out and go back to their hive. I didn't them leaving the OB hive after being dropped into it. I then brought out my observation hive (OB) that had a queen and maybe 60 bees on a by then an empty drawn frame. I took out the middle frame, placed a piece of paper cut to block the bees from getting to the bottom frame and added a frame of capped brood and some eggs. I then took the other frame and shook the bees in the empty space above the second frame. I closed it up, put the extra frame back in the original hive. I reinstalled the OB hive back in the house. I could not find the queen on the bottom frame. I should have seen her right away because of only having a few bees below the piece of paper. My 7 year old grand daughter said, "I think she is in there" pointing to a 2" tightly balled cluster in the bottom left hand corner. The bees were so tight they could not move if they were not on the outer edge.
I checked on them later that night and they still had the same cluster. I really thought they had balled her. The next day i checked oh them and found the Queen working hard laying eggs. That was 3 weeks ago and they have been increasing in numbers for the last week since the brood has been hatching.
I wouldn't recommend it but even an hour without a queen helped them to accept her.
Jim
Sounds like you did everything you could based on the situation you where in. I like the fact that you attempted to get the field bees out before introducing them to the OB. Nice job and thanks for sharing.
Some smoke will break up the balling too. 24 hours is probably best for acceptance. Overnight seems to work well even if overnight is just 12 hours. Something about night gives them a chance to mull things over...
What was the reasoning behind getting out the field bees from the addition?
To discourage potential robbing?
Not wanting the extra bees hassling the queen since they are not focused on the brood?
Quote from: windfall on February 22, 2012, 08:33:17 AM
What was the reasoning behind getting out the field bees from the addition?
To discourage potential robbing?
Not wanting the extra bees hassling the queen since they are not focused on the brood?
I was mainly concerned with robbing. Few bees to protect the hive and the first couple of days are already stressful.
Jim
Quote from: Michael Bush on February 22, 2012, 01:41:31 AM
Some smoke will break up the balling too. 24 hours is probably best for acceptance. Overnight seems to work well even if overnight is just 12 hours. Something about night gives them a chance to mull things over...
Mike,
I only gave them one hour because the temperature was dropping and the next day was a work day. That is why I tried to use the paper trick. If she had stayed below it, it did take them about 36 hours to get an opening.
Thanks for the smoke thick to break them up. I'll keep that in mind if I see it happen again.
Is it possible they were protecting her?
Jim
>Is it possible they were protecting her?
Balling is more complicated than that... Huber was convinced that bees never kill a queen, at least not directly, but they confine her because she's not their queen and they think there must be two queens who need to fight it out to resolve the conflict. Introduction of queens according to Huber:
http://www.bushfarms.com/huber.htm#letter6 (http://www.bushfarms.com/huber.htm#letter6)