I've been reading up on OTS queen rearing and Mel Disselkoen says to start one week before the start of swarming. Can anybody tell me when swarms start at 32.92 deg. N latitude? I understand it advances fairly predictably for each degree of latitude, but I don't understand the starting point to calculate this. Is this fairly predictable? Or just a wild guess?
Dallas,
It varies from year to year, especially here in the south. 2 years ago my hives were busting at the seams by the end of February. Last year, I did splits at the end of February and it was too early and most of the hives lost their queens.
Jim
So is there something to look for to help predict the start of swarms, like when the first drones appear or something? Has Randy Oliver or someone given us any guidance that you know of?
When the food source is abundant in the spring after a dormant winter. I watch for activity.
Steve
It's not a exacting time, what Mel is getting at is "anytime after". For us it's anytime after May 1st, but the hive strength,weather, flow, or drone availability might put us into the second week of May. I would pick the local beek's brains and see when your major flow starts and plan to do evaluations a couple weeks before that.
I normally start looking for swarms the first really nice week we have in March. But, it does vary from year to year. Like Jim said two years ago I had two massive prime swarms on Jan. 31. So it's somewhat of a guessing game. Watch what the weather is doing and see what the bees are doing. You will obviously see lots of drone brood and most likely mature drones. But, you will also see lots of worker brood, 5-6frames of brood in a single deep, if you really pay attention you will notice them back filling the broodnest and you will start to see new white wax being drawn. All that combined with some nice spring like weather and you should start to see some swarms.
things to watch
a strong nector flow. and much bearding. can be indactors