swarm in tree, queen on ground

Pi · March 28, 2009, 08:41:46 AM

I have an empty nuc in a tree that's baited with pheromone. This week one of my hives swarmed and they happily went to the baited nuc. 30 feet away I noticed about 50 bees clustered on a rock. I took a closer look at the cluster on the rock, and I noticed the queen bee. I've had swarms to baited nucs before, and I'm yet to get one with a queen. It seems like a swarm can ignore their own queen and go right to the pheromone bait instead. Comments please? By the way, queen and swarm were reunited and living in a nuc.

BjornBee · March 28, 2009, 08:47:04 AM

I never really thought about that before. Interesting.

JP · March 28, 2009, 09:20:37 AM

How many queenless swarms are we talking of here? Most likely swarms with virgins.

What doesn't add up however is that queens follow a swarm. I have to ask, how many have you caught that were queenless?

...JP

Pi · March 28, 2009, 09:36:33 AM

This is my 4th swarm in the same baited nuc. No queen yet, except for the one I just found on the rock.

JP · March 28, 2009, 09:39:28 AM

How large a swarm can your baited nuc boxes accomodate? Are they medium or deep nucs? What are you placing inside the nuc, frames, etc...

...JP

JP · March 28, 2009, 09:49:54 AM

Pi, this is what I'm thinking. You are catching after swarms which contain virgin queens that bees don't find very appealing.

Try placing much larger traps out, ones that could accomodate primary swarms, that contain the mated queen.

This should resolve your issue with queenless swarms.

...JP

Michael Bush · March 28, 2009, 10:53:48 AM

Usually the attraction works both ways though. The bees are looking for two pheromones, the queen and the cluster (QMP and Nasanov) while the queen is looking for the cluster (Nasanov) so eventually they usually find each other.

Brian D. Bray · March 28, 2009, 11:25:44 PM

If you are using medium nucs for bait hives or swarm traps it is necessary to used it double stacked. A single medium nuc box will almost always have all or part of the swarm abscond as it isn't large enough to hold primary swarms. 2nd swarms, maybee, 3rd and 4th after swarms for sure. But I've lost several primary swarms to having too small a box to accommidate them. A Deep nuc is really the smallest size bait hive one should use, traps should be of like size. An empty card board box will work better as a swarm trap then a single medium nuc.