Advice please, on bee removal and combine

[Boom Buzz]

I have one hive that continues to struggle.  It is queenless still.  I had placed a frame of eggs in it on September 1, two queen cells were made and capped, and by Sept. 17 they had emerged.  I could not find a queen today, nor any sign of one - no eggs.  The 10 frame deep has fairly good stores, but the bee population is very light - maybe two frames of bees.  I have seen bees carrying in pollen (just today) which I thought I had read is a good sign queen wise!?

I have a chance to do a bee removal from a shed this Saturday.  Clearly it is not optimal to do a removal but these bees are going to be exterminated by the owner and I thought I'd give it shot to hive them and give them as much of the honey as I can as well. 

My plan is to combine my weak hive with the removed bees and hope that the queen comes with them.  Is this a sound thing to do?

Thought I would do the newspaper separation placing the new bees and whatever brood comb and honey comb can fit into a second deep on top of the existing deep.  I figure I will lose the struggling hive anyways so why not give it a shot.  I realize my weak hive may have a queen that has not mated or started laying yet, but at this point I am thinking better to have two queens and let one get killed off than to let the hive fizzle out altogether.

Any other advice? 

We have had a little bit  of cold weather, but no freeze yet and days are still in the 70's nights back into the 40's, so the weather is cooperating!

Thanks in advance for any comments!

John



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[alflyguy]

Your plan seems sound to me. It's iffy getting the queen on a cutout. Your not sure about whether your hive has a queen yet. The combine gives you two chances to be queen right and more bees going into winter. Make sure you feed, feed, feed.

[iddee]

I think your plan would be perfectly OK, if you do the combine on Oct. 6th. That will be 35 days from egg. By then you will know if either or both have a queen, and can pick the one you want to survive if there's one in each hive.

[Scadsobees]

I'd guess you have a virgin or newly deflowered queen in there.

Your premise is correct.  2 frames of bees is not going to make it.  a cutout probably isn't going to make it.

When you do the combine, make sure you spray them both down with some sugar/vanilla water and do a newspaper combine.  

They will probably abandon a lot of the brood. You'll want to clean up the mess and get them to the smallest size possible before winter.  And feed feed feed.

Rick

[Boom Buzz]

Thanks for the information - all.

Looks like the cutout is a go.  I tried to convince the owner to wait until April, but they say the bees must go now.  They are impacting their horse riding business and they have plans for the shed area they want to implement now!

I will feed, feed, feed as a couple of you have pointed out.  I have a top hive feeder and I am thinking about putting as much honey comb and honey in the feeder as possible and let the bees get at it this way.  So they get it and the other hives don't.  Good idea?  Bad idea?  Or is it better to just feed syrup?
Plus I will put out syrup feed at a table for all the hives to take.

And thanks for the tip on spraying down with sugar/vanilla syrup.  What does this do for them exactly to help the combine?  Neutralize smell bias for their own colony maybe?

Weather is still looking reasonably nice for the next two weeks.  Maybe get one night of frost, but the days are still in the 69's and 70's.

Given that winter is fast approaching, Is it better to just do a combine right from the start, ie., tomorrow?  Or to keep them separate as IDDEE suggests to see if I wind up with two queens, eliminate one and then combine once the one hive realizes it is not queen right?  Not questioning your superior knowledge on the subject Iddee, just weighing the potential for negative weather versus the best way to go about combining.   :-D

Thanks again,

John

[Kathyp]

just make sure you use an entrance reducer.  the smell of that honey in the hive will cause robbing if you don't.  good luck!

on the queen thing, i would do as iddee suggests.  you want the best queen not just the one that wins the fight.  if you get a queen from that cutout you can off the other one and then combine.  if you have a frame of drawn comb that you can put in the middle of that cutout, chances are a queen would go right to it and start laying.  you'd know in a couple days if she's in there or not. or...you might find her doing the cutout.  i usually do if i take it slow and watch for her.  if you work from the outside in on the removal, chances are she'll end up right in the middle of the brood comb for you :-)