swarm in sept

Eugene Willson · September 04, 2015, 06:21:47 PM

Hi all!
I had a hive swarm Wednesday with three swarms, I knew there were three queen cells in the hive and I thought they were replacing the queen I got with a package in June . She had already swarmed once and now again. I killed her (green dot) and have the other two in hives that I will recombine this fall.
I must be doing something wrong, but this hive had a complete empty med on the bottom with a deep above since day one in late July. about mid August I put a med on top with some brood and they have that about 1/3rd full of brood and 1/3rd honey still has undrawn frames. The deep has two undrawn frames out of eleven. It has a top and bottom entrance across the whole front of the hive and they are in full sun until 4pm. The hive is about twenty feet from a .65 acre pond. there is still one queen cell unopened in the hive and I assume this will be their new queen. Any ideas or was she just swarmy?
Thanks
Gene

GSF · September 04, 2015, 10:45:40 PM

Have you been steadily feeding them? If so they may think the flow never stopped. Another thought; full is full. Even though they had room they may have backfilled the brood nest. Maybe checkerboard the frames if possible next time. Feed them new swarms big time. I don't know the weather up there but I could only guess it may be a little late in the year. Others with experience in your climate can give you a more accurate idea.

Eugene Willson · September 05, 2015, 11:09:24 AM

Hi!
I only fed them about 1 gal. when they swarmed in July , I would assume it is way to late for them to overwinter. The brood was about 70 % capped with 15 to 20% clean cells 50% of the frames were 90 % capped and no new eggs but there were clean empty cells.
The honey was on the top 5% or so except on the outside frames that were mostly full but not all capped.

Gene

Michael Bush · September 05, 2015, 12:12:21 PM

You can make any bees swarm all the way up to a frost if you feed them enough fast enough that they run out of room in the brood nest or let them get too crowded.

Eugene Willson · September 05, 2015, 09:08:32 PM

You can make any bees swarm all the way up to a frost if you feed them enough fast enough that they run out of room in the brood nest or let them get too crowded.

I only fed these about a gallon when they had capped honey so I quit feeding then. I thought they had plenty of room and good ventilation, how much room do you have to maintain? And how do you get them to fill all the frames? They had a complete empty med under and 1/3 empty med on top. I keep rotating empty frames to the center on top but the last one they left undrawn.
Thanks
Gene

OldMech · September 06, 2015, 10:27:21 AM

There are some questions still.. do you use foundation? How many bees were in that hive, meaning, how many frames of bees?

If they get crowded on the foundation they have drawn they can see the next piece of plastic as a barrier..
I was taught to move the frames over by 1 slot each inspection, when they are drawing them. This lowly makes new frames "Primary" in the hive.. as a main, or primary frame they will WANT it drawn out. The slow rotation allows the brood to emerge before that frame becomes a side frame, and the bees will draw the frames as they slowly rotate to the middle, or primary positions.. keeping them busy (employed) helps keep them from swarming as well.
Not sure why you put the medium under the deep? Put it on top when they have the box under it mostly drawn.. Then move up a drawn frame or two.
This also has to be done when there are enough bees. If you have a single deep worth of bees, having two medium boxes on top wont matter much because they wont FEEL like they need it, so wont touch it.
Spraying a frame with light syrup may also help get them lured to that frame and get them started on it.
Temperature plays a critical part in getting frames drawn. If it is cool they dont like to draw new frames.

In the end, what you have are BEES.. They are much like the pretty girl you married (if you are married) You can do everything RIGHT, but she will still decide you did something wrong. Those bees decided to swarm. Even if you did everything right, they can still make that decision.

When I see queen cells, i usually limit them to two.. Most often I cut them out and use them elsewhere, but leave two in the main hive. It limits the odds.. if one of them is not viable there is still a second chance. If they both emerge the chances are good they will fight. If one is born before the other she will likely destroy the one still in the cell... If one of them DOES swarm, you only lose one swarm instead of several casts
I had one swarm out of about 50 hives this year, and like you, mine happened last week.. WAY too late... so I caught the swarm and will re combine it to the hive once those bees realize that they are hopelessly queen less. (Yes I removed all their queen cells. ONLY because I caught the original queen to put back in there.)
Everything is controversial in beekeeping, and everyone will have a better idea. What I posted above is just how I do it..

AR Beekeeper · September 06, 2015, 07:13:04 PM

Why did you kill the queen with the green dot?

Eugene Willson · September 07, 2015, 11:58:34 AM

Hi,

Why did you kill the queen with the green dot?

She is the one that swarmed so much and is the oldest, also the new queens will be mated from local drones and I will try to raise some queens from them in an effort to reduce the swarm tendencies and cross with the local survivors.
Gene

Eugene Willson · September 07, 2015, 12:19:57 PM

Hi,

There are some questions still.. do you use foundation? How many bees were in that hive, meaning, how many frames of bees?

Originally I bought deeps and med hive bodies, then I found the Bush farms sight and liked the logic so the plan was to have room under the deep for the bees to hang out on until I could get them to move out of the deep by adding med on top. I will eventually go to all med. I also bought some plastic mann lake pf120 but about 80% of the hive is foundationless and the first hive was all foundationless. It swarmed anyway before it was full too. the bees have drawn all but one of the plastic frame med and left the last foundationless frame undrawn. There were about 6 frames of bees in the deep and 5 in the med I had to put some broodin the med to get them to move up into it. I was rotating frames from the outside to the middle from both sides when they stopped drawing the last med foundationless frame.
Thanks for the info, I need to do something different just trying to figure out what.
Gene

OldMech · September 10, 2015, 08:00:42 PM

Sometimes you can do everything right and they still do what they want. They ARE all female, so count your blessings if they did half the stuff you wanted them to

Dont fret the deep, leave it on the bottom, put the mediums on top. When spring arrives they should all be AT or near the top of your hive. At which time you can then pull the deep out, rotate the top bo to the bottom, and add a new medium for them to draw on top... No rush, no worries.. sounds like you have the right ideas and plans, now you just need to convince the bees... Let me know if you figure out how to do that!!