Early Split

Started by Beeboy01, March 02, 2015, 05:47:50 PM

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Beeboy01

Well I split my last strong hive today, started the fall with two nice hives but found out the hard way that one didn't make it through the winter. Still trying to recover from a small beetle invasion that hit the yard two years ago.
  The way it went down today in the yard was I took the strong hive which was two deeps and a shallow completely packed with bees. There were so many bees I was afraid it was going to have an early swarm which is why I broke it up. First I pulled one deep off it and moved it over to the second hive's location. I did that to pick up any field bees from the hive that crashed. As I moved that hive body I pulled two mixed frames of brood and put them in a nuc. The second box from the strong hive was left in place and also had two frames pull for the nuc.
  The box that was moved looked like it could have the queen in it, there was lots of brood and house bees present in it. I put a shallow that was about 1/2 full of honey on it  just to keep it going till field bees start up.
  The box in the orignial location had the deep with what was left of the crashed hive put on top. The deep had a  little honey and a little pollen along with a handful of bees still in it. I figure there are going to be a lot of field bees coming back to that location and I wanted to provide as much room as possible for them and save whatever I can from the crashed hive.
   The four frame nuc ended up with one frame of mixed pollen and honey, one and a half frames of brood and one drawn frame with a little honey, pollen and brood all together. 
  I'm not sure if I split the hive too early, I am seeing drones and some drone brood but haven't spotted any queen cells in the big hive. What does everybody think, will the nuc and split make queens? I plan to check again in a 2-3 days looking for fresh eggs and brood maybe move some around to provide young brood for all of them.
  Still way too early for queens and after getting burned the last few years with local nucs that died off after only a month I'm not buying any hives from local commercial yards. Kinda feel like I'm up a tree with this one, if I didn't split the hive it was going to swarm but the splitting could of done more damage than swarming. 

BeeMaster2

Blueboy,
I do not think you are too early. I have not seen any swarms but I am getting reports of swarms here. As long as you have eggs/ very young larvae, they will be fine. My only concern is having enough bees in each hive to feed and keep them warm.
Jim
Democracy is 2 wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well armed lamb contesting the vote.
Ben Franklin

Beeboy01

More than enough bees, haven't seen a hive this strong in a couple years. Looked more like a hive that had built up in mid July than one coming out of the winter. Too bad I can't find any local queens, the hive would be great to split into 4 or 5 nucs. They are still a little worked up from yesterday, picked up a sting from a guard bee this AM while getting the paper and walking the dog.

BeeMaster2

#3
Beeboy,
This evening, I split 2 hives, one a 3 medium nuc and the other a 3 medium 10 frame, and made 5 hives. One hive had numerous frames with queen cells that I used them to make sure they all had queens. I still have several hives that I also need to split. Hope to bee able to get a couple more done this week after work each day.
My wife helped out and it was great working together. She brought out a log book and kept good notes.
Jim
Democracy is 2 wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well armed lamb contesting the vote.
Ben Franklin

Beeboy01

Didn't spot any queen cells but there are plenty of drones and drone cells, my yard just might be a week or two behind your hives. Used to keep a log book till the great die off two years ago, it is a lot easier to keep track of the bee yard with only one or two hives, don't need to write a lot of stuff down, about the only good point about a small yard.

Beeboy01

Just did a quick inspection and all looked good. Spotted the queen in the moved split along with some fresh eggs and brood. Took one frame of the fresh eggs and brood and placed it in the brood nest of the other half, should be enough to get a queen cell started. The queenless hive was a bit worked up, one of the girls got through my veil and popped me on the cheek, ouch, not a bad sting but still made me run away for a few minutes.  :wink:
  Going to give it a good week or two before another inspection, will be looking for a queen cell in the queenless hive this time. Even the 4 frame nuc looked good with plenty of bees on the brood.
  Calling for warmer weather but with a good chance of rain for the next week which will help keep the girls in the hives.

BeeMaster2

Bee sure to time your inspection for right around the time the q cells are capped. Bee gentle with any frames that have queen cells, try to keep them upright. You do not want to bee inspecting you hive after the queen has hatched and before she has proven her self by having a bunch of capped brood. Give her at least 3 weeks after she hatches.
Jim
Democracy is 2 wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well armed lamb contesting the vote.
Ben Franklin

Beeboy01

Sawdust,  I'll give the hive at least 2 weeks before checking them, queen cells take a good 2 weeks to develop and get capped over. They hatch in about 21 days so I'll try to keep my mitts out of the hives for a little while.
Need to call around for early queens as a plan "B" just in case. The hive is a little hotter than I like and is due for a requeening this year.

johng

Your bee math is off a little. Queens emerge from egg in 16 days. So if your bees started a cell with a 24hr old larva you should have a virgin in about 12-13 days. But, there really isn't much you can do at the 2 week inspection. Your bees will make a virgin queen without a doubt. Your 4 week inspection is the one you need to pay attention to, that's the one where you should see new eggs and larva. If not that's the time to intervene.

njfl

Yes, I would definitely have a plan B as far as a queen source goes.

Beeboy01

Kicked plan "B" into action today and requeened the split and made two small nucs from the main hive. Couldn't find any queen sign in the split just in the orignial hive. The splits has been bringing in honey and I was lucky enough to pull 2 shallow that were drawn out and filled, ended up with about 4 gallons of a dark wildflower honey. Left plenty of stores on the hives, now just need to check the queen cages in about 4 days and hope it will all work out. Feels strange taking apart my only functional hive.

Beeboy01

Opened the tops of the hives just to check the queens. One nuc had a dead queen in the cage, the other looked like it had accepted the new queen which was still in the cage. I released the queen and combined both nucs into a nuc tower. The split had accepted it's new queen so I released her also. I know I'm rushing it but will be out of town for a few days and wanted to get the hives set up before leaving. I can work with three hives, maybe get some more honey and another split by mid summer.
  Now I need to leave the girls alone for around two weeks and watch the incoming field bees for pollen which is a sign of brood rearing.