combining during honey flow

[heaflaw]

I have about 15 hives.  7 of them I don't think will make enough honey for me to rob.  4 of them swarmed heavily a few weeks ago and the other 3 may have old queens or something.  Anyway, is it too late to combine to make stronger hives to gather a surplus?  My flow will end in 5 or 6 weeks.  Should I combine with swarms I got a few weeks ago or will that cause them to swarm again?

Any suggestions?

[abejaruco]

the answer is not easy. The best way to harvest is controlling the swarms, but is not easy (for me). My hives produce bees, and more bees, and not always honey. If I split putting the queen away, I find frames plenty of pollen and few honey. It is terrible.
I am using now a system based on the superposition of hives, or skyscrapers. I can see any advantages, better than the combination or fusion. Later, I break the skyscraper, remain a hive very populated, I add supers and they works. I dont use queen excluder.

That´s what I can say.  :)

[Shizzell]

I wouldn't combine a swarm with another established hive at all. 1st. The swarm (usually) already has a queen. I would put that swarm in a nuc or a deep (depending on size) and give them a couple of frames of brood/eggs. 5-6 weeks is a long time for honey production. Depending on your location I bet you can still get a a couple of shallows full, maybe a deep or two.

Jake

[Brian D. Bray]

If your interest is honey production over number of bee hives I's say combine away.
More bees means more foraging which means more honey.  Killing the less productive queens and combining hives is an excellent way to strengthen a hive for maximum production.

How is your local forage?  As Finskey would say "much honey needs good pastures."  If you have average to poor forage area you're still not going to get the honey production you want even if you combine your hives. 

Scout out the bee forage in a 1-2 mile radius of your beeyard.  What was, is, and can still bloom and how much of it there is will tell you if combining is worth while.  Forage plant locales are often overlooked when determining honey production.  No forage=no harvest.  In some areas the bees may be hard pressed to harvest enough stores to over winter, while only a few miles away the bees are bringing in lots of surplus honey. 

[heaflaw]

Thanks for comments so far.

I've had around 15 hives for 5 years.  Every year about half make 2, 3, or 4 shallow or medium supers of honey.  But the other half make none.  I know part of the reason is because of heavy swarming, but in looking back through my notes, I have 3 hives that have not made any surplus for 2 years and have not made any at all this year.  They looked good in the fall and also early spring.  So, I think it may be genetics or a poor queen.  I'm tired of spending time looking after hives that won't produce.  My flow should be good for a month more and my "good" hives will make about 2 more supers' full each.  I've taken off a super each from 4 of my hives so far.

   

[Brian D. Bray]

You've answered you're own question.  As I understand it the same 4 or 5 hives are not producing year after year.  In that case destroying those queens and combining them with some of your other hives that are producing a surplus would be the way to procede.

[KONASDAD]

Two weka hives rarely if ever equal one strong hive .

[Brian D. Bray]

Yes, but 2 weaks hives can equal a moderate sized hive and that gives it a much better chance to be successful both from a harvest stand point and a survival stand point.

[heaflaw]

Another part to my question: 

I'm going to combine what I think is a hive with a young queen with one with an old queen which I will kill.  Part of my weak hives are because they swarmed a few weeks ago.  I assume these have young queens.  I plan to combine these with either a hive that is weak from poor genetics/weak queen or from a swarm that I hived.  If I combine a hive that swarmed with a newly hived swarm, will I not cause the combination to swarm again? Not knowing which swarm came from which hive, I might put the swarm back in the hive from which it came.  I've always read not to do this.

[Brian D. Bray]

I've combined after swarms back to its parent hive a good number of times.  As long as remove the queen you don't want and wait 24 hours, I've never had a problem doing it.  Just use the newspaper combining method for safety sake.

[heaflaw]

Brian,

THanks for your advice