How deep do you go into the hive looking for swarm cells?

[Flygirl]

Hi All ~

My neighborhood was literally a buzz yesterday with a giant swarm.  My bee keeper neighbor came over to see if it was my bees ~ wasn't from his hives or mine. 

So, here's my question ... I've just added my first supers over the two brood boxes.  I've been checking the top brood box & peering down into the bottom box from above but I haven't actually gone down there & removed frames.  It's all looked healthly & calm but now I'm really worrried about swarm cells & the possibility of them taking off.

Should I go down to the first box & inspect the hive?  Oh bother!  What to do?

Thanks in advance for any advice, suggestions & warnings :)

[JP]

Yes, go in and do a check, make sure the queen has room to lay.


...JP

[annette]

I would go down and check on the frames in the brood supers below. At least once a month I check on the brood supers to make sure the queen has room to lay and open up the brood nest if necessary to keep them from swarming.

When did you check them last???

[annette]

See great minds think a like!!

[SgtMaj]

and open up the brood nest if necessary to keep them from swarming.

I'm curious what you mean by "open up the brood nest to keep them from swarming"?

[JP]

and open up the brood nest if necessary to keep them from swarming.

I'm curious what you mean by "open up the brood nest to keep them from swarming"?

Meaning giving the queen room to lay by swapping out undrawn frames with honey frames.


...JP

[chris8126]

I am totally new to beekeeping, so this might sound dumb.  Flygirl said that her neighbor came to see if the swarm was his or hers and it wasn't either ones, so how could they tell it wasn't theirs.  I know that you can mark the queen but if a hive swarms that means that a new queen, unmarked, emerges and takes part of the bees to find more space?  I know I need to read up on beekeeping more, I have a book on the way, just trying to pick up some tidbits on this forum.

[sc-bee]

Some of the things to look for in a hive that may have swarmed (not an inclusive list by no means):

-Old open queen cells and possibly other queen cells present
-A reduction in the population of the hive
-Congested brood nest area w/ backfilling of honey
-May be the lack of new eggs and amount of capped brood in relation to open brood (they place the old
  queen on a diet and backfill to cut down on the amount of eggs she will lay).

As stated above keep brood nest open--- lots of different methods to achieve this (open by replacing frames, splits etc), try a search a search on site.

Once you find queen cells swarming is usually inevitable. Of course that is what they want to do, swarm :-D!

>Flygirl said that her neighbor came to see if the swarm was his or hers and it wasn't either ones, so how could they tell it wasn't theirs.

Maybe an inspection was done and old marked queens were there or she said he was experienced and probably recognized the signs that they had not swarmed.

[Flygirl]

OMG!!  I went into one of my hives today & went DEEP to the bottom brood box.  The second box was so heavy I could hardly lift if off ~  I'm a strong one (for a girl/woman) so it was really heavy. 

In the bottom box the bees had drawn comb filled with brood from the bottom of the frames down to the bottom board!!  I could hardly pull the frames out...but I did & removed the brood comb.  There weren't any queen cells or swarm cells but WHY would them build down?  I think you're all going to say they're crowded but there's room....

The second box was full but there's a super on & everything is finally blooming & the sun was out the past 2 days ~  YIKES what else do they want?  New digs ~  please say "NO".

OK ~  please reassure me that I did the right thing by removing the burr comb off the bottom frames?  I took a bunch of pictures but I need to figure out how to do that....  OK ~ I'm trying ~ here it is. 

SOme of the pictures are fuzzy because my hands were shaking!  yikes ~ FG

[Flygirl]

OK ~ I'm a loser ~ I couldn't get the photos uploaded.  Or maybe I'm not able too because I'm a young one?

I'll look at the tutorial.  I really want to share the photos with you all because they're pretty cool.  Plus we got to observe a number of bees emerging out of their cells.   My 4 year old son was with me & was so excited!!  Later a rougue bee came buzzing around & he got really scared & said that bee is mad because we hurt the babies.  Oh man ~ yes, I felt really crummy. :(

I didn't have an empty brood frame handy or I would have rubber banded all the comb into the frame!  I didn't anticipate all the burr comb ~ 5 or 6 frames so it would have filled another whole empty frame.

I feel like a very naughty bee keeper ~ How does one anticipate things like this??

FG

Coming attractions ~ Pictures!  I hope ~

[annette]

and open up the brood nest if necessary to keep them from swarming.

I'm curious what you mean by "open up the brood nest to keep them from swarming"?

Read this on swarm control and Michael talks about the subject very clearly. This is how I learned from him.

http://www.bushfarms.com/beesswarmcontrol.htm

[klesage121]

Thanks annette for the link I read through quickly alot of very good information for a newbie, got it on my favs list now.

[Scadsobees]

And don't "go into the hive" looking for swarm cells.

Most of the time you can expose the box you are checking, carefully tip it back so that you can see the bottom, smoke the bees off of the bottom edge of the comb, and check for swarm cells that way.

Just make sure when you tip it that the edge you are tipping on is firmly on the hive, it is exciting when you tip the box full of bees off of the hive!

-rick

[utahbeekeeper]

And FlyGirl . . . . I am not a fan of brood box rotation EXCEPT when the bottom box is broodless and full of honey.  In this case, rotation . . . . that is placing the box with brood on the bottom and the honey bound box on top of that one just under the super is a good idea.  Don't be quick to take many frames of honey out because up there as well as here in Utah, the bees NEED 80 or 90+ pounds of honey for the long winter.

You an aviator?  Just wonderin' about the nic.  Bee well!!

[Flygirl]

Thank you all for the suggestions.  Thanks for the link Annette ~  I need to look at Michael's site again. 

Rick ~ I don't think I could tip the top brood box.  It's too heavy & once I had it tipped I couldn't hold it & remove the burr comb from underneath.  I'm working by myself so I have to do everything the most energy effecient way for me.  I'm always looking for swarm cells, queen cells, the queen, etc.... Not hoping for problems but on the lookout :)

Utahbeek ~ I'm a grounded flyer :)  Fuel is too expensive for a working artist.  Work & not much play.  My brother is a commercial pilot for a private jet service so I get to ride along sometimes.  He doesn't like small planes & I don't really care for the big ones :)  Ah well ~ thanks for the suggestion to rotate the boxes.  That was somthing I hadn't thought of but you're right that the bottom box is full of honey/nectar & that's probably why the queen is laying brood off the bottom frame.  I think I'll try that.

[DayValleyDahlias]

Now this thread causes me to ponder once again...

1.  Don't brood boxes also have honey on the outer frames?  On MB's site it mentions mostly B's & E's no H's

2.  To open up the brood box, do I remove the honey frames?  Is it okay to remove the honey frames?  Seriously this really confuses me.

I am going to inspect tomorrow and I want to be prepared to open up the brood boxes on both my mediums and deeps.

With the mediums, I just pulled the honey frames and moved them up to the supers and gave the broods empties with starter strips...but the deep is a different story...nowhere to move the honey frames to, except my kitchen...hhhmmmmm

[JP]

Sharon, its fine to have some honey and yes you will have some on brood sections you just don't want a surplus to the point they become honeybound.

Yep, bring those full frames in the kitchen and enjoy them.


...JP

[Flygirl]

DayValleyDahlia said:

"with the mediums, I just pulled the honey frames and moved them up to the supers and gave the broods empties with starter strips...but the deep is a different story.."

This is my problem too that in that I have deeps & mediums.  Another reason for me to switch to all mediums so I can move the frames around as I need too with too much disruption.   Thanks for the  reply & I'll be curious about your inspection....please do a post & up me/us.

FG

[Brian D. Bray]

The 2 outside frames in any brood box is always stores.  They can be harvested as long as they are replaced while the bees still have an opportunity to draw out the comb and fill it.

[DayValleyDahlias]

Brian,

That totally clears my muddled mind, Thanks~*~*~