swarm returned to hive; how can I prevent another swarm ? (in the suburbs here)

mushmushi · August 01, 2009, 10:27:30 AM

Hello everyone.

I have a bit of a problem with one of my hives.

info:
* first year I'm doing this so I have no dry comb only foundation
* location: Quebec (Canada)
* two hives
* started at the beginning of June from nuc (4 frames of capped brood full of bees + 1 pollen/honey)
* 9 frames per hive (I should put 10 for the brood supers)
* currently 3 standard supers
* bottom super if fully built
* 2nd super has 5 frames built
* 3rd super has 3 frames built

Last week I have noticed some queen cells and I have removed some of them; I decided to check again soon enough and remove the rest.
However, my bees swarmed. Huge grayish, buzzing cloud, 30 meters from the hive, they were all circling and staying near a pine tree.
An hour later, they went on the hive and slowly started entering the hive.

I have opened the hive, inspected frame by frame, and removed all queen cells (about 20!!).
Queen cells were at the bottom of the frames AND in the middle (supersedure?)
The queen was also in the hive. I did not notice fresh eggs but then again I did not have enough sunlight (cloudy).

Capped brood looks nice, very little holes. I do not have a lot of honey but other beekeepers also do not have much. Perhaps the season is late due to a lot of rain.

I really want to avoid a swarm because I live in the suburbs. There is a forest/orchard in front of my house; but no clue if the bees would escape there.

I have also noticed a small queen cell in my second, smaller hive.

Someone has mentioned splits / divides to control a swarm.
Currently, all I have is an extra super and frames but no foundation.
I would not want to increase my hive population yet.

What should I do ?

How are other people dealing with hives and swarms in suburbs / big cities ?

Thank you,

MM

mushmushi · August 01, 2009, 11:06:09 AM

pictures of my hives as of today:

my two hives
left hive (the one
that swarmed) entrance
right hive entrance

fish_stix · August 02, 2009, 11:11:01 AM

If you notice swarm cells do not destroy them as you could be left with a queenless hive. You can split the hive by taking the old queen with 2-3 frames of capped brood plus some honey and pollen and the bees on those frames and move them to a nuc box, or even another hive body if you don't have a nuc box. The old hive will continue to care for the swarm cells and in 2-3 weeks you'll have a new queen the natural way, plus a new hive.

mushmushi · August 02, 2009, 07:06:44 PM

> If you notice swarm cells do not destroy them as you could be left with a queenless hive.

That's okay since I would have no problem with buying a new queen.

> You can split the hive by taking the old queen with 2-3 frames of capped brood plus some honey and pollen and the bees on those frames and move them to anuc
> box, or even another hive body if you don't have a nuc box. The old hive will continue to care for the swarm cells and in 2-3 weeks you'll have a new queen the
> natural way, plus a new hive.

I do not want to have more than 2 hives, not that I have anything against bees but because of lack of space, good neighbour relationships and new hive equipement.

Kathyp · August 02, 2009, 07:20:14 PM

nice looking hives. raccoon control?

mushmushi · August 07, 2009, 11:20:21 AM

Quote from: kathyp on August 02, 2009, 07:20:14 PM
nice looking hives. raccoon control?

skunk prevention ;)

I noticed these little buggers in my yard so I decided to prevent them from going to my hives.

Scadsobees · August 07, 2009, 01:55:46 PM

Hmm...I'd recommend a split and recombine, but you killed all the queen cells. I think that you may just need to ride it out. If they swarm now the hive is going to be in some trouble, you will want to transfer a frame of eggs from your other hive into it. But they may not swarm.

You have plenty of equipment for a split, if you consolidate some of the empty frames, you have a whole empty super on top of the hive.

In the future, leave one queen cell, put the queen and a split in a seperate box, then when the new queen is laying you can combine them back togather with newspaper.

Rick

mushmushi · August 08, 2009, 12:38:18 AM

Thanks for the tips Rick.

Right now I'm definitely riding this one and I'll keep posting what's happening with the hive in question.

Cheers,

MM

mushmushi · August 10, 2009, 11:20:23 PM

A few days ago, I inspected again all the hive's frames and yet again, more queen cells. However, I didn't remove them this time.

So I split the colony. Seems like I don't have much of a choice really.

I moved 5 frames full of bees as well as the queen in a new hive that I've built. The frames consist of mostly capped brood, some uncapped brood, a bit of honey and a bit of pollen.

I have noticed that there are about 1-2 bees flying perhaps every 20-30 seconds out of the hive.

Is that enough ? The bees cover well the frames; I suspect most of them are nursing bees and not foraging ones.

I plan to get rid of the old frames which came with the nuc (they are dark and ugly) and reunite them once I have a new queen in my 'older' hive.

I'll post new pictures soon.

Cheers,

MM