Introducing new queen & shook swarm?

I've got one hive which contains a pretty grumpy queen. It's not unworkable but this year I'm planning to bump her off and replace her.

I've also been reading a few places about people who do a shook swarm every year and report that it has a positive effect on the bees overall. So I'm going to try that on half my hives this year.

My question is could I do both at the same time? Shake the bees into the new box and introduce a new queen in her cage.

When introducing a new you need to leave the hive queenless for a period of time. If I was doing it I would make sure all the bees are happy in their new home before introducing a new queen. You could make up a nuc with the old frames and introduce the queen to that and then unit it with the shook swarmed hive later.

i have done this but its a awful waste of brood unless the combs are really bad.i usually dont have time to go back to the apiary to add a new queen to a dequeened hive so i requeen there and then but with a hair roller cage with the end stuffed with newspaper.when i was using smaller cages and candy the queens were being released too quickly so the losses were quite high.using roller cages and newspaper,the acceptence rate is now very high

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When you take an old queen off, the hive makes emergency queen cells. When queen cells are capped after 5 days, the bees accept new queen very easily.
Then tske care that the new queen destroyes queen cells. If not, do it yourself.

It is 300% sure that shook swarm does not make the colony better. You must identyfy the thing, why the hive is not allright. Then ask, how to handle it. Shake shake shake heals nothing.

I think you could try it. That is essentially what happens when a package of bees are put together. Bees are shaken of comb and then a new queen is given to them in a cage.

I have heard of people that just move the grumpy bees in the evening,if they are so bad you can't even open them. Then they leave an empty hive with a caged queen for the flyers to go back to the next day, like an AF but with a caged queen waiting. The original hive is them easier to sort out. So I think it could work based on these two things.

If I did it I would smoke heavily (if they are grumpy you will probably need to do that in anyway) and spray them with syrup and feed at the time of doing the shook swarm .

May be worth only exposing the candy to the bees after a day or two, to give them more time to get used to her.

If you do go ahead please update this it would be good to know if it works.

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If combs are bad, lift old combs over the excluder and give new foundations into brood box. Worst you can do is to destroy brood.

You may put brood frames over the excluder too and bees draw new combs during flow. Then you have new combs for next summer.

Renewall of combs is annual operation and mostly I give foundations to hives during main flow.

During swarming you get new combs when you put AS on foundations. AS draw foundations in one week.

.often guys write that they do not have foundations. Yes, buy them. It is better that you have them stored all the time.

I see protheroe already does it, sorry that must have gone up while I was typing.

Finman said:

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It is 300% sure that shook swarm does not make the colony better.

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This is really want to try out, see if a shook swarm does make the hive more vigorous. Given I'm a hobbyist if it has a negative impact in terms of honey production it isn't a big issue for me.

I'm attracted in particular to the ability to knock the mites right down by removing the brood.

domino said:

This is really want to try out, see if a shook swarm does make the hive more vigorous. Given I'm a hobbyist if it has a negative impact in terms of honey production it isn't a big issue for me.

I'm attracted in particular to the ability to knock the mites right down by removing the brood.

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Hive more vigorous? What does it mean? You do not measure your skills with honey yield but what is the measure of "more vigorous"?

This tells that you do not know what to do and why.

Lets look varroa. It kills brood, but your are ready to kill brood 10 times more than varroa. How wise is this?

I recommend that you read some beekeeping book and I bet that it is more interesting than to do some hazard nursing actions.

If your desire is to do shook swarms, then this can still be achieved by doing a series of rolling shook swarms, finishing of with a vertical A/S and re unite, treating the broodless bees as you go, this will save all the brood and combs.

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In early summer I measure my succes of beekeeping with amount of brood frames. If they are not enough, rest of summer will not succeed. So, what idea is then to destroy brood frames or to stop laying?

Finally the amount of yield depends on how good are pastures around your hive. That is why I move them to better places for nain yield.

Hivemaker. said:

If your desire is to do shook swarms, then this can still be achieved by doing a series of rolling shook swarms, finishing of with a vertical A/S and re unite, treating the broodless bees as you go, this will save all the brood and combs.

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don't waste the brood for no reason

It is certainly a good opportunity to requeen, whatever you do. Bees without brood or their old queen will readily accept a new queen.

Finman said:

I recommend that you read some beekeeping book and I bet that it is more interesting than to do some hazard nursing actions.

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As I said I'm trying this out because I've read and listened to experienced beekeepers have said they've seen good results over the year using this method. So I want to test it myself and see what happens.

Sadly you can't come around my house and manage my bees for me correctly so I'm left to develop my own experiences based on a range of advice.

Edit - this is the podcast that finally motivated me to give it a try, although several other people I trust also do this

urgh ..... link obfuscation google 'Kiwi Mana Randy Oliver' it's episode 61.



Randy Oliver tends to base his judgements on empirical evidence which as a maths nerd I find comforting. Worth a listen the 'brass knuckles' approach to varroa control is a great analogy.

domino said:

...Edit - this is the podcast that finally motivated me to give it a try, although several other people I trust also do this

urgh ..... link obfuscation google 'Kiwi Mana Randy Oliver' it's episode 61.

Randy Oliver tends to base his judgements on empirical evidence which as a maths nerd I find comforting. ...

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Strapped for time, I just moved through the recording quicky in short jumps. I did not find anything about performing a shook swarm - perhaps you can help by telling us the time on the recording when he talks about that. What I did find was that he talked about the benefits of a brood break - but he does that with nucleuses while waiting for the queens to emerge.

Kitta

domino said:

urgh ..... link obfuscation google 'Kiwi Mana Randy Oliver' it's episode 61.

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Try this....Randy Oliver podcast.

http://hwcdn.libsyn.com/p/e/d/c/edc...22118578&hwt=e78cf5c1f7105630fda581b907865603

Madge said:

What I did find was that he talked about the benefits of a brood break - but he does that with nucleuses while waiting for the queens to emerge.
Kitta

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That's the bit that I'm referring to. I know he doesn't talk about shook swarms but his comments around the importance of a brood break resonates with other people I've spoken to who insist that putting the bees on new comb every year via. the shook swarm method has had great results in keeping mite levels very low, the bees build comb faster than the Bailey method and hasn't impacted honey production noticeably.

I take on people's comments about using the Bailey method to save the brood. However, what I'm interested in is the claims that the complete break (although I've heard the technique where you put one frame of open brood in to trap the mites left on the bees) and the new comb change has positive effects over the Bailey change.

I don't think I'm going to harm them doing it and trial and error is one way to learn.

domino said:

However, what I'm interested in is the claims that the complete break (although I've heard the technique where you put one frame of open brood in to trap the mites left on the bees) and the new comb change has positive effects over the Bailey change.

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With a rolling shook swarm they all get a complete brood break, at least for as long as it takes them to draw the new foundation into comb and the queen to lay it up.

Hivemaker. said:

With a rolling shook swarm they all get a complete brood break, at least for as long as it takes them to draw the new foundation into comb and the queen to lay it up.

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That's an excellent point, thanks.

Hivemaker. said:

With a rolling shook swarm ...

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What is a 'rolling' shook swarm, H?

Madge said:

What is a 'rolling' shook swarm, H?

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Ah, you beat me to it Kitta! I was going to ask for more detail about that too. Sounds like a win win answer.