Re-queening nasty-------- hive

[JonnyPicklechin]

..just be patient it will get better if the Queen you bought is a gentle type..

She is an early season red who saw a lovely gentle but prolific colony through a whole season last year here in my tranquil garden. Trust is there!

 

[enrico]

Ahhhh! Well done
E

 

[JonnyPicklechin]

Ahhhh! Well done
E

Feel like giving you, mjt, Jeff, Murox, BF, Swarm, Hachi, Curly, Poly etc a jar for the brilliant help.

Would that be called, "Busman's Honey"?!

 

[Curly green fingers]

It will come good in time well-done johnny!
Or some would say good lad!

 

[Beefriendly]

As Millet says it can take 5-6 weeks for the "bad" bees to die off. It can, however, happen overnight...sometimes.
I had a very grumpy unproductive hive which I was about to Snelgrove and raise a new queen....Thought these guys are behaving for a pleasant change.....couldn't find the queen but found a well hidden but emerged queen cell. Looks like they solved my problem themselves with a sly supercedure....with some good weather forecast for next week hopefully a good chance to get mated.

 

[Swarm]

...and this morning 3 jars of honey delivered to 3 very gracious neighbours. Even got hugs. Its all been quiet and they have been using their gardens as usual.

Love that part, sounds like you have very nice, understanding neighbours.

 

[Canary Honey]

Great thread and a equally great outcome.

Last year I tried to combine a queenless moody colony with a smaller one with a very pleasant fresh new good laying queen colony, using four sheets of news paper, the shreds on the ground the next morning appeared like shrapnel and the queen was dead, ungrateful bees were allowed to dwindle.

This year I have a colony of unpleasant (I will grade them as unpleasant as they haven't declared full war as others have described) bees and am struggling to handle them. I have already eliminated the flyers and been in the hive to queen hunt, luckily I found her and did the deed quite efficiently, unfortunately the corpse (in two halves) dropped into the hive, immediately the girls smelt that something was up and started to growl, time to shut up for the day!

The rest of my hives are more reasonable (the bad ones are an unrelated import from some miles away) and I didn't want them to be influenced by the newcomers. I have a couple of splits each with a sealed queen cell likely to hatch any day, should I try to combine the bad girls with a smaller hive with a sealed QC or wait for after mating?

I obviously need to go through the bad hive to look for queen cell activity, but this is not the time, so soon after their loss.

Any advice appreciated.

 

[Murox]

Well done, phase 1 is taken care of. Phase 2 - Keep checking the unpleasant hive for queen cells and destroy them all, shake bees off each frame every time you check. Let that colony become hopelessly queenless. When they are in that state you may cautiously introduce a nicer new mated queen or try to combine - as you have "nasty drones" around you do not want any virgin queens about.

 

[Canary Honey]

Is it when they are hopelessly queenless that they are more likely to be accepting a new introduction? Previously they were laying workers and quite happy to be this way, so I should introduce my good queen before this stage?
Up to three hives with new queens hatching, getting influenced by drones from a bad family can't be helped I'm afraid, just going to have to take the risk and hope for the best.

 

[Murox]

The day you killed the bad queen is Day 0, eggs are eggs for 3 days so by day 4/5 their should not be any more suitable eggs for them to make queen cells. Get in there and destroy all queen cells. and check again a few days later. Once there are no eggs and no queen cells they have become hopelessly queenless. Then you have more chance of them accepting a new queen from whatever source. Probably best to put new queen in a push in cage so you can protect her and observe the "nasty bees" behaviour towards her.

 

[JonnyPicklechin]

As an update....my nasty hive is much calmer but i must have lineage issues as two more hives are feisty. Not as bad as before but following and heavy pinging.

Workmen in garden right next to apiary laying pipes so should be interesting. Veils at the ready.

Tomorrow will bring great news on an out-apiary site to move them to. Stress levels lower. Will update...



Sent from my SM-G955F using Tapatalk

 

[Canary Honey]

Not wishing to take over Jonny's thread, but as I'm in a similar situation.

Hopefully the attachment works! The picture of the smaller hive was last night, bunch of bees outside, inactive, swarm? too hot (solid floor)? overcrowded?
This morning they are much the same, this is the half of the hive that was split and left to receive the 'fliers'. Going into the hive this evening, sealed brood, no queen cells, bees are unpleasant in that they are keen to fly at you rather than attack, and absolutely FULL of bees, the queen was in the other half that was removed about two weeks ago.
Check on one of my new queen cells, she is out, okay lets not disturb them any further.

Decide to risk it all and combine in the safest way I could come up with -
Other picture is the result, bottom is the original box, then a small shallow (empty,no frames (why would I have any ready?) just to give them some space to hang out instead of on the street, then is a plastic queen excluder sandwich with paper in the middle, thats two excluders turned right angles ro each other and paper in the middle with slits then the shallow with my new baby queen and family. Strict instructions have been left to play nicely

 

[Murox]

I don't quite understand your post, but I get the impression that they are overcrowded. How many BB's are they on?

 

[Beefriendly]

then is a plastic queen excluder sandwich with paper in the middle, thats two excluders turned right angles ro each other and paper in the middle with slits then the shallow with my new baby queen and family.

One hates to ask but whats the reasoning behind 2 excluders at right angles to each other?.....

 

[Beefriendly]

then is a plastic queen excluder sandwich with paper in the middle, thats two excluders turned right angles ro each other and paper in the middle with slits then the shallow with my new baby queen and family.

One hates to ask but whats the reasoning behind 2 excluders at right angles to each other?.....
As Murox...they still don;t have enough space....

 

[Canary Honey]

One hates to ask but whats the reasoning behind 2 excluders at right angles to each other?.....
As Murox...they still don;t have enough space....

I had replied to this yesterday, but obviously it didn't post!

The only previous time I have tried to combine colonies the queen didn't survive.

On this occasion the new queen has recently emerged, and I have attempted to combine with the 'flyers' half of the nasty colony which still have brood to emerge and have checked for QCs.
I wanted extra security and even preventing the bees mingling immediately. I thought the excluders at right angles in orientation would leave much smaller gap and delay access or at least restrict it a little longer. I was concerned with the possibility of the upper queen (trapped) queen containing section overheating to shaded the hive for this day.


Last night I did not open the hive, but swiveled the upper box with excluder underneath and could see ample holes in the paper above the other excluder, holes probable large enough for bees to pass through so continued the rotation and the excluders are now in-line.

Tonight I will make new frames for actual space and give them something to do. I am not good at spotting a queen and will hope for the best, anticipating eggs in a future inspection.

The other half of the nasty hive that had the queen until recently was inspected for QCs and all were taken down, one was almost three inches long!

 

[Murox]

Correct me if I have this wrong - you have split a nasty hive. You are attempting to combine the "flyers" with another "normal" hive and this normal hive has a recently emerged virgin?

The other half of the nasty hive is currently queenless and you are removing any queen cells? - whats is the plan with this one?

 

[mdotb]

If you have a newly emerged virgin queen above newspaper and two queen excluders, does the hive also have an entrance in the top box? Otherwise how is the virgin queen going to get mated?

 

[Canary Honey]

Correct me if I have this wrong - you have split a nasty hive. You are attempting to combine the "flyers" with another "normal" hive and this normal hive has a recently emerged virgin?

The other half of the nasty hive is currently queenless and you are removing any queen cells? - whats is the plan with this one?

I have another small hive with a baby queen of similar age so should have emerged also, as this half of the nasty hive had a queen until more recently I will allow a few more days before checking for further queen cells and attempting to marry to the baby queen.

 

[Canary Honey]

If you have a newly emerged virgin queen above newspaper and two queen excluders, does the hive also have an entrance in the top box? Otherwise how is the virgin queen going to get mated?

The bees were only captive for one day, plenty of stores and the biggest concern was overheating and having to cross their legs.
Bees have been mingling for one day, excluders are being removed in a moment, mating will not have occurred yet, too soon.

Fingers crossed she is still in good shape

Looking forward to an update from Jonny.