They Were Hours From Swarming! (Making Splits and Interrupting Swarms)
Vložit
- čas přidán 29. 05. 2019
- I went into the most abundant hives on the lookout for swarm cells and I caught one in the nick of time! I'm pretty sure I was able to stop a swarm from happening. I made my first three splits of the year and noticed a LOT more nectar in the hives after just one week. Also, a couple of queens get named!
Thank you for watching and commenting.
We post (almost) DAILY on INSTAGRAM: / vinofarm
SUPPORT THE CHANNEL...
CHECK OUT OUR AMAZON STORE!
www.amazon.com/shop/vinofarm
--------------
These are products I use and recommend. If you buy something using these links, I receive a small commission from Amazon. Thank you!
--------------
BEE GEAR I USE:
-----------------------
YOU WANT A VENTED BEE JACKET - amzn.to/2aNJnoR
SQUARE VEIL - amzn.to/2m6mwYK
AWESOME MOUSE GUARDS - amzn.to/2xnRorz
QUEEN MARKING PENS: amzn.to/2WMk3Us
BEAR FENCE CHARGER: amzn.to/2IduxIt
CAMERA GEAR I USE:
--------------------------
MAIN SHOOTER: amzn.to/2WHL3Eu
MAIN LENS: amzn.to/2WQV8iF
SECOND SHOOTER: amzn.to/2ayC2Zs
SECOND LENS: amzn.to/2IaKbo1
ACTION CAMERA: amzn.to/2Ifu5cw
MICROPHONE: amzn.to/2FSMTvs - Jak na to + styl
That map/legend makes everything so much easier to follow. A big win for the channel!
I second this! So much easier to follow and understand everything! Thank you Vino!
Totally agree. Now Jim just needs to add the Queen's names to each hive on the legend and expand the color codes with the splits he made.
@NickS. •• Hey Nick, You need to go bing watch fromthe beginning and you'll find out really quickly what Balboa is. :)
@NickS. •• he names his bees. Balboa is the grandmother or great grandmother of...
People in ten years are going to be asking him about Balboa. Probably might actually admit regrets by then but I doubt it. It's a beekeeper thing. ;)
Why does he use the oversized sheets of material on the top of the hives, to form an overhang around the edges? Anybody?
Honestly, before I started watching this channel I was terrified of bees. But now I've just grown to respect them! It always makes it much more interesting and exciting to see bees out and about collecting from the flower bushes.
Same here. And now I'm thinking about getting the bees of my own, even though a year ago I ran as fast as I could if I saw a bee closer to me than 10 feet, that's how scared of them I was. Truly inspiring videos and very educational. Thank you and keep it up :) .
And to think that even though that they are able to sting, they are least likely to sting a human. The chance you get stung by a wasp is way higher.
Future queen name suggestion: Valentina (female version of Valentine). St. Valentine is the patron saint of beekeepers.
Saints Molaga and Gobnait in Ireland
Mickey, Pauline,
Timothy O'Donnell oh, I like this name. Well done.
All hail queen Una. All hail queen Adrian. Long may they lay!
Hail, hail! Long may they lay! Long may they reign!
All hail the new queens! May their reigns bee fruitful and honeyful!!! All hail!!!
I am amazed at how fast you find all your Queens! 👍👍
As we all know a swarm is when about half the bees and one or more queens leave the hive. No Queen no swarm. In every case I have ever known an artificial swarm also includes a queen.
In your situation it may of been best to have made an artificial swarm with the Queen, and leave the cells to requeen the hive. Added bonus would be a higher honey crop after all brood is capped since no resources would be needed to care for brood.
For the artificial swarm I place the Queen and many shakes of bees, (at least as many frames of bees as frames in the box, more would be better), in another box filled with few drawn comb and the rest foundation. I often also place a frame with some food resources and maybe a very small amount of open brood to hold the bees. You want a lot of young bees with the Queen and very, very little, if any, brood.
Prior to bees swarming they gorge themselves on honey for the trip and to draw new comb. After the Queen is moved and before the bees are shook I smoke them up a little to let them load up on the nectar. This gives them a good start at the new home drawing comb.
Leaving the Queen in the hive after they are that far along with swarming has a few issues. 1- They have already decided to swarm. 2- You will need to constantly check and remove new cells as long as the flow is on. 3- They will continue backfilling the nest with nectar as they stop the Queen from laying and thin her down to leave. Way to much work.
By time the New Queen starts laying in the old hive the Old Queen will have a very nice colony going in the artificial swarm hive.
Remember if you keep the artificial swarm in the same yard you will loose all the foragers. I move mine away.
Just my two cents worth...
Thanks. I printed this for future reference. Like the smoking tip to get them to gorge.
Absolutely. This the best comment of those I have read. Just removing queen cells and some bees and brood won't necessarily prevent swarming. If you do that and it's immediately followed by a period of bad weather you might get away with it but otherwise you'll be collecting a swarm from a tree etc - his latest video in fact.
The split he did is working perfectly fine. Though he should've removed more brood to reduce the mass of bees to prevent from swarming. Especially for beginners this is the recommended approach since it's a lot easier to handle.
Of course your suggestion of creating an artifical swarm is more "natural" way of producing more hives. But it can also be rather stressful for beginners.
P.S. The honey crop is only higher, if you plan to substitute the honey with sugar-water. Which sorta counter-acts creating a more natural swarm-feeling.
Normally you would make a split with the queen as an artificial swarm. That gives you the best chance to prevent a swarm. I would call what you did here a regular split. Great video! Love your channel!!!
With the large amount of bees you need to check on now, it might be worthwhile to hang some more swarm traps around the property in case you miss a swarm.
Get all of your queens marked so you will be able to tell the new from the old if the hives make new ones to swarm (and so we can see them easier).
Best suggestion in the thread. Catching them in a box is easy compared to when they're up high in a tree.
There are 2 schools of thought relating to swarm prevention when there are swarm cells. The first is to make a nuc split using the queen cells, which is what was done in the video, which is more akin to a walk-away split; what you did for your first 2. The second school is moving the queen which is truer to an artificial swarm. Swarming is not just a sudden thing; as they are constructing the queen cell they are also putting the queen on a diet so she'll be able to fly. The best way to make sure she doesn't fly off is to move her. You're so proficient at spotting queens, I'd say that is a move worth considering and will lessen your anxiety about swarming. Yeah, I kinda saw this coming last week!
A few extra details:
Moving the queen better signals the occurrence of a "swarm" event because on the queen's side, new digs lacking in pheromones indicates that a swarm has occurred, and on the old hive side, the disappearance of the queen's pheromones does the same.
It is more reliable to move then queen rather than the swarm cells, because you can leave most or all of the brood behind and just move pollen/nectar with the queen (since she can supply the split with eggs/brood), pretty much eliminating the possibility that you accidentally move (or leave) a swarm cell with the queen.
Also, be extra-generous with the new split bee population (more than half if possible) because the old hive will be reinforced by returning foragers and bees leaving the new split by old navigation info, while the split will basically be stuck in reboot mode for a few days.
It's not unusual at all for them to fill in around the edges of the brood nest with nectar and pollen, perfectly normal. They do that so they have resources extremely close to tend to the young brood.
Jim, when a queen and hive is wanting to swarm, making a split by taking out the queen cells won't necessarily stop their desire to swarm. When they are wanting to swarm already... It is usually more effective to take the old queen out and make the split with her instead of the queen cells, which is what naturally happens when they swarm...the old queen leaves when the queen cells are capped. Splitting in this way convinces the queen that she has swarmed and done her job. Splitting that way also generally works better because the old queen has a stronger hold on her bees to stay where you put them in a new box than bees taken with queen cells. When you're just making splits without swarm behavior, it doesn't matter much which way you do it, old queen goes or stays...she doesn't need convinced she swarmed in that case you're just preventing swarm desire. (in principle) I mean they are living creatures, you can never be sure what they are thinking but as a general principle I find this holds true.
I'd imagine she was wanting to swarm just because it's her nature and there's a good nectar flow on and things were going well in a strong hive. Someone asked if that was a supercedure cell because it was in the middle and not on the bottom of the frame. I doubt it because there is so much brood and the old queen's pattern is good. More than likely it is where it is just because it's at the bottom of the brood pattern....which makes it a swarm cell technically...if you buy into the cell location ID theory. Personally I find that to be hit or miss just because of details like in this instance.
Things are looking good man, keep it up.
I think he wants to see a swarm. lol
Jim, Brent (above is correct). Since that one q cell is capped, that is their commitment to swarm and soon. The second frame you added to the split with all the started q cells on the bottom of the frame confirms swarm impulse not a supersedure. Traditional wisdom: Only 3 ways to save a colony at this late stage from swarming: Take away the queen, or take away the flying bees, or take away the brood.
Brent is correct except, the queen doesn't make the decision to swarm. The bees do.
this is the wholesome stuff i live for
I was considering running single boxes on a couple of my hives this year. Watching Canadian Beekeeper and Devin Rawn and looking at the math it seems to make sense. However what the Canadian Beekeeper does is run them as doubles during the spring buildup (and early flow) and pull the top boxes as splits. I discussed running singles with a local beekeeper (in Mass) who raises queens and he stated that in the spring the queens can exceed the average laying of 1500 eggs per day pushing 2,000/day. That makes the space issue more of a risk for a single box. Couple that with the flow that's starting now and that can easily lead to being honeybound. They will move that nectar to the supers at night, but with the flow on the queen may be outpacing them. Driving the queen back down to one box, say late June when she slows down may be a better idea vs keeping her in one box right now. For the two hives I had as singles I added the brood boxes back on and will add supers this weekend. As long as you keep stripping off the resources and brood from those singles to make splits I'm sure you'll be fine
Yes, I'm experiencing what you're describing and this whole single box thing is an experiment this season based off the channels you mentioned. I'm just going for it to see what works and sharing what happens!
@@vinofarm Ha - so I checked my hives today. One of them that I added the brood box back to last weekend has a big fat beautiful capped queen cell. I guess I was already too late. I pulled the top box off with half the bees and my current queen and moved her to a new spot. Instant virtual swarm More free bees :)- that always makes me laugh - Free - except for the need to buy $200 worth of woodenware!
I love where your channel is going! The map make everything really easy to follow :)
I just had a similar situation but I moved the queen and 3 frames of brood and larva. Left the swarm cells for them to make queen. Looking forward to seeing how Adrian handles the swarm impulse.
Good Job on your Videos!
That's just awesome! Never thought about splitting hive before brooding.
I just love the name una for your bee queen that survived the winter. 😍🥰😻😘🌹💕❤️🦊🐺
I’ve been watching you for almost a year, you have learned so much and took us along. We learned, too! You’re doing great!👍🏻
Insane how far you’ve come in your knowledge even from the year before. Really enjoy your videos!
I like watching these older videos for references and refresher of the mind. Thanks for the time you put into them !!!
Fun Fact: the queen cell I found at 11:30 would become the actual queen that survived last winter. That’s queen Adrian’s first daughter!
@@vinofarm lol. That is my daughter’s name. She is a Marine USMC.
and it is SPLITS TIME~~~~~ i just love it when u start the day with 1 n end with 2 XDDD
Love your videos...I learn so much about beekeeping. Thank your for sharing.
WOW! ...great video... I look forward to every "episode" and learn so much from you. Keep up the great stewardship of your hives and thank you for sharing!!
Nice video! And what a catch preventing the swarm😊
I have an old empty nuke box somewhere close,oddly, I think its the smell but when ever I dont catchem before they swarm, when they split. the queens always smells out the nuke and go into it with the rest of the breakoff.
Lucky you!
I think you do an awesome job with your bees I really enjoy learning and watching you work with the bees thank you for sharing it has been a fun Adventure been watching for a little while and we'll keep watching :-) peace out
Congratulation! They look awesome, and Queen Adrienne is a good name!
What I love so much about your channel, and your vids is the story line that's going on with your hives. They are named, they have stories, and character, and I have become invested in the stories of your hives that you're sharing with us.
It's like a soap opera with bees, and at the same time interactive AND educational.
Love your channel. You're obviously very organised and dedicated to your bees and to the channel. I really like the addition of the panel on the right. makes things really clear, and whoever encounters the channel for the first time and has seen a couple vids in random order, from some point (and especially after your vid explaining the whole journey) is all caught up and can follow this bee-series easily. really great job!
I went to my sisters this past weekend and noticed her neighbor had 2 bee hives in his back yard. I got all excited and told my sister all about what I have learned about bees over the last couple years from this channel lol
Hey Jim, I’d advise to leave the swarm cells in position and take the queen right hive to a new position in your apiary, doing this more closely mimics a swarm, the tendency to swarm is still there while the old queen remains. What you’ve done may or may not work as they can still swarm without being superseded and without queen cells drawn, it’s happened to me and she still swarmed after splitting leaving minimal workers and that hive ended up dead 💀
Queen Abigail! St. Abigail was an actual bee keeper!
Oh boy your timing was impeccable
Another great video! Nice job on the splits.
I would have moved the queen and a bunch of bees to a nuc, leaving the queen cells behind, that way they think they have swarmed. It's a little less risky
That is what I was thinking while watching this....... Move the queen.........
Exactly. Imitate nature and move the queen, artificial swarm.
I did an artificial swarm this past May, moving the queen, and leavin* the swarm cells. They still swarmed, but I was able to get them back. I think it will work either way.
@@primitivedaisy Sometimes they have already made up their minds to swarm and then there is not much you can do. Glad you caught the swarm
Just shack em and sell packages much easier lol
LOL Queen Adrian of the Balboa Hive...
Someone likes the Rocky movies ahahah. :)
great catch. I have to bust into mine this weekend. we are still having some cold weather. 48 this morning. Dang.. Great job
Lol, I would be so nervous about not being able to check the rest of the hives after finding one about to Swarm. I don't have hives yet but it's great to see you go through everything and explaining why. I think I'll be more confident when I do finally get some bees.
They put nectar in the brood nest when there is a strong flow on and later they'll move it to the supers (if drawn)
That's what I was thinking afterwards... While I was was standing there recording, I was a bit concerned!
they dont move it to the super they use it to feed brood...they just then send all the other nectar to the super that why it give that imporession, bees never move nectar or honey , only to their stomac or broodm never from a store to another
Excellent experiential info! Thank you!
Yay...Queen Adrian and long may she reign...
Hopefully they won't swarm on you. I have always moved the Queen so she think she has swarmed and left the Queen cells behind. But maybe it will work this way as well. Thanks for sharing my friend.
Great Video....I find by putting a deep honey super above single brood chamber you can bring up non brood frames up ^ and interchange frames to make sure empty frames are directly next to brood frames in bottom brood chamber.
Beautiful sunset, Jim!
Agree with the comments below about splitting the queens not the cells. The parent hive will continue to make queen cells. Love the channel.
I think the single brood box idea is going to lead to swarming. The queen can fill up the brood box quicker than the bees hatch out, and the nectar comes in so fast they plop it right down on the first floor. I predict Adrian will build more queen cells. They need drawn comb. Empty frames can't be built fast enough.
When you show the frame with the Balboa queen at around the 9 min. mark, there's another large bee about three inches down-left of her. Is this a drone? I thought it was her until the arrow appeared!
Most likely a drone. The way you can differentiate the two is that the drone just has a thiccer body + ass than the worker bees. The queen also is longer. In addition the drones behind is usually "round" while of the queen it is more pointy. Exceptions prove the rule. Backfast for example have rather fat queens - which is why I think they are fantastic beginner bees since the queen is one of the "easiest" to spot.
Great content !
How effective are plastic frames in comparison to foundationless and wax? I'd expect wax to be the most effective, but it's also the most work. I'm currently foundationless and considering whether it'd be worthwhile to branch into plastic foundation.
Lkonae it takes bee resources (honey) and time to build foundation. Why not give them foundation to help save time. The nectar flow, which they need to build comb is only 3 months. The clock is ticking. Plastic foundation is easy and can be reused.
I'm watching in 2021 when he lost all but Adrian and seeing him name her is great
At 13 minutes, pauses video and Googles 'what is a swarm cell and why to bees make them'. Ooh, interesting. Presses play again :) I'm gonna bee and expert soon.
Maisie Carter I know beek’s been keeping bees for fifty plus years, he says to me one day “you know son I’ve been doing this most my life and I still know nothing about bees” he goes on to tell me he is still learning even at 65 years, the best way to learn is hands on and a backyard hive can be rewarding, I encourage anyone to take it up it’s such an interesting hobby
This reply is mostly for the less experienced readers, but also for Vino Farm:
You should've taken out more brood from the hive that wanted to swarm. Less bee-mass makes a swarm less likely. With the amount of beemass they still had left there is still a reasonably chance they decide to swarm nonetheless. When I do these kinds of splits on a swarm-friendly hive I usually take out ALL brood-frames except for the one that has the queen on top. Ideally with open lavae in case the bees decide to not continue tonurture the beecells after the relocation (happens seldom, but it does happen).
Secondly you gotta remember that about 90% of the Varroa is in the brood. So by transfering it into a new hive, this hive will potentially have quite a bit of Varroa. So gotta prepare to treat the hive after the summer solstice (which is when most hives start breeding a little less which makes the Varroa catch up).
And thirdly you should consider creating artifical swarms like some other users here suggested. Essentially just take the queen into a new, mostly empty hive (I like to add a little bit of food into it) and drop a good chunk of bee mass on top and then close it so they have to stay stuck in there for 2-3 days. Personally I like to use two boxes with the bottom box having mostly empty frames in it. Makes it easier to drop the bees inside a little more forceful. Without or with very little brood. And then I usually look every night after sunset, if the bees started building on the frames. Once they do, it can be opened and they are happy with having "swarmed".
Though the best bet is to get into a position where you don't need to do swarm-prevention anymore since you know when your bees will most likely be swarm-ready. That's a matter of experience, though. And only works well when you still have a reasonable amount of hives. When I have bees that look like they will swarm the next year, I like to prepare them the next year a little before the swarm-timing and put the entire bee-mass into a new, mostly empty hive so they can start from scratch. Plus it's a good way to clean the boxes + frames + get rid of old wax.
Loved your video with your experimenting, let’s face it we all start somewhere and have to learn the ropes so to speak, every bee keeper does things there own way what suits them, I feel this video was great in respect for helping other new bee keepers also as they be undecided on how to handle there situations with swarming and how to handle it, mistakes will be made but that’s how we learn, you were awesome with explaining your hives and you fixed them with what you thought was right at the time, the comment section was great full of tips and helpful information so a win win all round for everyone. 👍
that close to swarming , already programed to
If I am remembering correctly, you have caught and prevented all but one swarm! One bro fist for you.
True. I've only had one swarm loss. (But as I'm being reminded... this one still could have swarmed over the last couple days. I need to go have a check!)
Right in time 👍
Cutting queen cells out to stop swarming is tough to do. Here's why. A new queen takes 16 days before it hatches out, so one thinks, well, I'll be back in 14 days or 12 days or 10 days or 9 days and cut out any new cells to stop the swarming cycle. The problem is that I've been back in 6 days and the hive has already swarmed as soon as that. A six day old new queen cell just started and they are off. Run several hundred hives and it's not feasible to be back in five days, nor would anyone want to do that. If one wants to try to prevent swarming, you absolutely must clip your queens, so that you have the full 16 days before a new queen emerges. The hive may still swarm but the bees aren't leaving because the queen isn't going to fly anywhere, and you may lose the queen outside but you can control the bees not leaving, which you want to do, because you need them for the honey flow. Nobody is going to split several hundred hives, and you are going to lose the Spring honey, anyway, if you do that. Just learn how to breed queens so you always have your own stock on hand to fix problems.
Enjoyable video as always.
Thank you for the video )))
Probably already been said a lot but lock the nuc/split up at least two days (I go 2 1/2-3days), the bees will stay where you put them. It really does work for me, hope you try it!
Did you check those queen cups for anything in them? If it was only the one cell up on the frame it could be supercedure going on.
I j love the name adrianna for your new bee queen
😘🥰😍😻🌹💕❤️🦊🐺
YAY, Adrian!
You should move that queen.
If you missed queen cell, they'll swarm.
Yeah I prefer to move the queen too. Need to do splits still though of they will still swarm. I did this last year and they swarmed in 16 days after I pulled the queen. Not sure if they let two queens mate or the new queen laid a few cells and swarmed immediately.
I really like the double divided resource boxes. Where did you get them?
Is it better to put the queen in the new location instead of leaving her at the original hive when doing a split?
I have heard that suggestion before, but as always, every beekeeper has different opinions. This is how I do it. There may be situations where moving the queen is a better solution, but in this case, I think what I did was OK.
@@vinofarm i agree with you, just taking few frames of a box a suddently with that new space they forget about that swarming business
Question I have not heard discussed in any videos I've watched yet.. I'm limited to three colonies where I live. What is the best method for me to use to limit my colonies growth. besides just going in there and destroying or killing any Queen cells that I see
Adrian will make more swarm cells I think. I think you have to take away more brood with swarm cells to prevent swarming in this instance. it comes down to what you want. More hives...... split as you did....and again next week when they make more swarm cells.When she is "cut down" enough there will be no more cells. Just a bunch of splits if you kept up. Or move old Q with some bees and leave both extra strong for honey. Small split with old Q with the benefit of no egg production delay will be equal to new Q in old hive. Hives should be balanced in a month or so if new Q is up and running.
That's just my opinion and I am a new beekeeper . Keep doing what you are doing please. I look forward to all your videos.
What's the distance between your rows of hives. I don't have a lot of space to work with but I want to expand.
I’m looking to utilize resource hives this year. I make almost all of my boxes, could you snag key measurements on your resource hives for me?
I had a hive on Monday that's was about to swarm. I took queen cells. As I removed one, a Virgin queen popped out. It was weird. I caged her and put her in nuc that went queenless. I will release whenever it stops raining!
Same thing happened to me monday!
@@donbeissel2965 I didn't know that. The nuc came from a hive that is really mean. I didn't want them to kill her as requeening the hive the nuc was split has been difficult. This will my second time attempting to queen this nuc. Never had this issue with nucs from my other hives in past.
could you have put the swarm cell frame in one of the other nuc's to give them a jump start as well?
Awesome
I didn't notice if you have upper entrances above the QE. If not you might want to try it. It can help increase honey production to the level of of hives without QEs.
Yes, Upper entrances on all hives.
Your apiary is awesome
Got to say man you're so far my favorite videos for my bee watching. One thing that you stop doing that I used to love is a little tutorials at the beginning or end about your flowers and different things that the bees might be feeding on and things like that I'd be appreciative if u added those thing back in. It really helped me decide what I needed to plant for my bees that I plan on getting next year so that I can already have my bee yard kind of growing strong for them. I'm nothing like you I don't have a big property where I can hold a lot of stuff I'm just a city boy. But big fan from Missouri watching your channel
Yay bees!
Cool!!!
So what are the large white sheets over the covers of your hives, and why are they there?
What exactly are swarm cells? Very fascinating stuff.
Another great video in the vino bee yard. You should try doing a snelgrove split for fun. I have seen it done and I am going to try it myself. You got a lot of bees now and you just keep growing, so give it a try as a way to do a split.
What do you think caused the backfilling of necture?
It looks like u can add a knee pad to your work trousers?... if so where did u get them?
Thx
Those are Carhartt double front dungaree pants. You can slide a knee pad in up from the bottom. All my work pants have knee pads now. Huge life improvement! amzn.to/3Z0Iz4z
so...some food for thought..i have noticed, a couple times, when I was inspecting, they back filled with nectar. I was super scared I was queenless...this has happened at least twice that I can remember...even though they had plenty of room to put nectar. so I am making plans in my head to figure out what to do, and then I go back in the next week and it is all full of eggs/larva...do you think maybe sometimes they back fill to clean the cells, or something?? I was panicking...sure I was failing as a bee keeper, and then they just were fine the next week!! I try to remember they know what they are doing, but sometimes, I try to be too controlling and get myself all upset for nothing..i wonder when I will learn!!! lol
Hello, what do you mean by the term 'honey bound'? Do you mean that the queen was laying on uncapped honey because of no room for brood? I have heard of 'egg bound' but not sure how that applies to a busy hive. Thanks,great channel.
Dandelions are, fortunately, one of those flowers that you'll see more of as the season progresses, so they'll be your buffer as the seasonal blooms come and go right up until your first hard freeze. (Maybe save some dandelion seeds and scatter those instead of trying to plant more flower bulbs? Hee hee. XD)
What is the difference between nectar and honey?
YO, ADRIAN! I still don't know jack about bees. But this bee video was amazing.
What stops the bees from going back to their original hive?
And i was just about to sleep XD
I may sound a bit silly but is there a reason why you have the eggs and such at the bottom with the supers up top? And do some bee species prefer to have supers below their eggs? And what would happen if you did that?
I was told by my beekeeping club its better to put empty drawn frames in the hive about to swarm cuz the bees won't really recognize a frame that needs to be drawn as space. Hopefully while they draw the empties some brood hatches and gives her space soon
What are swarm cells? And what does it when a hive is about to swarm?
I like your hat and veil combo. Where can I purchase something like this?
Splits are always exciting! And it's nice to see all the hives doing well. I have one question: is it difficult to look after so many hives? At what point will you stop splitting them?
P.s.: Name suggestion - Sonia
Im new here but super interested in bee keeping and especially the science surrounding bees. Could someone explain to me what a swarm cell is? All I know is it indicates the bees will soon we swarming
Use a big neon chalk marker to put a spot in your queens so they’re easy to find
One of my hives keeps pushing the queen out without making queen cups or supersedure cells trying to swarm. Makes no sense.
Great work. You have a large number of hives and are splitting more. What’s your goal?
I know you really study in depth your decisions so maybe you could discuss using queen excluders. I know some opinions that excluders cause shortening of worker life.do to the wings being worn out passing thru the excluded. Why do you use excluders?
Have you considered switching to the horizontal deep Layens hive?
No. Watch my videos from the past 12 months. I designed something better for my needs.