You will remember that my urban bees were very defensive. VERY! So I moved them back to a yard near home with plans to re-queen the hive. I managed to reduce the hive to a single deep a few weeks ago. I then added a second deep to this easily enough, but the time has now come to replace the old queen. My new queen arrives next weekend. However, working the hive is particularly nasty and I have to be very well protected. The last time I was in it I only got to the 6th frame before the bees were all over me and stinging my suit. And me! I literally ran away!
So my plans for a coup have been formulated....
On Sunday (yesterday) I split the hive into two deeps. I started from the assumption that the queen would be in the top box laying. I then very bravely (well I thought so) moved the top box to a new base board without using smoke! No smoke????? Well I didn't want to chase the queen deep into the bottom deep. I'll explain why later. By the way, I was stung while doing this split!
My theory is this... If I move the queen in the single "top" deep, when the foragers leave (i.e. the bees that fly and sting) they will go home to the deep that wasn't moved. As a result the queen should be left with just a few "nice" nurse bees around her! It should also mean that when I look in the "top" deep to find the queen she will be much easier to find and therefore KILL! Secondly, by splitting the hive 6 days before my new queen arrives I should be able to quickly and easily tell in which deep the old queen is present. If there are supersedure cells in the "top" deep then she must in the other lower deep - I sincerely hope she is not! This is why I didn't use smoke. If there are no supersedure cells then I'm looking for larvae and eggs of up to 6 days in age. Easy? No?
So once I have found her I will kill her and a day later introduce the new queen in her cage. As soon as the new queen is installed I will place a sheet of newspaper (with cuts across it) on top of the deep and then relocate the lower deep back on top of the deep containing the new queen. Still with me? Anyway, I hope the bees will gradually adjust to their new monarch and will become much calmer. Finally, I will go back to the newly combined hive in another 3 days in order to release the new queen and after that I hope things will be back to normal.
So what if the queen is not in the "top" deep as I hope? Well, I should be able to tell this by spotting supersedure cells that are being developed in the "top" deep. I'm not looking forward to determining that the queen is located with all the stinging foragers, but I'll just have prepare myself for going through the hive as best as I can! This time I will be armed with smoke as well as sugar syrup in a spray bottle.
If it becomes too much for me I will try to kill the bees using dry ice! I figure if I put a lump of dry ice inside an empty super placed above the inner cover over the hive then the gaseous carbon dioxide will permeate through the hive and kill the bees off. I'll then use the bees that were in the "top" deep and therefore fortunate enough to escape the gas chamber as the start of a new colony.
I'm not too concerned about finding supersedure cells as any cells will only have larvae in them and should not be capped. I'm hoping the bees will deal with the supersedure cells by themselves, after the deeps have been recombined.
Oh! I neary forgot! before I go working the "top" deep looking for the queen I will seal the nasty hive shut so that these bees cannot come out and harass me while I'm installing the new queen. If the bees in the deep I'm working send out an alarm pheromone the last thing I want is for loads of nasty aggressive bees to come out of the neighbouring deep gunning for me!
Wish me luck!
Wow. I think I've been fortunate enough to have "nice" behaving hives so far. It sounds like you are definitely up for a challenge this weekend!
ReplyDeleteDo let us know how it turns out! I'm curious now to know if the queen is in the top/bottom box, and how they react to a new queen, and if the colony calms down a bit.
I've never had bees want to sting me that badly, but I suppose I always had a contingency plan in the back of my mind just in case. I figured I'd wear several layers of sweatshirts/pants under my suit to keep the suit as far away from my skin as possible. Not sure how it would work out, though, since I haven't had to resort to that much protection!
Quick question, as I too am getting a new queen (for a split) this weekend. Are you planning on leaving her in the queen cage she comes in, or release her into a push-in style cage so she can start laying eggs right away?
No I'll leave her in the cage she arrives in for a couple of days. If all looks well I'll remove the cork from her cage so the bees can get to the candy and release her into the hive.
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