buzzzzzzzzzz new adventure

[addy1]

The wall right before we cut it.

 

[tbendl]

OR they fight to death.

Mother Nature is a bad @$$..
What's capped brood? I'm going to guess that those are baby bees maybe in the little holes? So if the queen flees the rest of the bees don't follow her? I am just fascinated with these furry flying honey makers.

 

[addy1]

The bees

The yellow at the very top is capped honey. The lighter tan is possibly capped larva. There are a lot of empty cells, which is not "normal" but there is no nectar flow currently, the bees are moving towards "winter" even down here.

We are not sure if this will be a viable hive, only time will tell. It will take days of having the laundry room open for them to clean out the honey drippings, excess wax etc. Every bee in the area is coming in to feast. There is some fighting going on, there are dead bees, no way to avoid it.

After they are done we will need to seal up any openings in the wall, then spray it with bleach or ammonia to remove the bee scent that will tell another hive to move in.

 

[tbendl]

So do you leave the hive exposed while all that happens or are they now in your bee boxes? And any idea how long it took to get the hive that large? It looks to be about 8' long in the picture

 

[addy1]

Mother Nature is a bad @$$..
What's capped brood? I'm going to guess that those are baby bees maybe in the little holes? So if the queen flees the rest of the bees don't follow her? I am just fascinated with these furry flying honey makers.

Capped brood is the final stage, first eggs, then larvae, when the larvae pupates it is capped, they the bee nibbles out and becomes a bee.

The queen can't fly except when she first is a queen, she flies out and mates with the drones, then she is too big to fly, unless they decide to starve her so they can swarm then she can fly again.

We hope we got the queen that way the bees will move into their new home following her. If they had recently swarmed one of the queen cells we saw will hatch out and be a new queen, but then it is 21 days before she flies and mates, so the hive is way behind in doing hive stuff.

 

[addy1]

So do you leave the hive exposed while all that happens or are they now in your bee boxes? And any idea how long it took to get the hive that large? It looks to be about 8' long in the picture

We pulled the comb, the honey, the cells, cut them to size and used rubber bands to attach them to the wood frames. One frame of their comb, one frame of new foundation next to it.

We leave the opening open until they do a clean out of honey, wax etc. It was 3 layers of comb, each layer around 6 feet so around 18 feet x 1.5 feet of comb. This may have been an old hive that a swarm moved into. but this was his dad's house. We were down here every 6 weeks or so checking on them, never saw a bee problem. There were no bees in June when we were here, so some time from the end of june until now they did this building. If they moved in at the end of june. The tenant did not see them until mid sept so maybe 3 months.

 

[j.w]

This is amazing! So you somehow scoop or cut a big hunk of what they made as a home w/the queen or queen cells and put it somehow in your bee box and that attracts them to bring all the rest of their stuff to the box? This is going to be so cool to see happen!

Oops I didn't see that last post above this one so guess you already answered my question before I asked it.

 

[addy1]

I will take a picture of the rubberbanded comb. Our gloves were covered with sticky honey and bees, no way I could handle the camera.

If we did not get the queen or if the queen was killed, or if the queen had recently swarmed, the hive MIGHT make a new queen out of the queen cells we saw. A queen cell is a special cell where the bees fed them royal jelly to make a new queen for a queen if needed.

The best of all choices would have been we saw the queen and moved her to the box, her pheromones would attract the other bees. At this point we are not sure what the outcome will be. Time will tell. The bees only live 6 weeks, if the hive slowly goes down in numbers that would be an indicator that we are queenless.

 

[addy1]

In the spring and summer we could buy a queen to get the hive running again, but not at this time of year.

 

[j.w]

We shall see how it goes w/your bees. So maybe you just didn't see the queen and she's really in there or they didn't have one yet. So when they swarm and go off to make a new hive they don't bring a queen w/them, they have to make a new one right? And like you said if they just started a new one then and don't have a queen it might be too late for them and they won't make it. Bummer if that happens but that's the way of nature. You are doing your best to help them.

 

[addy1]

when they swarm and go off to make a new hive they don't bring a queen w/them, they have to make a new one right?

No the swarm takes the queen with them. The workers, nurse bees quit feeding her so she skinnies down and can fly again. The bees left have to feed a queen cell , or eggs the royal jelly to make a new queen. That queen has to grow, hatch, fly, mate (at only 55 plus degrees) then start laying eggs, which need to grow hatch etc. So there is a long span between a swarm and the hive stabilizing again.
Or the queen can die for some reason, or we hurt her pulling out the comb.

 

[j.w]

Maybe she was just so small you didn't notice the difference between her and the other bees. Hope she made it as they'd have a much better chance it seems.

 

[addy1]

One thing we have been told more than once, don't over think them. But I do believe it will be a tough road for them to recover or move forward. We are going to buy another 50lb sack of sugar and feed them up. So far 400 lbs of sugar on the bees up north, now 50 lbs on the bees down south. But if it helps them survive it is worth the 15 bucks it costs. We bottle feed them, i.e. a gallon jar placed on the hive top let them.

 

[addy1]

This is our next job. Some of t he bees are clustered in the laundry room. We need to gather them up and toss them back into the new hive box. First a trip to home depot to get supplies, tarp to cover up the door (full of slats) so once we move the bees we can close off the room.

 

[MitchM]

Very exciting, addy.
Good thing you're now a knowledgeable beekeeper.