What have you done today bee-related?

[AndrewLD]

Leaving no or one brood frame might be better than two as the intention is to split the brood pheromone away from the colony.

It's a big ask for the older bees to draw foundation. A 'proper' swarm has younger bees, including the wax makers included in it. An A/S has just the older flyers who's glands have stopped producing brood food and are also past the 'wax production' part of their life.

Ah - that's where I went wrong. Not only two frames but some open so they could quickly build more swarmcells.....
I am confused now - the A/S is supposed to leave a queen and flying bees but with a load of foundation - so what is supposed to draw that?
I am starting to think I should just let them swarm and concentrate on catching them in order to ensure the right mix of young and old bees to start the new colony
In another post you mention two queens fighting it out... Having gone through a split that had supposedly left left flying bees and a queencell (make that many!). I ruthlessly shook and cut out all QC's. At the end of it all it occured to me that I could no longer be sure I would have a queen in there so I opened one of the cut-out cells and slipped the queen (nice big one) into the entrance - thinking "if there is one in there - they will fight it out". Within 30 minutes they swarmed.
This is doing my head in. Don't these bees read the book?

[AdamD]

It can take a while for an A/S to get going - leaving one frame of sealed brood with them does mean that there will be some young bees coming along soon - and also space for the queen to lay. Note that older bees can revert back to younger ones if the have to so their glands work again.

I haven't had a colony swarm with just young virgins in before; it's been a reliable technique. (I used to get calls from a friend who's swarm control technique was to wait until they swarmed with a virgin and then call me for help!) (I used to clip the queen for him more often than not and he often missed the first swarm).
Although I have had a colony swarm the day AFTER I removed all queencells. (And, yes I checked them thoroughly after they swarmed and there were none), so I guess the pheromone from virgins can stay for a little while. And like the other post, an A/S can swarm again a day or two later.

[Steve 1972]

8°C here today with heavy rain and hail showers..it felt more like 2°C in the wind..nothing but a quick view of the entrances was done no bees flying from any hive.

[Patrick]

Ah - that's where I went wrong. Not only two frames but some open so they could quickly build more swarmcells.....
I am confused now - the A/S is supposed to leave a queen and flying bees but with a load of foundation - so what is supposed to draw that?

This is doing my head in. Don't these bees read the book?

Quite Andrew and unfortunately it is beekeeping orthodoxy regarding A/S that they knuckle down and draw out the foundation. Often as not, they simply throw a swarm as soon as possible. Some drawn comb, even if only a couple of frames is a major improvement on all foundation in my view. As has been discussed before, the difference between an A/S "swarm" and a true swarm is significant, not least in this this regard.

Couldn't get into bees today, it was a cold hooley. Yesterday did some rounds but was a bit of a shambles tbh. Checked a load of queen cell mini nucs from my experiments with Cupkit and found in 3 mini nucs the cell cup holders had fallen through onto the floor of the mini nuc and the un-emerged virgin perished in the cell. Gutted - I had charged the nucs with cells at the main rearing apiary and moved them by car to another apiary to get mated - too much jostling in transport it seems. Normally I have cells with a big foil collar and they stay put but I had not extended it up enough this time it seems. All the other charged cells had emerged however.

Got back to main apiary to find a 5 frame nucleus made up for sale and with a qc the size of a duck egg (well, nearly..) on its side and the roof and crownboard beside it, no damage done. My first negative experience of sharing an apiary with badgers. Don't blame them- had only put on bricks on the ground - hadn't weighted the nuc down and they must be starving with this very dry ground at the no, my fault not theirs. Most of bees had abandoned the nuc but found virgin queen still wandering around at speed with enough bees left, so no harm done.

A bait hive picked up a ludicrously small cast from somewhere, but they are drawing out foundation already. A load of hives due to inspect today but haven't will just have to wait, thankfully all queens clipped so cross fingers..

[MickBBKA]

Well not today but Friday. Inspected bees, out of 20 colonies I don't have a single super with more than 75% stores even in colonies with 17+ frames of brood and nobody in my area has either. last Wed was coldest night of the whole winter and we had 4 nights of ground frost, we never had a week of frost between Nov to end of March. 10 weeks of East or North winds is killing me...…..and the bees... The nectar they do have though has an amazing scent I have never had before. I have no idea what it is but think they are foraging on something they never usually go for, probably because everything else is finished now they have brood and need to start storing nectar. Just hawthorn in flower now which they never use and Blackberry starting to flower. June gap in about a week.

Very concerned about the weather pattern. Looking back on 10 years of solar readings this year is almost identical so far to 2015. First 3 months were average followed by a very sunny April the difference between 2015 & 2020 being down to a few .kwhs. What followed was a very dim summer with extremely low sunshine...……..Lets see what happens....EEEEK...!

[AdamD]

OSR is near to finishing around me, although honey in the frames is hardly capped. I've extracted 2 lower supers from the two largest colonies and not all of the honey came out. It's very pale in colour when it does. Yesterday evening I put clearer board under 2 supers of a couple more hives; they will come off later today. These two hives were supposed to have single queencells in - although they had more than that so I went through the 2 brood boxes per colony and removed all the rest. I might do the same again in a few days. Just in case. Considering it was getting dark and the colonies were full and queenless, they were well-behaved although some of the bees decided that being on my head was better than being in the hive so I needed a good shake afterwards.

[AndrewLD]

Ditto - thank heavens for the end in sight of the OSR. I am taking advantage of the much lower temperatures to clear some supers for the main flow. A super of OSR frames will stay for any June gap and/or go back on after the main flow in lieu of syrup - they collected it and they can eat it! That will still leave me plenty to cut out and put in the Kochstar.
The problem is going to be that I am completely surrounded by OSR - not expecting a big return in the main flow but then it doesn't look as though I would be able to sell it anyway

[curly green finger's]

Watched girls collect water , feed my nucs that I've made via splits. looking forward to some more good weather so I can check my Miller frame that is in a demaree colony.
Cleaned inspection boards with soap and water ( I'm putting them in once a week for 24 hrs this time of year.)

[NigelP]

Hi Mark, welcome to a saner forum /wry grin/

[curly green finger's]

Hi Mark, welcome to a saner forum /wry grin/

I've missed the banta for sure..
How's your spring going nigel?
Steve (millet) messaged me on the other forum so I thought I would come have a looksee.