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  • Supersedure? Early Swarm

  • General Q&A, Bee chat and only Bee chat please
General Q&A, Bee chat and only Bee chat please
 #6276  by thewoodgatherer
 08 Apr 2020, 19:31
Ok so like many I did my first full inspection on Sunday to find 5 healthy hives with one having as many as 7 full frames of brood, the 6th hive however only had about 2/3 frames, bees looked healthy but queen clearly not laying as well as the others, on further inspection I found one nearly ready to cap queen cell along the side against the frame and a further 4-5 day old one.
Bees had plenty of space, very low varroa levels and I found fresh eggs. I found the 2019 marked queen and clipped her.
I made the decision righty or wrongly that this was supersedure due to poor laying.

So today I go in to have a quick check and queen is still about and laying the odd egg here and there, a further two queen cells are built. Again I have ,shaken the bees off, selected one sealed cell and decided to leave.

Is this supersedure or an attempt to swarm early
 #6279  by Patrick
 08 Apr 2020, 19:55
Only the bees actually know but based on colony size and misfiring queen I’d do exactly the same as you have and go for supercedure.

Only thing I would also have is a clipped queen. That way, if I got it wrong and they swarmed the outcome would be the same anyway - all the workers present and a single viable queen cell. In that event you just have to keep an eye out for extra emergency cells being raised as a response to queen absence.

Clipped queens make things like this and worrying about which part of a split has a queen much easier.
 #6281  by Chrisbarlow
 08 Apr 2020, 20:03
Supercedure, to early for a swarm
 #6282  by thewoodgatherer
 08 Apr 2020, 20:10
Patrick wrote:Only the bees actually know but based on colony size and misfiring queen I’d do exactly the same as you have and go for supercedure.

Only thing I would also have is a clipped queen. That way, if I got it wrong and they swarmed the outcome would be the same anyway - all the workers present and a single viable queen cell. In that event you just have to keep an eye out for extra emergency cells being raised as a response to queen absence.

Clipped queens make things like this and worrying about which part of a split has a queen much easier.
Thanks Patrick, forgot to mention I clipped her on Sunday ;)
 #6286  by nealh
 08 Apr 2020, 22:21
I would say it is certainly not too early for a swarm with the weather as it is, though the size of the colony sounds like SS might be more the order of the day. I collected one on April 17 last year that grew in to a large colony with superb characteristics, a week earlier another swarm was collected from the same area within approx. a couple hundred feet.
If the frame with the QC was shaken the likely hood is it will fail or it will get torn down so more may well appear.
 #6291  by AndrewLD
 09 Apr 2020, 10:51
nealh wrote:
08 Apr 2020, 22:21
I would say it is certainly not too early for a swarm with the weather as it is,
One of our members has posted pictures of a swarm he collected a couple of days ago. I have drones in two of my colonies and one would be a prime candidate for an early swarm and has almost filled the first super. I am hoping that extra supers and removal of stores frames either side of the brood nest will give them something else to think about.
 #6307  by nealh
 09 Apr 2020, 22:13
The weather is due to cool Monday onwards so have refrained from Demareeing four of my B&H colonies, all have between 14 & 16 frames of brood each have two supers on as they have found a fair bit of nectar. My garden colony I removed three frames of drone brood laid up in the nadired super and a good amount of new nectar which I have moved above. Did a fair bit of uncapping of the drone to find very few mites so a good sign the vaping is getting good results from last year and the birdies will no doubt enjoy the rich feast.