Dear All,
After a hectic May of swarming from a very healthy, large colony that couldn't wait until my first April inspection to decide to instigate swarming, I now have 3 colonies (Original, captured swarm and an insurance split I did when it was all going off). My two new colonies (swarm and split) are now Queen right (eggs and healthy larvae) , yippeeee! However, my original colony has no eggs that I can see but is still a large colony of bees spread across a 14x12 brood box and 2 supers. So, which option is best going forward:
1. I combine one of my smaller colonies with the original but risk them deciding there are too many bees/too little space again.
2. Gift a frame of eggs to the parent colony and hope there's time for them to raise a new queen and sell a spare nucleus hive either this year or next (I only want 2 colonies -back garden beekeeper)
3. Do both - gift a frame of eggs for now, wait and see who does best by winter and combine if necessary.
I'm leaving it until the weekend to take action, as we've had sun for 7 days now and I'd expect if there was an active Queen in the original hive, she would have followed the same pattern as the other two and be laying by now ...
What does everyone think?
PS. Second year of bee keeping and still learning!
After a hectic May of swarming from a very healthy, large colony that couldn't wait until my first April inspection to decide to instigate swarming, I now have 3 colonies (Original, captured swarm and an insurance split I did when it was all going off). My two new colonies (swarm and split) are now Queen right (eggs and healthy larvae) , yippeeee! However, my original colony has no eggs that I can see but is still a large colony of bees spread across a 14x12 brood box and 2 supers. So, which option is best going forward:
1. I combine one of my smaller colonies with the original but risk them deciding there are too many bees/too little space again.
2. Gift a frame of eggs to the parent colony and hope there's time for them to raise a new queen and sell a spare nucleus hive either this year or next (I only want 2 colonies -back garden beekeeper)
3. Do both - gift a frame of eggs for now, wait and see who does best by winter and combine if necessary.
I'm leaving it until the weekend to take action, as we've had sun for 7 days now and I'd expect if there was an active Queen in the original hive, she would have followed the same pattern as the other two and be laying by now ...
What does everyone think?
PS. Second year of bee keeping and still learning!