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Queen of drones

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Charlie Bezzina:
 I definitely remove all the bees before exchanging frames. I was under the impression the bees can tell if there are foreign bees in the hive and that would result in fighting and dead bees.

The15thMember:

--- Quote from: Charlie Bezzina on November 26, 2022, 08:53:43 pm --- I definitely remove all the bees before exchanging frames. I was under the impression the bees can tell if there are foreign bees in the hive and that would result in fighting and dead bees.

--- End quote ---
It depends on the bees, the time of year, and if a flow is on.  When there is a strong flow on, the bees are less picky about who gets in and who gets out.  The guard bees will often let bees from other hives who are carrying honey and pollen into the hive if they ask.  During these conditions adding some foreign bees into a hive probably wouldn't cause much fighting, although foragers that you added would still be oriented to their original hive, so when they left the new hive to forage, they'd just return home.  Nurse bees, who are caring for the brood, haven't oriented yet and aren't really loyal to the queen at their age, they are just loyal to the brood, so they can usually be moved from hive to hive without too much fuss, especially if there is a flow on.  During a dearth though, you wouldn't want to just move bees between hives, because that could easily cause fighting and robbing.   

Oldbeavo:
We usually locate the queen then swap brood and bees on the frame to the receiving hive, a dusting of icing sugar creates enough confusion that the is no fighting.
We may give the receiving hive a shake of bees from an open brood frame just to give them some nurse bees that will be workers for the hive in a few days.

Charlie Bezzina:
Hi. I opened the hives today to have a look at what the bees are up to. I managed to find the queen in the busy hive which was great! She is striped with dark bands. I didn't find any queen in the dwindling hive, but there were some young larvae so I'll find out soon who is laying them.

Ben Framed:
Hi Charlie, Good for you! I understand your level of satisfaction. Glad it worked out for good. Thanks for the update..

Phillip

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