After my first failed attempt of a cutout at my sister's house, my dad and I got a call from my uncle who said he noticed some honey bees moved into a sprinkler control valve box on his daily walking route. It was the small size box. I went right after it got dark to collect the bees, waited for all of them to come home first. It wasn't really a CUT out. I just lifted the lid of the box and moved the entire lid into two mediums I brought with me. They were there for about 1 week and they build several combs already. So I rubberband those into frames and put them in the hive. The combs had very little honey. No signs of brood yet.
My dad and I hand scooped the remaining bees into the mediums and at the end I smoked the heck out of the valve box. Then I noticed this larger bee running around like mad. It tried to fly once but just fell back down. It had shorter wings but wait, maybe the larger rear end made the wings shorter. Anyways, at the end I THINK that was the queen. Good thing I smoked the box as it had an edge that is a good hiding place.
The size of this new hive is VERY small. The amount of bees I would guess less than 1 pound if lucky. Maybe only softball size.
Here's a youtube video of the hive after 2 days at home.
Entrance activity. Looks like some drones are outside everyday. Are they being kicked out???
Bee activitiy at hive entrance
Topic: Cutout June 2nd (Read 1786 times)