Got home last night, and the bees were at it again. Lots of activity around one of the weeker hives, but I could tell they were both getting robbed out. (See previous post on the result of moving 2 of 5 hives). I shut down the hives, and got my smoker out. Smoked robbing bees away from the entrance, and stapled a section of window screen on the front for ventilation. I smoked the inner cover and had a quick look, there were three solid frames of bees. I spritsed them with lemon grass syrup to settle them down and get everyone smelling the same, and covered them up.
So on the up side I got three solid frames of bees in each hives, and two good queens. Unless the queens got killed of course, but I am going to keep it posative for now. My plan is to keep them in for 72hrs. which Michael suggested to get them re oriented, and hopefully get them building a brood nest. They have syrup, and brood builder patty. My other hope is after 72hrs. the robbing will stop. We are coming into a big blossom period here with fruit trees dandy lions and such. So hopefully the robbing bees will find good fair else where. When I open them back up I am going to cut the entrance down to one bee space, and gradually widen if they can get some momentum going.
Is there anything else that anybody can think of short of taking them off the property that will help these two hives stop getting robbed by the other three stronger hives?