Confining Queen for Brood Break

[snispel]

I have a hive with a deep box of brood and 3 medium boxes of honey. I want to do a brood break split, but I really like my queen, so I want to keep her. I read somewhere that you can take the queen and put her in a nuc with no room to lay and that creates a mini brood break. Then I would let the rest of the hive make a new queen from her eggs and come out with two hives and a brood break for both.

But, I can't find that post and can't remember what I put in the nuc with the queen. All honey? Honey and young brood? Honey and undrawn frames?

Thank you for the input.

[van from Arkansas]

Ms. Snispel greetings.  You will need pollen and nectar/honey for the queen developing larva.  You also need waxed out open frames for the queen to lay.  I would move the entire frame the Queen happens to be on to the new nuc.  Make sure the old queenless hive has eggs to make a queen cell. Make sure to move the original hive to new location or you will have passive robbing.  No hive should remain the the original location.  Hives/nuc can be moved as little as 10 feet but more is better.  Try to allocate the bees 50/50 to each hive.  Hope you have incoming food and not in a dearth.  I would not try a split during a dearth unless you plan to feed.  Feed is another topic all together.

Best to the bees.

Van

[TheHoneyPump]

Just put the queen in a cage and leave her in the hive.   Leave her caged for 10 days.
At day 10 go destroy any queens cells, there willnot be many with her still in there.  After day 10 check leave her caged for another 6 days then release her.  At day 18 start your mite treatment to catch all exposed mites over the next 8 days.

[snispel]

Thank you for the input.:)

[JojoBeeBoy]

I'm doing this now more by accident than anything. Overfed for 6-8 weeks to get some buildup and drawn comb. This caused everyone to make swarm cells. Trying to go through the hives now and move old queens into nucs with 1-2 frames of resources (occassionally a shake of bees from another frame). i.e. She can keep laying in the nuc, but the main hives are almost completely emerged/exposed. If the swarm cells emerge and don't measure up or come back from mating flights, I'll just move her back in her old home. 

You didn't say how many hives you have, but if it's one, I would not be triffling with the queen much. A mistake or unfortunate happening can really set you back. I like having at least two laying queens on the place. That way I always have a young egg/larvae to give a colony if they have to make a queen. I've had to order a new queen and if they are not accepted or abscond, you've lost too much time. Hope this helps.