Beemaster's International Beekeeping Forum
BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => HONEYBEE REMOVAL => Topic started by: Psparr on April 24, 2016, 10:52:27 pm
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Did my first cutout today in the soffit of an old stone house. Owner says the hive has been there at least ten years.
Not easy to get the comb out in the space I had to work with. Hoisted my bee vac up on a pulley attached to the ladder. Got hit right away in the face so put the veil on. Got two five gallon buckets of honey out. Probably fifteen pounds of bees in the vac. And a medium super full of brood comb. Still some more brood comb to remove tomorrow but is difficult to salvage any more. It's some really old tough comb. Can't access the numerals on my phone or the comma. Think it got a good bath of honey. Speaking of honey I was literally covered head to toe in it. Gravity is some crappy stuff.
All in all I think it went well. Quit counting stings at about forty. Homeowner was happy the bees were being saved comma and I even got a beer out of it. (http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160425/07ab6adde396a66d9126e577c5bfe0fd.jpg)(http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160425/e914b15ac7d3c233c526f74642f5ed2f.jpg)(http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160425/2a1824d0d01077a149ba8d9ce57c7465.jpg)(http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160425/4eb5005d8fff443b23cb9853dca6ae93.jpg)
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Yep the honey bath you get when removing over head is always "fun" ;-)
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Congratulations Psparr on your first cutout. Older comb is harder to cut but easier to handle. Every week I am cutting swarms out of my deep nucs. They build wax below the medium frames. New wax is so soft it is constantly crushing under your fingers. Old wax holds tight.
What you need are some cut out tools. Divemaster makes them. Maybe you can get him to sell you a set.
Jim
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I have never done or even seen a cut out but I must say, your pictures are super impressive.
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I've heard about a knife with the tip bent over about an inch. Would have come in handy. The combs were really tall and getting them to break off at the top didn't work.
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Here is Divemaster's forum name: divemaster1963.
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Thanks sawdstmkr.
Here's a not so good quality short video of me vacuuming the bees. Vacuum worked well only maybe fifty dead bees when I was done.
https://youtu.be/wcx8ujZYcg8
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Thanks for sharing. Looks like you had the vacuum setting set just right, just enough to barely pull them in. Good job.
Jim
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An update on the cutout.
Got a call this morning that there was a swarm in a nearby maple about 40-50' up. Was planning to finish the cut out tomorrow because they were calling for rain and I wanted to vote before going in to work. I drove over with a swarm trap, some old comb and LGO. Set the trap on their deck and had scouts within seconds. They must have absconded this morning. Just a little robbing activity in the original hive. Hope to get a call by this evening that they accepted the trap. Supposed to storm pretty bad here later.
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Second update. Homeowner just sent me this picture. (http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160426/41bab99d74ab2ce3dfc98f5f0956c192.jpg)