Poisoned bees - please help

[animal]

Long story short for now (maybe a rant later).
A real estate guy sprayed permethrin, I think ... Definitely sprayed something on the old (wild) hive. Found an empty can of wasp/hornet spray and that was the active ingredient. Pretty sure he sprayed the hive too. I had left it about 8 feet from the wild hive in hopes that they would clean up the spilled honey and go into my hive ..
Anyway. it seemed to be working ... Go out there last night and the old nest was mostly cleaned out and my hive opening was clogged up with dead bees. Cleaned it out, got a scrap of plywood to use for a bottom because I think it and the outside of the hive had been sprayed and brought it home. I have already condensed them down to 5 deep frames (that only gives them about a half-frame of honey) and put them in a box that is basically a 5- frame deep box with a 2" hole in the lower left corner ... A lot of bees wanted to stay on the walls of the emptied out box ... so I put the boxes directly against each other, placed lid of full size box ... over half sized box and half of full sized box ... and put lid of half-size box over remainder of full sized box. (in hopes the ones in the big box will cross over...
Also emptied all frames from full box.

What else can I do now ? Just got home about an hour ago. The ones left seem ok and their activity level seems about the same as it has been on other nights.

[animal]

they all moved over. correct lid on and in a clean box now.
there were another 200 (?)  dead  plus about 20 pupa on the floor of the full sized box.

Ok.. it's not supposed to rain today. !5 %  and high of 84 , cloudy.
Better to put them where it gets the most wind ... or coolest spot or just under the porch?

[Bob Wilson]

If they are out of the possibly poisoned hive box, and they still have their queen, then treat them like any other 5 frame box colony (nuc). If the honey flow is on now, you can leave them with your other hives.
If you are worried about them being robbed, you could reduce that 2" hole entrance a bit. That's rather large for a 5 frame nuc box.

[animal]

it is a 2" diameter hole not a slot across bottom ...still too big?
.. built as a trap  ... all I had that was not contaminated
 first time in bees ... did a cut-out
do not know if I have a queen, but they've been going out and coming back by night

[animal]

Ok, Thank you! I think I get it now ... I didn't have a restriction on the entrance of the hive to begin with so it had a 7/8" opening all the way across... was just going by area of opening ... actually had worried that 2"dia. was too small. Plans I went by didn't show that piece ... had typos too (fun)

Did the cut-out May 4th -5th... I think ... days have been running together a bit lately.

Almost positive he sprayed my hive (out of malice) .. it had that strange bitter- warm taste. Definitely sprayed  oid nest about 6' to the right and 6' up.
I guess it's a waiting game now.

[The15thMember]

How horrible!  I had a hive get into something when they were out foraging a few weeks ago, and that was bad enough.  I can't imagine how upset I'd be if someone had sprayed them on purpose!    And after you did all that work trying to save them too!   

Like Bob said, as long as they are on clean equipment, that's really all you can do.  You may have to baby them along for a while if their population has been greatly reduced.  Keep their entrance small, and don't give them too much space, otherwise you could have problems with beetles and waxworms. 

[Kathyp]

Wow.  Does the owner of the place know?  That really sucks that someone would do that to a hive box.  I get people being dumb enough to spray a wild hive.  They might think it's a threat to a sale or something. 

[Ben Framed]

Found an empty can of wasp/hornet spray and that was the active ingredient. Pretty sure he sprayed the hive too. I had left it about 8 feet from the wild hive in hopes that they would clean up the spilled honey and go into my hive ..

Mmm

Bob gave good advice which seems to be reasonable and sound.

Was the 'tame' hive on your side of the property or on the property of the wild hive?

Phillip

[animal]

I've typed, untyped, detyped, retyped and can't find a way to explain things that would be right for this board. ... getting in the weeds or telling too much ... another try

To me, this is a jobsite .. not my property, not his. I had cut out the wild hive from the soffet and extending into the attic about (5' long)... it just kept going and going.. My hive was established with the bees from the wild hive. I bobbled the "bee vac and released a bunch of bees.. those went back to where the wild hive was and started sucking honey. Originally I had my hive closed up but the entrance was covered with a 1"x 2" that I hadn't screwed down and the bees moved it while i was doing other things. They started going out and coming back and.. bringing more bees ... so i put my hive as close to the wild hive site as I could, and left it like that. Had plans to pick it up  saturday but owner wanted some work done on her residence that day.   

Owner/customer seems to be straight-up all aces lady. I don't know what she knows about any of this.

Mad?  I'm not mad at the guy. I have to have some semblance of respect for someone to be able to get mad at them; just disgusted by the waste. I started to get mad, but it just evaporated. I had also left him a note about bees etc. and he had torn it up and dumped the pieces on the floor repair. .. like a child had thrown a temper tantrum... also marks in the grass where had wheeled around in the mule fast coming up to the area by the hive... really strange... Mostly, I was in awe, I guess.
I think I understand it; him, that is. But I really don't want to. That's a really strange feeling for someone that's usually manically driven to try to understand things.

"All the work" isn't bothering me either. All in all, I think I learned a lot doing it and the ones left seem to be ok. It just kinda sucks that when I started to like the little buggers, they get sprayed.

[The15thMember]

I've typed, untyped, detyped, retyped and can't find a way to explain things that would be right for this board. ... getting in the weeds or telling too much ... another try

To me, this is a jobsite .. not my property, not his. I had cut out the wild hive from the soffet and extending into the attic about (5' long)... it just kept going and going.. My hive was established with the bees from the wild hive. I bobbled the "bee vac and released a bunch of bees.. those went back to where the wild hive was and started sucking honey. Originally I had my hive closed up but the entrance was covered with a 1"x 2" that I hadn't screwed down and the bees moved it while i was doing other things. They started going out and coming back and.. bringing more bees ... so i put my hive as close to the wild hive site as I could, and left it like that. Had plans to pick it up  saturday but owner wanted some work done on her residence that day.   

Owner/customer seems to be straight-up all aces lady. I don't know what she knows about any of this.

Mad?  I'm not mad at the guy. I have to have some semblance of respect for someone to be able to get mad at them; just disgusted by the waste. I started to get mad, but it just evaporated. I had also left him a note about bees etc. and he had torn it up and dumped the pieces on the floor repair. .. like a child had thrown a temper tantrum... also marks in the grass where had wheeled around in the mule fast coming up to the area by the hive... really strange... Mostly, I was in awe, I guess.
I think I understand it; him, that is. But I really don't want to. That's a really strange feeling for someone that's usually manically driven to try to understand things.

"All the work" isn't bothering me either. All in all, I think I learned a lot doing it and the ones left seem to be ok. It just kinda sucks that when I started to like the little buggers, they get sprayed.

Boy, I feel you on that one.  I told my sister about this, and her response was "I can't believe there is actually that much evil in the world".  What kind of a person would do such a thing?! 

[animal]

Just checked by peeking down between the frames. Didn't see any dead. They seem busy doing bee things. 4 of 5 frames are full of bees on both sides.last frame is about half full. I've been getting the dead out ... mostly because I'm thinking that permethrins are residual powders and they might pick up the poison from handling a dead bee.  dunno if this is right or wrong, but they don't seem to mind being handled much. No stings since the cut-out, so far, and i'm only pulling frames at night.

[The15thMember]

Just checked by peeking down between the frames. Didn't see any dead. They seem busy doing bee things. 4 of 5 frames are full of bees on both sides.last frame is about half full. I've been getting the dead out ... mostly because I'm thinking that permethrins are residual powders and they might pick up the poison from handling a dead bee.  dunno if this is right or wrong, but they don't seem to mind being handled much. No stings since the cut-out, so far, and i'm only pulling frames at night.

Just did some quick googling, and permethrin does last for a while on surfaces (the NPIC fact sheet reported it remained at 60% of its original concentration on an indoor surface in daylight after 20 days), so probably not a bad idea to help them clean out their dead.  Small struggling colonies are often unable to mount a good defense, especially if they lost most of their older workers.  4.5 frames of bees really isn't too bad, they should be able to build back up from that if all goes well for them from here on out.   

[Ben Framed]

What a bad break animal.  Sorry you are beginning beekeeping like a salmon swimming upstream. Hang I'm there! I will get better!

Phillip

[BeeMaster2]

Animal,
Why are you in the hives at night. This is the worst time to bee in the hive. All of the field bees are in the hive with nothing to do unless it is cold and they need to heat the cluster. If that is the case, you definitely don?t want to bee in there.
Jim Altmiller

[animal]

I guess the best answer is that I don't really know what I'm doing .. had assumed that they would be less active, less likely to be aggressive, slower and easier to not accidentally squish them , etc.
and during the day, I'm working.

Despite my ineptitude, they do seem to be doing a lot better and multiplying. I've left them alone for the past week-plus .. when I didn't find new dead in the bottom.... except for sliding the top a little every day or two because they keep gluing it down and to take a glance inside once.

I was planning to check for dead tonight and to see if I could tell if there were any eggs, queen cells, queen  ...  etc...in there ... pretty sure some of the brood I put in there have matured ... since they seem to be doing stuff in the 5th frame now and also seen a lot of really small bees lately.

So.. do this during the day instead ... or should I just leave them alone longer?

Another change is there have been a lot clustering around the opening(2" diameter, about half open since someone said 2" was too much) at night in the past few days (rain has been the only change in weather).. to the point that they were on the outside (about an inch around the opening last night)
Thought ... maybe they can't get enough air so they come out or they want it warmer inside so they plug it up
So I slid it open all the way and checked later. They had retreated so that none were on the outside, but still plugging up the hole. .. so I put it back to half this morning when they were out of the way.

[BeeMaster2]

Animal,
We encourage new beekeepers to inspect their hives to learn the ins and outs of the hive. I recommend that you don?t inspect them more than once every 10 days or so. Do it when you see lots of bee?s coming and going from the hive. This is when they are the busiest. Lifting the lid is not inspecting the hive. I recommend that you get or make a screen top cover with an insulation board on the screen. You can then lift the lid and insulation board and see what the bees are doing without disturbing them at all.
You will bee able to see how many frames they are working.
You can learn a lot by just sitting next to the hive and watching them come and go. This is very relaxing.
Jim Altmiller

[animal]

Thanks Mr. Altmiller,
Right now they're in a box that I built as a trap. It's basically a nuc box with a solid bottom (removable) and a 2" hole at the bottom of one side with a sliding door. It holds 5 deep frames.
My goal has been to get them back into the hive that I had put them in at first and was poisoned ... it has a standard bottom, deep 10 frame box, shallow box, queen excluder screen, telescoping lid ...what they're in now is what I had that was clean and ready at the time ... and I hadn't intended it to be permanent.

The poisoning reduced their population by about 75%. Now they seem to have rebounded to about 1/3 of original number.

I am hoping that it is about time to transfer them back into the original deep box since they seem to be recovering and I think the original hive is now clean.
Should I wait on that transfer and tweak the box they're in instead?

[The15thMember]

So.. do this during the day instead ... or should I just leave them alone longer?

I agree with Jim that new beekeepers should inspect regularly, just to learn what is going on in the hive and what is normal.  As a hobbyist beekeeper who loves inspecting, I usually inspect my hives once every two weeks.  When I was new, I inspected once a week, and I still do that sometimes during swarm season.  Definitely don't inspect a hive more than once a week.  With a hive this small, during an inspection I would pull every frame and take a look at how the brood is developing, how the hive is putting up stores, and making sure you see eggs or a queen.  Remember, busy bees are happy bees, so inspecting when it's warmest and the hives are most active is best.  You have been getting away with opening them at night only because this hive is small and unable to defend itself. 

Another change is there have been a lot clustering around the opening(2" diameter, about half open since someone said 2" was too much) at night in the past few days (rain has been the only change in weather).. to the point that they were on the outside (about an inch around the opening last night)
Thought ... maybe they can't get enough air so they come out or they want it warmer inside so they plug it up
So I slid it open all the way and checked later. They had retreated so that none were on the outside, but still plugging up the hole. .. so I put it back to half this morning when they were out of the way.

Bees have their own heating and air conditioning systems and will regulate their temperature and air flow, so no worries about them getting enough air.  They are sticking the lid down simply because that's what bees do, they use propolis to stick everything together.  Any space in the hive smaller than one bee space (the size of one bee's body, ~9-10 mm) will be filled with propolis, any space larger than that will be filled with comb.  This is why the Langstroth hive was so revolutionary when it was invented and is still in use today.  Langstroth discovered that bees won't fill 1 bee space with anything, so everything is spaced 1 bee space apart in a hive, that way everything remains movable and unstuck to the nearest thing.   

I am hoping that it is about time to transfer them back into the original deep box since they seem to be recovering and I think the original hive is now clean.
Should I wait on that transfer and tweak the box they're in instead?

I am unsure at what point I'd feel comfortable using that box, just based on how long the permethrin can persist.  I'd be interested to hear other opinions on this, as I have (fortunately) no experience with bees who have been poisoned with this pesticide. 

The poisoning reduced their population by about 75%. Now they seem to have rebounded to about 1/3 of original number.

It's good to hear they are rebounding nicely. 

[animal]

Thanks 15th,

I really appreciate info... A box really isn't a problem, and since they seem like they'll survive  ... I'll just make another hive for this bunch and use the first hive when it's time to split(if all goes well). It took me all freaking day to make the first one, but I've got a better set of plans and all the jigs made to cut/staple/screw the frames and boxes now.
Pretty sure it's clean ..(cleaned it,removed wax finish, cleaned again and then left in sun/rain for a week) but a couple weeks more in the weather will be good for it.

Getting away with it .. After transferring to the "nuc" , I only lifted frames twice?? to remove the dead (because I was afraid that any poison on them would transfer to other bees that might try to remove them). The 2nd(possibly 3rd? not entirely sure.. been working weird hours and my brains are a little scrambled) time I lifted frames, no dead and mostly left them alone after that (the peek through the frames was looking at the floor with a really bright flashlight looking for dead).. I'll just leave them alone ... at least until I have a new box ready.

Oddly enough, they were never aggressive .. the crawled all over my hands, up my arms, landed on my glasses, etc. but no stings. Kinda cool and weird, but a bit frustrating.

[The15thMember]

Oddly enough, they were never aggressive .. the crawled all over my hands, up my arms, landed on my glasses, etc. but no stings. Kinda cool and weird, but a bit frustrating.

What's cool is that you didn't respond with fear to them crawling on you!  You are a natural beekeeper for sure!    Very few people would have that kind of nerve right out of the gate, and bees aren't any different than any other animal, when you remain calm, they remain calm (for the most part ).  While I am impressed, I would recommend a veil any time you open the hive, just for safety first reasons.  You only have two eyes, and even a fairly calm bee who gets accidentally stuck between your eyeball and your glasses lens is a dangerous situation.