My hive is in my weekend home (though by next month it will be my primary residence). While I was away this week a swarm took residence in the wall of the barn between the siding and an interior sheet of plywood, accessing it through holes in the siding. I suspect it's a swarm from my hide but I am not 100% sure of it. It was not there the previous weekend and some workers who were doing work in the barn noticed it on Wednesday.
I spent Saturday trying to decide what to do (unfortunately got locked out from these boards because I forgot my password and never received the link to reset it). By the end of the day I decided to let them be. I am a newby, and wasn't sure I was going to be able to move them or that I was still in time).
On Sunday I went to the farmers market where I spoke to the beekeepers who sold me my first hive and they suggested to take them out because there should not be much comb in there to remove. I spoke to another beekeeper who also said I should take it out because it was going to become a major nuisance in the barn.
I prepared a box and took two frames from my other hive. One from the very side with draw comb and a bit of honey, and one from the middle with brrod and honey. I also put the bait that I had in my trap, and set it on the ground under the wall where the bees were coming in and out.
Then I took a couple of boards off the barn siding. The bees did not bother me at all while I was doing that. The comb was up the wall so I had to take many boards off, but unfortunately I was not able to take the last 2 boards where the comb was, so the comb was hidden but easily reachable. I took a bucket and scraped the comb into the bucket and moved everything into the box. At this point the bees were quite angry. I never saw the queen during this process.
After I was done there was still quite a few bees in the exposed wall. I got a few in the bucket and put those in the box too, and then covered the box and left. When I came back two hours later, there were only few bees in the box and a huge ball of bees back where the comb. I swept them back in the bucket and put them back in the box. The bees were really angry now.
I had to leave last night and I will not be back for one month. My husband will be there later this week and can let me know what's going on.
Did I mess it up? If the queen was in the box the first time wouldn't have the bees gone there? What's most likely going to happen now? The old place is not that appealing to them anymore since it's very much exposed now.
One more question: the frame with brood that I took from my original hive had a queen cell in the middle of the frame. Isn't that a supersedure cell? Does it mean there is a problem with the queen in that hive? Also how much did I set back my hive by taking those frames out? I wouldn't want to damage that hive to botch a swarm rescue.
All I all I am pretty despondent. I wish I had somebody helping me out to show me the ropes.
Topic: What a mess :( (Read 1904 times)