Swarms

[DaneDodger]

While I've been reading and learning one question that popped into my mind was how else do you prevent swarms besides providing more supers for them to move into?  It seems like if your colonies are well so they are constantly producing more and more bees which leads to swarming that eventually you would be BURIED in supers, unable to keep up!  Are their numbers somewhat self regulating?  I only want a few hobby colonies personally so what would I do with a swarm if I couldn't find anyone to take it off my hands?
Jenn B.
central Texas

[Bennettoid]

Splits.

[DaneDodger]

Ummmm  :?  Maybe I'm just too new to beekeeping to know what you mean.  Or maybe I'm not making sense.  Lemme try this another way:
Let's say I have only one new box with 10 frames and put 3 lbs of bees plus a queen in it.  The queen gets out of her little shipping cage, she mates, the workers are working, she's laying eggs, everything's going along like gangbusters.  The colony is doing so well that at some point I see signs of swaming because they're becoming overcrowded but I don't want more than the original one box with 10 frames.  Do I just let them go, get rid of the extras somehow, or what?

[mgates61]

hmmmmmmm.....

Only want the one super with 10 frames ???  No honey supers ????  WHats the use then ??

My understanding is that if they get overcrowded....they  will swarm or abscond.

[indypartridge]

The queen gets out of her little shipping cage, she mates...

The queen should already be mated when you get her.

The colony is doing so well that at some point I see signs of swaming because they're becoming overcrowded but I don't want more than the original one box with 10 frames.  Do I just let them go, get rid of the extras somehow, or what?

Yes, if you just want to stay at a few colonies you can just let them swarm. Or you can make splits or nucs and sell them. Here's some good reading on the topic:

http://www.bushfarms.com/beesswarmcontrol.htm
http://www.bushfarms.com/beessplits.htm

[DaneDodger]

mgates61 - No I'll want more than one 10 frame of course but I was trying to give a simple hypothetical.  Sorry for being so confusing  :-P

indypartridge - That's what I was wondering, how to get rid of any extras I don't want to keep!  Everyone just seems so intent on capturing swarms and such that I thought maybe you HAVE to go get the swarm for some reason, you know, like when your dog gets loose LOL  Thanks for the links!  That's one of the sites that I've been looking through to get more info.
Jenn B.
central Texas

[Jerrymac]

People catch swarms to get more bees. You can keep them from swarming with plenty of brood nest area, and keeping them from filling everything up with honey/pollen.

[DaneDodger]

Ahh so if I understand this properly if I order, say, 3 lbs of bees with a queen, set up a hive with a 10 frame super on bottom then queen excluder and another 8-10 frame I'd end up with brood in the bottom and honey in the top.  Then if I put in a pollen collector and collect honey often enough to keep them working in the warm months to store up their food supplies (but not enough to harm them) that would reduce the chances of swarming?  I know that there's really nothing you can do that will gurantee it without actually weakening the hive but I'd like to do my best to keep them at a reasonable number for me to work with too.
Jenn B.
central Texas

[buzzbee]

If you use the queen excluder the brood nest may not be able to expand as far as the colony would like. You may force a swarm.Leave off the excluder and let the bees have the room they  need.If they fill all the boxes just add some more.   Swarming is natures way of reproducing the bee colony. It's not always a bad thing,just a matter of what your goals are.                                    Ken

[Jerrymac]

Lampasas is about mid-state right? Do you have any real winter or is there something growing all the time. If the bees are out working most of the year they will probably need more than one deep for brood. Perhaps three. In a good year you are going to get a bunch of bees.

Most people here do not like queen excluders. And if the queen has free reign of the hive there is less chance of swarming.

Here is another problem with swarming. The queen you have leaves the hive. Then a new queen has to emerge and go out and mate. She might not get mated very well. She might not make it back to the hive. Then you will have to order another queen. OR.... in your area, she might get mated by Africanized drones.

[DaneDodger]

Hmmm ok so no queen excluder and more brood boxes than I'd thought.  But then won't the queen lay eggs in all the frames?  I thought you wanted to keep at least one box where the queen can't get in so that all you get in that one is pollen and honey?

Yep, we're in central Texas about an hour NW of Austin.  The winters are normally very mild.  This past winter was pretty warm!  I swear we must've had maybe a handful of days that hit as low as 20s but mostly seemed to stay in the 30s or so.  It's already shorts and t-shirt weather here!  The two winters before were nasty for this area, some ice and snow, but still only got down to somewhere in the teens I believe.  Most of the plants around here that I've seen are cedars, weeds, and prickley pears so I'm planning to do some planting too before actually purchasing bees. 

Yeah, I had visions of buying my bees, letting the lil queen just live out her life then letting the bees raise their new queen...just a nice little circle of life.  Heh I got that kicked out of me last night on my first beekeepers meeting!  They suggested requeening once a year with a purchased queen (really, that often?) to keep a strong queen in charge and avoid the colony becoming africanized.  I've got one child that probably is allergic to bees to some extent so a gentle strain will be a trait I want to look for.  I've been told by one beekeeper that Italian strains are very gentle but they look so much like the Africanized so how can you tell if the hive is being taken over? 
Jenn B.
central Texas

[Sir Stungalot]

Jen, just relax...don't try to overthink the whole thing right now. Most people, when they start, have a hard time just keeping a few colonies alive, muchless have to deal with to many bees. The whole re-Queening thing will make more sense to you in a year or so. I, myself, never re-Queen unless I want a "new" type of bee in my yard.  I too live in Texas and I can not say that I have ever had to deal with Africanized bees. Yes, I know they are here but thus far...no problem.
Your bees will take care of the Queen issue on thier own- they have been doing it forever.  The only time they can't "fix" the queen thing is if, say, you squashed your queen in the middle of winter while you were inpecting your hive. Assuming the bees would make a new queen(which is what they would normaly do) once she hatches, there would not be any drones to mate with at that time of year.
Like I say, just relax, you are not going to be inundated with bees (unless you were super lucky!)...keep learning, like you are, and all the sudden this stuff will all come togeather in your head- somewhere in your second season the proverbial "light bulb" will go off in your head! Everything that you have been learning will fall into place.
 As for Queen excluders...again, relax. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't.  I only have them on during a strong flow- during which I have an upper entrance for the bees to go in. Thats another subject though. Once you are used to seeing what brood looks like ect. Queen excluders often make new beekeeprs more comfortable.
 Oh yeah, Jen, the population of bees in a hive swells and ebbs through the year...it is not a constant upward spiral of bees. All those supers you put on early in the spring will be off...sometimes even the extra brood box- as you hit winter. Your Queen knows when to slow down (or even stop) laying eggs. All depends on the food available. As winter rolls on, a huge hive can dwindle to near nothing...sigh.... go quite a few like that right now!

The only thing you will need to watch for as far as the re-queening issue goes is if all the sudden your hive turns mean- but this is not just a one time thing. Over the course of weeks. There are times when a hive will just be cranky one day for no good reason (that you can tell). Next day all will be fine.  This is normal.
The African thing...a hive that always prior was good natured is ALWAYS rotten now...that is when you would squash a queen and get a new one. I have done this thoough I do not think it was African genetics...just cranky genetics. Either way...you will come to know your hive and will know if something does not feel right.

The nice little circle of life you mention is very possible. 
Good luck!

[Jerrymac]

I have not bought any bees. I have captured swarms or dug hives out of walls or other unwanted places. I have not seen anything near what they say to expect from Africanized bees. Some times my bees are pretty defensive... like at the end of Summer last year. Now on warm days I go see what is going on in the hive and they don't get upset at all. Tomorrow I plan on going into one of the hives that was really mean last year so we will see.

[Brian D. Bray]

Ummmm  :?  Maybe I'm just too new to beekeeping to know what you mean.  Or maybe I'm not making sense.  Lemme try this another way:
Let's say I have only one new box with 10 frames and put 3 lbs of bees plus a queen in it.  The queen gets out of her little shipping cage, she mates, the workers are working, she's laying eggs, everything's going along like gangbusters.  The colony is doing so well that at some point I see signs of swaming because they're becoming overcrowded but I don't want more than the original one box with 10 frames.  Do I just let them go, get rid of the extras somehow, or what?

As long as you keep removing frames of bees and brood to other hives you can keep the hive at 1 box, but why?  You can also pull the outer frames with only honey on them but swarming is more likely than when puttling brood frames. The more bees the more honey a hive will produce. 
I plan on having 2 nucs for queens this year.  Each nuc will have a 5 frame deep and a 5 frame medium.  The mediums will be used to boost other hives so that I can get max production out of them and keep the nucs from swarming.

[Sean Kelly]

So if my bees swarmed, is it okay if I don't try to catch them?  I'm kinda limited per my landlord to no more than 5 hives (he originally said only 2 but I twisted his arm with a jar of honey to let me have some more hives) and capturing swarms will only increase my apiary.
Hmm...

Sean Kelly

[JP]

Swarms are a another beekeeper's best friend. Locate someone in your area that collects swarms. They will gladly take them off your hands, I know I would. Another thing, Sean you mentioned landlord, so if you have a swarm that clustered nearby you will want to act cause they could take up shop in someone's house, perhaps even yours or a neighbors.

....JP

[DaneDodger]

Relax???  That word looks like English but I'm not familiar with it  :-P LOL  Ok I admit I do tend to get pretty darn perfectionist when it comes to keeping living things.  I just feel like if I, say, decide to bake a new kind of cake and mess it up, oh well no big deal and the only thing that suffers is my pocketbook in ruined ingredients.  With living things I tend to want to do it all as perfect as possible so that they don't suffer because of my ignorance.  I'll go look up the meaning of that word and try to put it into practice though  :-D

I'm glad to hear that the Africanized aren't quite as huge a problem as they made it sound at the meeting!  It didn't really make sense to me but since they are so much more experienced and knowledgable on this than me I just decided to take their word on it.  But my mind was honestly thinking that if a queen from my hive flies out to mate then surely the drones nearest are going to be the most likely to mate her so unless there's an army of Africanized drones hiding behind every tree chances are that drones from that same hive are going to be the ones that mate her.
Jenn B.
central Texas

[Cindi]

Sean, what some people do when a hive swarms is to recombine them back with the originating colony, if they know which one it was.  That would be of course if the queen was not put back in I would suppose.  The younger new emerging queen would probably kill her or more than likely she would kill the ones not yet emerged. 

You will hear more responses, but if you put the swarm back in the box and gave them more room you would have a strong colony again and it would gather honey.  When a colony issues a swarm, a good many of the bees are gone, there has been a halt in brood laying and that original colony will not have any surpluses of honey. The swarm ate so much of the honey for their fuel in search of a new home.

If I didn't want increases, that is what I would do. I would still try to catch a swarm if I saw it in the tree or somewhere and send it back to its home, bad bees.

Or better yet, tempt your landlord with another jar of honey (or two or three), hee, hee.  Wait for more responses, they will come.  Have a beautiful and wonderful day, groove on groove.  Cindi

[Jerrymac]

Tomorrow I plan on going into one of the hives that was really mean last year so we will see.

Well I did it. And despite some knocking around they were very gentle and patient with me. Just another person saying it depends on the time of year and weather.