Strengthing Strategy for Weak Hive

[Quint Randle]

My weak hive has finally got a laying queen again. I now want to try and get that hive as strong as possible to get ready for winter (I'm in Utah).

I would say the cluster is about 5 frames big. Just to give some context.

1) I am going to give it 2 frames of capped brood from my very strong hive.

2) I thought I would switch the hive positions of the strong and weak hive to give them more foragers.

I don't want to weaken the stronger hive (2 very full brood boxes and 2 full honey supers). So I was thinking I would switch them like around 3 pm or something so they go some foragers coming back from the strong hive, but not too many).

I would appreciate any thoughts you have on this strategy. And does this hive have a chance at making iat through the winter. (I've been giving them full frames of honey from the strong hive as well on and off over the summer as well.)

Thanks,

Quint

[Finman]

.

Take two frames of emerging bees from big give. Not merely capped. If you have now 5 frames bees you have after 2 frames bees enough for one deep. You have good time to get wintering one box colony. If you have there some flowers colony gets pollen and raise wintering bees during 4 weeks.

.

[sierrabees]

You probably would not get fighting from the bees returning to the wrong hive, but as strong as your weak hive is, and if you shook off the older bees from two frames of brood and gave the young bees that held on you should be in good shape. Why take the chance of losing some when the old field bees from your other hive try to get in.

[carbide]

If you switch the location of the two hives it won't make much difference what time of the day that you do it. Most of the forageing bees from the strong hive will return to the original position of the hive. Even if you move the hive late in the day, the foragers from the strong hive will return to the original location even if they don't go out forageing until the next day.

[Quint Randle]

Okay. so I understand Carbide's comment.

So here's my question. What percentage of my foragers will "transfer" to the weaker hive when switching? Am I in danger of losing too many foragers for the strong hive? It is a very strong hive. Maybe it doesn't really matter now that the honey flow is ending. That was the whole point of my question was to get a handle on whether it was worth weaking the strong hive (xx %) by switching.

I'm going to transfer the two frames here in the next day or so and would like to have a more definite feeling as to whether I should switch the positions of the actual hives or not.

Thanks again.

Quint

[iddee]

With a laying queen and 5 frames of bees, I would switch places with the hives and NOT move the two frames. Actually, either will help the weak hive and the switch will not harm the strong hive when there is no flow going on.

[BjornBee]

Returning foragers do not cause fighting in regards to swapping locations.

Guard bees are keen to the behavior of potential robbers. They circle around, fly in close and then back away, and exhibit behaviors that are very clear to guard bees. It is easy to see robbers testing the entrance for potential weak hives or poorly defended ones.

Returning forage bees loaded with nectar and pollen do not exhibit such behavior. They are flying to the spot they have known to be correct. There is no hesitation on thier part, and most guard bees do not even pay attention. If they want to bring food into the hive, its as if they say "Come on in!"

I practice the art of hive swapping quite often. Swapping nucs is sometimes a must. Using 5 frame nucs for queen mating means some are strong, some are weak. Having them in the same yards as full size hives means keeping them strong enough to keep them from being robbed. Hive/nuc swapping is an easy way to accomplish this.

[Quint Randle]

Thanks.

I went ahead and did both the other day. Put two sealed brood frames into the weaker hive and then switched the actual positions of the hives as well.

All seems to being A-OK. I checked back a day and half later and now I have two busy hives.

Thanks again...

Quint