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Making Splits

9K views 30 replies 19 participants last post by  praxis178 
#1 ·
Anyone got any good video of ways to split hives? Walk off method is probably the best for me.
 
#8 ·
Well if i worked with my bees like she is i'd need a epipen guess i have a lot to learn .
I'd love to work with out my ultrabreeze no way or even no gloves but my bee's know they get me every time.
Great video. Bet she has some arms on her hell i feel like a old man after watching her throw them deeps around .
 
#12 ·
Acebird's method will work, but, I would take one frame, from box one and put it in box two. Leave the next frame in box one. Take the next frame from box one and put it in box 2. Leave the next frame in box one. Repeat until there are no frames left to divide.. You can then close the hives and walk away.

The reason I like taking alternating frames, over just taking a full box is.... You may wind up with no viable eggs in one of the hive bodies, and the queen and all the viable eggs are in the other box. No chance for them to make a new queen.

If you can, move box 2 a considerable distance ( 2 to 3 miles) it is better, if you can't, field bees will return to box one, but, that is not normally a big problem. If I am doing several, I like to mark them, within two days you will be able to tell which one has the queen. Watch the other one closely for a week to insure they are making queen cells, and capping them. Continue to watch to insure a new queen emerges and starts laying. If this doesn't happen for whatever reason, you will need to place a new queen with that hive.

Walkaways will work as long as there is unsealed brood in the hive that doesn't have the queen, and they make queen cells, and the new queen emerges and gets mated. You do lose considerable time with this method, over splitting, (find the queen) and place a new queen with the hive that does not have the queen. Downside here is, queens cost money.

Hope this is helpful.

cchoganjr
 
#16 ·
No chance for them to make a new queen.
Yes that can happen but you only need to make one queen not two. Picking boxes from the top and smoking as you go is likely to push the queen into the bottom box. If you observe where the most of the brood is assume the queen is in the bottom box and put that one where the most of the brood is not.
 
#15 ·
Making a split is NOT dealing cards! If the donor colony can't afford to lose a consolidated outer portion of it's core cluster, you shouldn't be taking anything from it! The same is slightly less true when making nucs from combinations of non thriving colonies. THe purpose is not to totally disorganize the bees and intentionally stress them as much as possible.
 
#17 ·
When splitting a double deep hive the very first thing I do is set the top box off onto the bottom that you will be using for your split, divide and conquer so to speak. The queen can normally be found where there are eggs and open brood. I take a quick inventory of brood and divide it somewhat evenly and in the process almost always find the queen.
 
#19 ·
Exactly... However she can, run and hide, and just be difficult to find. If you don't find her quickly, I find it helpful to just go ahead and make the split. Mark the two boxes. Wait a couple of days and you will find her. Either put a new queen with the other one, or watch and insure they make a new queen.

cchoganjr
 
#20 ·
Acebird... Yes that will work, however there is no certainty that the smoke will drive her to the bottom. If it does, and most of the brood is in the bottom box, and you have driven her down with smoke, she will be in the bottom box with most of your brood. If boxes above does not have viable eggs, that colony is doomed.

I prefer to find her, and with experience, it is not all that difficult. But, in a walkaway, as mleck said he was very likely going to do, you need unsealed brood in both boxes because you don't know for sure where she is, and you need viable eggs in the box that does not have the queen. The only way to walk away and be sure, is to have viable eggs in each box.

Reference Vanve G.... Splitting bees is not like dealing cards, agreed, but, the best way to assure survivability, and quick groth, of a walkaway split, as mleck is considering, of both colonies is to have brood in all stages, as well as honey and pollen in each of the boxes.

cchoganjr
 
#27 ·
Acebird... Yes that will work, however there is no certainty that the smoke will drive her to the bottom. If it does, and most of the brood is in the bottom box, and you have driven her down with smoke, she will be in the bottom box with most of your brood. If boxes above does not have viable eggs, that colony is doomed.

I prefer to find her, and with experience, it is not all that difficult.
I think it is but if I had the experience maybe not.

I played the odds ... I took a colony in the spring and split by the box in thirds. This will most likely give you a dud and it did so I dumped the dud and split by the box in half the colony that continued to expand veraciously. Only looking for two colonies I got three so my goals were met.
 
#21 ·
Speaking of liking the EPE hives, this guy's local to me and in my bee club. He's now a franchisee or partner or something (not sure of the exact business arrangement) with Swienty in Sweden as of a couple weeks ago. He's selling their high density foam hives, they're pretty nice. He was displaying them at the ABF conference in Hershey. The website is still just getting set up and is still a bit "European" in some of the phrasing, I believe he'll have this stuff in-stock in mid-Feb. No idea on shipping but I can't imagine it would be as much as straight from Europe to you.

www.modernbeekeepingusa.com
 
#23 ·
I just placed an order today for a complete hive that consists of 1 deep, 2 mediums, top cover, inner cover, bottom board with varroa insert, queen excluder, entrance reducer, and a hive strap. I ordered an additional deep, and a hive top feeder. The shipping was $29.10 and the total cost was $215.34. I had to pay sales tax since I live in PA. I saw these at the ABF Conference and, with the 10% off special this month, I thought I'd give them a try. If I like these, I may see if I can pick them up in the future since I'm about an hour away.
 
#28 ·
Acebird....After I wrote the post, I realized my situation is a little different from what you are describing. Most of my hives are single deeps, and are split two or more times each year to sell nucs. It is a lot easier to find the queen in just one deep, than in multiple deeps/with shallows. By the time the 10 frames have been divided into two boxes, a quick glance will normally find her. And as you said, there are so many different reasons people split their hives. Mine are almost entirely to make nucs for sale. Occasionally, I split a brood stock to reduce chances of swarming. Almost never just to increase my hive count.

In a walkaway split, I think the most important thing is to make sure there is new brood, viable eggs for making a queen, in each box/boxes, unless, you know where the queen is. If you do find her, I like to put some viable brood, and a couple of frames of chocolate brood in the queenless box, to keep the colony going until the new queen emerges and has mated, and made it back to the colony. In a walkaway, the most important thing to me is, keep an eye on both colonies until you KNOW for sure that they both have queens.

Thanks.

cchoganjr
 
#30 ·
The lady made every move count which made it look easy, she showed no fear of the bees that made it look like she had her job to do and the bees had theirs.:thumbsup: I'm still confused as why the man in the truck never offered to help lift those 80 lb honey supers and stayed in the truck?but then again she lift and stacked them like there was nothing to it? The lady has True Grit.
 
#31 ·
I have to agree that lady had it going on in spades! VERY cool to watch and realize just how far I yet have to go.....

Those supers (and brood boxes) looked like they were made out of Styrofoam or similar just how well does that put up with hard use like in a mobile/out yard style operation?
 
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