moving TBH's

[bee_wrangler]

I am planning to use some THB as swarm traps and some as increase colonies next year. I'm thinking i will need to move some of these at some point. I'm looking for some suggestions on moving these hives without damaging the delicate comb. Or am i being overly concerned?

Dan

[bigbearomaha]

I have planned not to use them in that capacity for the same reasons.

My TBH's will be stationary and I will use another box to contain swarms and cutouts to bring the bees to the new home where it will stay.

Big Bear

[Cacklewack]

I've moved a lot of top bar hives this season without any issues. I tend to do it on cooler evenings and simply load them in my truck, tie them down and drive carefully. Comb is pretty resiliant.

Matt

[brac]

I would think they would need to be sideway in the truck, not long ways

[Tomas]

I don’t have a lot of experience moving my colonies that are in their permanent tbh boxes. These are all stationary. But from what I have read and which makes sense in my experience, is that a hive with mostly old, dark-colored comb can be moved without too much of a problem. This comb is much stronger than newly drawn comb and usually firmly attached to the top bar.

New comb is another story. I catch many swarms in Honduras using trap hives. My trap hives have the same dimensions at my ktbhs, except for being shorter. They usually have nine top bars. Their depth is 12 inches. Here are some links to pictures:

http://i155.photobucket.com/albums/s...ngintree02.jpg

http://i155.photobucket.com/albums/s...gingintree.jpg

http://i155.photobucket.com/albums/s...ree31Oct06.jpg

All these new hives have to eventually be moved to one of the apiaries. The large swarms cause me the most problems with comb breakage while moving them. Since Africanized bees like to readily abscond, I try to wait at least ten days before removing the swarm traps with bees from a tree and taking it to an apiary. I want the new colony to be firmly established. The big swarms can just about have the swarm trap full of comb that is heavy with new brood by this time. These combs readily break if I happen to bump it too hard. I have to be very careful in how I handle these. If I carry them by hand, I usually don’t have a problem. The roads up to the mountain are the main problem (lots of rocks and ruts—makes for a long trip).

If you move them before they build too much comb, it can help things quite a bit. Smaller swarms don’t usually give me too many problems.

What I have tried with success is turning the trap hive upside down to transport it in a vehicle. This gives the combs much more support when they rest on the top bar and not hang from them. You have to turn it upside down by turning it on/with the edges of the comb. If you turn it upside down by flipping them on the face of the comb, you’ll have breakage (I hope that makes sense). Do this carefully.

If you think you did get comb breakage, you almost have to open it immediately to fix the problem. Otherwise you might lose the hive because too many bees die from being crushed or suffocating/overheating (broken comb might block the entrance).

I also try to build my swarm traps as light as possible. The less weight I have to lower down from a tree, the better. Also think about the way you may hang them in a tree. Mine literally hang so they just have to be lowered down once a swarm moves in. I don’t set them in a crotch in the tree because it can be a pain to lift them out of there and then lower them down. They can be heavy and I may have to do this while literally up in the tree at night.

----------
Tom

[doc25]

What are you using for TBH's? If you were using your long hive design you can use say medium frames for the trap and move them into a long hive with just TB's once you got it home.