Angry Bees

[Woodbuster]

Hello folks. This is my first post and I'd like to give you my situation. I live in Mexico and I have had bees for about three yrs. I have struggled all along with angry African bees. I used to live in the country but now I live in the city and I have my bees on a roof. I just came down from trying to take the honey off of my hive. I had to stop because of the amount of bees on my veil. There were so many I couldn't see through the screen. I am afraid that they will attack our neighbors. We had to put our dogs in the house to keep them from being stung. I have had two parrots killed by bees before so they will attack. Do any of you folks have any ideas on calming angry bees? I am going to look for a place to move them too as soon as possible. Thanks ahead of time. Roger

[Capricorn]

Requeen them with genetics that are known to be gentler.

[MichaBees]

First of all; you are under a lot of liability under Mexican law. May someone get injured; directly or indirectly because of your bees, you could be taken to jail for a long time. I have bees at an orphanage at the Copper Canyon in the Sierra Madre in Chihuahua and we had the same issue.
Re-queen as soon as you can, I know there is a government effort to keep the beehives from becoming Africanized; you may want to talk to SAGARPA for they can make good queens available for you at an excellent price ($10.00 to $15.00 US Dollars)

[Bee Bliss]

Something for people to consider is that keeping Africanized bees in a location keeps those genes in that area via swarms, drones, subsequent daughter queens. Requeening is a way of fighting that also. Good luck

[Woodbuster]

Thanks for the info. I will look into that. I suppose that to requeen I need to find the queen I have and kill it before adding the new queen. The only problem is that I have never seen my queen. But, of course, I never spend much time examining my bees. When the bees are like that you don't really feel like it.

[slickbrightspear]

before you requeen woodbuster take your boxes and set them each on a bottom board about 150 feet from your other hives and put a new box at the old location this will let the old aggressive bees come back to the old spot and you will not have to fight thru as many of them to find the queen.

[Woodbuster]

I know I've been foolish and am working on changing that. I have killed hives before that have shown strong African traits. The two hives I have here didn't have such strong aggressive traits, which is why I brought them to the city. They have been getting more aggressive and have culminated to the way they are acting now.

[Capricorn]

As for most things bee related, Michael Bush has some good info out there for requeening hot hives.

http://bushfarms.com/beesrequeeninghot.htm

I like the tip in this thread about moving the boxes and letting the workers fly back to a different box. That's a good idea.

[MichaBees]

You are lucky to be at such a beautiful city!, and beekeeper too!.
I visited your city 4 times in the last 14 months; I just can not have enough of it.

[Woodbuster]

Well living here is another thing. There's been marches, riots, and road blocks for the last couple of weeks. Maybe next time you come you can help me with my bees.

[Countryboy]

It may be easier to soak the hive with soapy water at night to kill it, and then start over with new bees later.

If you wish to requeen the hive with a calmer queen, I made a YouTube video of how I requeened a mean hive.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmmtjFgdqz8

Please keep in mind that it will take several weeks after requeening before the bees become gentler. The old bees will still be AHB, and it will take a few weeks for them to die off and the new gentle bees to become adult bees.

If I had ANY concerns about the safety of myself, my loved ones, or my neighbors, I would kill the hive by soaking it with soapy water. It doesn't damage the combs, and it is not very difficult to find new bees.

[edward]

Think about what time of day it is + weather conditions .

Its easier to go into a hive when most of the bees aren't home.

= not as many to fight with

mvh edward

[max2]

" It may be easier to soak the hive with soapy water at night to kill it,"
Finding a tub big enough may not be that easy??

Angry hives ( even if they are not Africanised) are an issue most of us - even with a lot of experience - find is easier said then done. Speaking for myself, I have never found it easy to deal with an angry hive, find a queen, re-queen and re-assemble.
I would kill such a hive in a city location but I'm not sure how? I never had to do it.
I was in Oaxaca a few months ago at a little place about 1/2 hr away called Bonanza. Lovely place, lovely people, great beer - a little wet!

[Woodbuster]

Well, after thinking it over I think I will have to kill the hive. I'd try to move it but the wood is starting to rot. I wouldn't trust it. I would like to kill the hive without affecting the honey store. I only get to harvest once a year and I would hate to lose all that honey<approx. 2 five gallon buckets>. I think I will start over with some good quality bees in new hives. Thankfully I'm a woodworker so making new hives won't be a problem. Would any of you folks know how to kill the hive without affecting the honey? Thanks

[Matt Little]

Well if you are worried about the old brood boxes leave them there and transfer your frames to a fresh new box, then carry to a different location and hunt out the queen. If you kill it, put in some bee escapes so you can nick the bee-less supers of honey before killing the hive. Justa thought from a noob...

[MichaBees]

Before you kill Osama Bin Laden hives, I would try something else.
If your colonies are strong, I would build 2 new boxes and do a split with new queens. Then, you would end up with 4 hives, 2 bad ones, and 2 good ones. Wait to see your new queens prosper, install a bee funnel at the entry of the Osama Bin Laden hives, let the old bees stay outside the box, and then at night, when they cluster; spray them with soapy water.

[Michael Bush]

I see no advantage to killing them. I've requeened and seen them calm down almost instantly.

http://www.bushfarms.com/beesrequeeninghot.htm

[Woodbuster]

You're probably right but I don't want to work with my bees at the current location and risk someone getting hurt. They really get angry when you open them. If I could re queen without having to go through the hive looking for the old queen I'd do it.

[Woodbuster]

I think that that is the best idea so far. Do I just make a funnel out of paper?

[Michael Bush]

You get as many bottom boards as you have boxes on the hive (besides the one it's on). You put them all behind the current hive and set each current box on a bottom board and put a lid on. Do this quickly and smoothly. Then you put an empty box on the old bottom board and put a lid on. Wait a 24 hours. Put a queen cage in all six boxes (including the empty one on the old location). The field bees now live at the old location. In about four days check the queen cages and see which queens are alive. The live ones were queenless. The dead queen is where the queen is. Split it into two hives and walk away. Come back in two or three days and see which one has queen cells. Put that one on one of the hives that now has a queen. Destroy the queen cells if you like. Now you have only five frames at most to look through and no field bees. I think you'll find it quite manageable. Kill the queen and combine it with one of the now queenright hives.