Combining Swarm With Original Hive

**John_H** · 04-20-2011, 01:54 PM

One of my hives swarmed yesterday while I was in the bee yard. I got the swarm with the old queen into a single deep and removed all but two of the swarm cells in the hive. But now I am wondering if I could either 1. remove the remaining swarm cells and do a paper combine to get them back together or 2. leave the swarm cells and put the swarm on top with a double excluder and top and bottom entrances.

I'd like to keep the hive strong for the spring flow and I wouldn't mind requeening with the queen they produce if she looks good. I'd appreciate any opinions or other suggestions.

Thanks,
John

**NasalSponge** · 04-20-2011, 03:35 PM

In your situation this is what I would do: I would leave them separate and let the original hive raise a new queen and see how she does, if she looks good then I would pinch the old queen and paper combine. I have never combined a swarm back to it's original colony so I have no idea what would happen there, if they would try to swarm again or not.

**NCSUbeeKEEPER** · 04-20-2011, 03:52 PM

I think this could work, but the key will be to let them exist as separate colonies for some time. I would say at least 3 weeks. Combining them too soon could result in making them feel like they failed to swarm. I've never done this, so I really can't speak to its effectiveness.

**John_H** · 04-21-2011, 07:10 AM

Thanks for the replies. After some thought I don't see a reason to rush trying to recombine them. I may put them together separated by double excluders to see how a two queen colony works.

**Rick 1456** · 04-22-2011, 06:14 AM

Thanks for the post,,,,I've been wondering this as well but not found info. I haven't had this situation as I usually just increased my apiary. I was thinking to keep the parent hive strong while the new queen gets up and running and the flow is on, I would give the swarms(mother queen) brood back to the parent colony. Not all, of course. Then you could eval the new queen and go from there. Just thinkin.

**jal_ut** · 04-22-2011, 09:19 AM

I would keep them separate until the new queen gets laying. If you like her, pinch the old queen and unite with news paper, and a queen excluder. You don't want the new queen in the top box. There will likely be brood there, but you want the brood to hatch and that top box to be filled with honey. (I assume that is what you want?) Perhaps you should add a med super at this point too? I have had good luck uniting two colonies like this just before a flow. It puts a lot of bees in the colony to pack nectar. It is best to unite them at the beginning of a flow. They will then usually pack nectar instead of swarming. When uniting with news paper leave a top entrance. I like to just slide the top board aside enough to make an entrance. I am just using flat boards for the top board. It may not work if you have the telescoping covers. I guess you could use top entrance shims on top of the queen excluder? Any way the top box needs an entrance until they get the newspaper out of there.

**John_H** · 04-22-2011, 01:04 PM

My goal is to have the hive strong for honey production. I've been running top entrances. All I need to do to provide a 2nd, bottom, entrance is remove the solid reducer I have closing off the standard bottom entrance. The hive that swarmed has two deeps and two medium honey supers on it (one drawn and one foundation). I had already taken a 4 frame split out of the hive and I was trying to give them room to prevent swarming. So much for that!. On Tuesday when they swarmed I took another 4 frame nuc with a couple of the swarm cells. It's been three days since they swarmed and now we are getting rain that is supposed to go past the weekend. At this point I plan to recombine them Demaree fashion when I have a chance. Old queen and swarm with capped brood and foundation with bottom entrance, excluder, the two honey supers, excluder, original hive brood boxes with swarm cells or virgin queen if she has emerged (the cellls I left were capped). I'll try to squeeze them into a single deep if I can.

**mrspock** · 07-01-2012, 10:29 PM

Originally Posted by John_H

I'd like to keep the hive strong for the spring flow and I wouldn't mind requeening with the queen they produce if she looks good. I'd appreciate any opinions or other suggestions.

I just came across this thread trying to understand why it worked when I tried it out of desperation.

Had a hive swarm on the eve of nectar flow. Have no room for increase, and couldn't bear the production loss.

I tried to shake swarm into a hive body w/ frames, but the next morning, I found half the swarm inside the box, with the rest clustered outside. I had limited time to deal before work, so did the following:

Sprayed the heck out of the inside of the hive with sugar feed containing HBH. Added the hive body with the swarm on it to the middle of the hive, and put covers with entrances above it to allow the bees immediate access.

I was hoping the HBH would draw the swarm into the hive. It did. Came back in the evening, and the hive's strenth had replenished.

I really don't quite understand why this worked, but it did... for now.

**odfrank** · 07-02-2012, 12:31 AM

Do a padgen: Move original hive to a new stand. Place swarm at old stand. The workers from the original hive return to the old stand and join the swarm at the old stand. Your working force is kept together for the flow.