3lbs package of bees purchase 4/2013

4986 Views 15 Replies 11 Participants Last post by angusbangus, Dec 7, 2015

Ron Ledford

Discussion Starter · Apr 12, 2014

I bought a 3 lbs package of bees from Wolf Creek 4/6/2013 and they are overly aggressive to the point of following me beyond twenty feet from the hive and staying my constant companion. Anyone having similar experience from a package bought from Wolf Creek around April 2013?

Yesterday one found me on the front side of my house and tried to sting me. Could be a coincidence but I am noticing more behavior like this from the hive in question.

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Annabee

· #2 · Apr 12, 2014

From their Web site-----

Maybe its the Russian ??

Wolf Creek Apiaries, LLC is nestled in the beautiful rolling hills of western Middle Tennessee in the Duck River Valley, with a cute little beagle in the front yard.

We are dedicated to the organic management of bees. Our stock is derived from the wild feral stock of the Duck River Basin. We add a little Russian genetics, so that the bees will fly at 38 degrees if the sun is shining and the wind is not blowing. Some Italian genetics are added for honey production. The gentleness and winter handiness of the bees is acheived from the addition of Carniolan genetics. The result is a gentle bee that is a good honey producer.

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Ron Ledford

Discussion Starter · #3 · Apr 12, 2014

Good question. I have two other hives with Russians (Kelley Queens 8/13) and they are not of this temperament.

Rader Sidetrack

· #4 · Apr 12, 2014

Are you feeding the new package? If you are feeding with an inside hive feeder (or a boardman), and if they are getting robbed by the more established hives, that may contribute to grumpiness.

Ron Ledford

Discussion Starter · #5 · Apr 12, 2014

I failed to mention this is my second package (1st package 5/12) from Wolf Creek and I am not having the same issue.

TWall

· #6 · Apr 12, 2014

Well, it doesn't matter how many packages you got from who, it sounds like this one is hotter than you like. You can try to re-queen. If it is russian they have a reputation of being more difficult to re-queen. That has not been my experience. You may want to make some nucs out of it. Or, you could make it hopelessly queenless and then give it a frame of eggs and young brood form the less protective hive to make a queen from. However, my experience with russians is that they often get hotter in succeeding generations.

Tom

Miha

· #7 · Apr 13, 2014

I purchased all of my new packages this year from Wolf Creek. The bees seem to be a bit more aggressive than my last year's Italian bees (Walter Kelley)... They start zooming around me even when I am 20 feet from the hives, and not even in front of them but at a diagonal distance of 20 feet. When I walk behind the hives, they notice it and start buzzing around my head, ready to sting. My last year's Kelley bees would never do that. This morning, as I went to check on one of the hive's entrances by looking at it from the side, a bee landed on my wrist and stung me. These are my first Wolf Creek bees.

Daniel Y

· #8 · Apr 13, 2014

Earlier this year my strongest hive also was a bit more aggressive Even my daughter pointed it out and started to dread working with it.

On march 21st we made a cell builder out of it. since then it has lost all it's aggressiveness, including the queenright portion of it.

In addition prior to this we had been having some robbing issues. In all I have come to this conclusion. It was this strongest hive that was doing the robbing. result in hyper aggressiveness on the part of the bees in this hive. keep in mind the robbers are fighting and dying just as much as the robbed are. and they have no morality that tells them they are in the wrong. it is nothing more than survival to them.

I believe the converting to a cell builder disrupted this robbing behavior. and further reduced the queenright portion of the colony to a population that was no longer strong enough to instigate robbing. So although it was not intentional I may have stumbled upon a couple of solutions to robbing if the offending colony can be identified. First any aggressive but strong colony is suspect. and second weaken it by splitting. Dilute it by adding bees fro other colonies or redirect it's activities by giving it queen cells to build.

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dleemc1

· #9 · Apr 14, 2014

there like mine all mixed up, but I really really like mine.

sterling

· #10 · Apr 15, 2014

The bees in the package are probably not the daughters of the queen that came in the cage with the package. You could make sure they are not being harassed by something or robbed and give them enough time for this queens daughters to get started and the bees that are there to die off.
I helped hive four packages from Wolf Creek on March 27 and they were not aggressive. Check them last week and still no aggression.

iivydriff

· #11 · Apr 15, 2014

Is the queen laying yet? Are you feeding the package? and like Sterling said the package bees are not the same bees the queen is from more than likely. They probably came out of Texas or southern California or somewhere. Have you looked in there maybe they are queenless. Also when the queen starts laying and they have some brood they will calm down.

jwsjeff

· #12 · Apr 16, 2014

I bought three packages from them last year and two of them were docile and one was very aggressive. However, they supercedured the initial queen and a few months later they calmed down. I have issues with bees constantly superseduring though - not sure if that is related to Wolf Creek or not.

sterling

· #13 · Apr 16, 2014

jwsjeff said:
I bought three packages from them last year and two of them were docile and one was very aggressive. However, they supercedured the initial queen and a few months later they calmed down. I have issues with bees constantly superseduring though - not sure if that is related to Wolf Creek or not.

What do you mean by "constantly"? Did they all supersede? Did they supersede more then one time?

jwsjeff

· #14 · Apr 17, 2014

sterling said:
What do you mean by "constantly"? Did they all supersede? Did they supersede more then one time?

Of the three I bought last year, one never suerceded, another did twice and the last is currently on their 4th queen... :-/ Perhaps it just felt like it was constant.

sterling

· #15 · Apr 17, 2014

jwsjeff said:
Of the three I bought last year, one never suerceded, another did twice and the last is currently on their 4th queen... :-/ Perhaps it just felt like it was constant.

I would agree that many supersedes is constant. I would like to know the cause. I am not aware of any of my packages superseding their queen that many times in that short of a period.
One question. Do you do a lot of inspections in the brood nest?

angusbangus

· #16 · Dec 7, 2015

I just saw this... I picked up 6 packages from Wolf Creek about the same time. Only 5 made it... but they were all really docile.

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