[jasongonella]

A friend of my wife has a hive living in a tree near her house, and another friend has a hive living in a wall of her house.

Since they know I am an amateur bee keeper, they asked me about removing them.

Now if this was a swarm, I'd know what to do, although I've never done that before.

But what do you do with an established hive? It would really be a shame to let this resource go to waste.

 

[Hampton]

Trees are most times a trap out. The house can be a trap out or a removal (cut out). It depends on where the bees are and the structure.

 

[concrete-bees]

jason

the tree one ....

if its a tree that can go - just cut the tree down and cut about 10 feet above it - then cut down until you get to top of the comb

cap the ends with plywood and take home - from there you you will do what is know as a cut out - its messy but sometimes worth it - just split the log or cut it lenghtwise to open the hive and take the combs and cut to fit into empty frames - then use rubber bands to hold them in there **** but keep them in the up right direction - if you put them in upside down they will reject the combs and brood -

On the House one

depensing on were it is in the house i find it easier to take it from the inside and cut drywall but thats because i do drywall but it just depends on where in the house it is located
ive only took one out of a house and it was in a utility room wall
but you might have to take siding off to get in to it
but after you get it open - just work slow and do a cut out as before
just put the house back together and FILL the area with foam or insilation - otherwise other bees Will come back and start over

 

[jasongonella]

Yeah, I think I will need to know more about a trap. So you have a way for bees to leave a hive but not re-enter. I've seen those in the catalogs for hives, a plank that forces toe bees to turn only one way, so they leave a chamber and don't re-enter it. But I think for a free-standing hive how do you do that?

So I put my box next to the rogue hive and trap the exit to the rogue hive. That way the bees enter my box instead when night comes. That much I completley understand.

 

[brac]

problem with that is your friend would not be happy when the vermin move in to eat all the honey left inside the wall. The House should be a cut out.

 

[Monkadelic]

Definitely do a cut out on the wall! This is how I became what I call myself, an "opportunistic" beekeeper.

My girls had probably been in the wall since September (they were removed about two weeks ago), and they had stored up more than four pounds of honey. I can't imagine if that were still in our wall, what the repercussions might be. We went from the outside, but on our old house, it was the best way to go at it.

 

[jasongonella]

Yeah, I understand why house bees need to be cut instead of trapped. But if someone can help me with how to trap out the tree bees I would appreciate it. So I need some way to enable them to leave and not come back. How do I do that?

 

[drobbins]

the problem with a trapout is you don't get the queen
you put a cone on the hive entrance so the foragers can't get back in
then you put a box with some brood comb and some eggs right in front of it
you basically make a split and put it right in front of the hive
when the hive runs out of food the come out and go into the split which has raised a new queen
it doesn't really get the the hive out of the structure(as in getting them queen and all) it just gets them out so the homeowner is happy
with a cutout you hopefully get the queen or at least some eggs so they can raise a new on and you get the genetics
of course it requires you tear up the wall:doh:

to do a trapout you fashion a cone out of screen wire
staple this over the entrance
think about those pics of a cattle corral you've seen
a corral with a funnel shaped chute going into it
you chase the cows in and they can't figure out how to get back out
you want to do this in reverse
I have some pics somewhere, I'll go find them

Dave

edit: sadly none of these show a closeup of the cone

http://drobbins.net/bee's/trapout

 

[jasongonella]

The funnel, does the big end point at the hive entrance or away from the hive entrance?

As I have been told, if you do a trap-out, eventually the queen stops laying and later swarms with what is left of the hive. I might be able to get her then.

 

[D Coates]

I've done a couple trap outs successfully.

Have a couple frames of bees (3 frames worth), honey, pollen, brood and eggs in a 5 frame nuc. Put 3 frames of drawn or undrawn foundation in the remaining space.

Put a screen cone over the hive exit/entrance. The hole needs to be slightly larger than a pencil. Have some loose strands of wire pointing outward as well it makes it all but impossible for the bees to re-enter Have the cone slightly above horizontal so anything that's dead (they'll toss drone brood as supplies dwindle) doesn't roll down and clog the exit. Make sure your exit is the only one they can use. I go back the next day and make sure they didn't find any other exits. Put the entrance to the nuc no less than 12 inches away from exit of the cone.

Check them every weeks or so. They'll make a queen from one of the eggs. Assuming she gets back from her mating flight you're in tall cotton. I leave them on for two months. After that I let the nuc rob out the trapped out hive and I remove everything, get paid and leave. I make sure to tell the homeowner to put put insulating foam in there otherwise they will be calling me back the next year when a swarm moves back in.

 

[mike haney]

Yeah, I understand why house bees need to be cut instead of trapped. But if someone can help me with how to trap out the tree bees I would appreciate it. So I need some way to enable them to leave and not come back. How do I do that?

walter kelly co. sells a trap just for this. check out their website. good luck,mike

 

[mherndon]

I've done a couple of cutouts on video and have them on "youtube", do a search for mherndon100. There should be two videos one without a bee vac and the other with a bee vac. One was done from the outside and the other from inside the house. The inside job was done on a house that was being remodeled so the bathroom we were in was going to be re-done and the demolition wasn't that big of a deal. I saw some pictures of colonies that were treated with pesticide to kill them out. What a mess that is left in your wall. I recommend cutouts over all other measures.

Mark

 

[Batman]

Jason,

I'm currently kind of doing the same thing at a house near me. The bees are in a brick pillar with limited space above the pillar. It's been a real work in progress, I started this last Sept. I am going to be revamping my method as this is purely a trial and error learning situation. I will prob go check on the bees for the first time since Oct. since I was hospitalized then and with winter and all, it just wasn't worth checking on. The location and relation to the roof and the fact that the pillar is made of bricks, cutting isnt an option. The screen cone isn't an option either, if I put a ladder out there to hold a nuc, I'd be out a ladder soon after. Luckily the people that own the place are very cool about the whole thing and are very patient. They actually enjoy the bees being there, so if I get them out of the pillar, I might just put the hive in their backyard. My first hive came from a cut out of a wall, too. I still like to talk about that one.
Just curious, but has anyone actually used one of the swarm capture boxes from Walter Kelly Co? Might be the next step for me on that pillar, tho I am about to try a modified nuc that I will just put a 1 way bee escape on it in the floor. I already have drawn out frames with some honey in the hive. I closed off all the exits from the pillar except for the one going up into the nuc. The bees have adapted to the new enterance, but I think they are just going right through the box and back into the pillar.