Top bar hive split

1451 Views 2 Replies 3 Participants Last post by Delta Bay, May 17, 2014

RCorl

Discussion Starter · May 17, 2014

I split two of my tbhs last week by removing the bar with the queen and several bars of open/capped brood and some honey and placing in a top bar nuc. The parent hives are booming with bees and many bars of sealed brood, and some eggs and larvae. My concern is, in the time it takes for them to raise a new queen and until she gets mated, all the current brood will have emerged and there will be an enormous amount of bees. Will this workforce, having no brood to care for, backfill everything leaving no room for the new queen to start laying, and if so, will I lose them to a swarm as soon as she gets mated? If this is the case, what do I do to prevent it?

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JakeDatc

· #2 · May 17, 2014

28 days for laying queen.
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesmath.htm

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Delta Bay

· #3 · May 17, 2014

They will back fill as the brood emerges plus they should build at least a few combs. Once your new queen starts to lay the colony will get back to building comb and opening up the brood nest for the queen to lay. To keep them from swarming your best bet is to knock down all but one or two queen cells. If you leave two make sure that they are on the same comb and preferably right next to each other.

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