Abscond/Swarm-9/1/23

[Jacobs]

The latest arrival came in at 2:26 pm today. I heard buzzing in the back of my yard and watched the arrival of what turned out to be about 1 medium frame of bees. I had not seen scouting and it was unclear just where they were heading, so a little Swarm Commander convinced them to come to the front of one of my bait hives. I immediately gave them some sugar water in case they were starving, and I have a small, unmarked queen in a catcher clip in the bait hive. I will release her tomorrow. If they behave, I'll put them in a nuc.

[Jacobs]

The bees treated my place like a bed and breakfast. I released the queen early this morning and at noon, the bees were clustered off the bottom board of the bait hive. I tried to scoop them back in and they took off and left in the direction they came from yesterday.

[Jacobs]

The bees are back in town! I don't know if they returned sometime late yesterday afternoon or early this morning, but the small abscond has returned to the bait hive.

[Jacobs]

I have watched the queen disappear and 4+/- queen cells develop since the arrival of these bees. As of Friday, 1 queen cell had emerged and the rest were being torn down. Just a few minutes ago I saw a small queen on one of the frames. I hope she will be able to get mated, make it safely home, and start laying sometime this week or next. It will be a real struggle to get these bees through winter if they get queenright, but it will be a fun struggle.

[Pharmacyman]

Good luck!

[Jacobs]

The new queen is at work. I checked the nuc this morning and found the queen backed into a cell. When she moved out I examined that cell and a few around it and saw eggs.

[Jacobs]

PoorlyMatedQueen_IMG_0898.jpg (33.55 KiB) Viewed 219628 times

Not the easiest image to see, but the queen is laying a mix of worker and drone brood in worker cells. I don't know how long she will last or how far into fall and winter these bees can go, but I will let it play out and see what happens.

[Jacobs]

I am not seeing any brood in this dwindling colony. I doubt SHB are eating all of the eggs. I think the queen has quit laying. I did see another very small abscond attempt to take up with a healthy nuc this afternoon. I have not seen a queen among the very few bees arriving and the bees in the nuc are having none of it. These arrivals will not last long.

[hazmatinferno]

Hey Jacobs.....any update on that colony that "abscond/swarm" you were watching?

[Jacobs]

I haven't seen much activity the last few days. When it warms up enough I'll take a look, but if the broodless situation has continued, it's just a matter of time until the end.

[Jacobs]

I checked today and found a deadout with a "cluster" of about 30 bees.