Taking a Gamble to Save a Queen

[Jacobs]

Yesterday, while going into some hives with 2 members of the beginner course, we opened a hive with less than a cup of bees, but with a queen, some capped brood, eggs, and larvae. I was talking to Wally this morning, and followed his suggestion at trying to save this queen. I have a double deep hive that appears to be building up. Bees are in the bottom deep and are on 2 honey frames in the second deep. Wally suggested that I put a wooden framed queen excluder and a second queen excluder above this second deep. I put the queen from the weak hive in a queen cage with 2-3 of her workers and sealed both ends with cork. I pushed the side of this into the comb just behind the brood and put this medium box with queen and bees from the weak hive on top of the queen excluders. I put the inner cover on over this with no top entrance and put the outer cover back on. On Thursday morning, I will go in and directly release the queen into her medium super, still leaving the excluders on so that the queens cannot get together.

The hope is that the bees from the lower deeps will come through the excluders to help take care of the brood and will also get used to the scent of the caged queen. If this queen's workers want to leave the hive, they will have to go through the excluders and go through the entrace of the deep hive. If they successfully combine, the foragers from the weak hive should orient to the new location. I hope.

Wally thought this might work, but if I did nothing, I would lose this queen and hive in the next few weeks. Something to play with. Something to try. Not too much of a gamble for the double deep hive.

[Jacobs]

I did a direct release of the queen this afternoon as soon as the temperature reached 50°F since the weather was not going to cooperate tomorrow. I did not see definitive evidence that bees had come from below the excluders, but there may be a few more bees up top than before I placed it over the double deep. Bees were on the face of the queen cage as I took it out and they were not hostile to the queen.

I'll be curious to see what happens and how these bees do during these next cold snaps.

[Jacobs]

I took advantage of yesterday's 70°F+ day to check this hive. Unfortunately I found a dead queen and one or two other dead bees. It looks like the other workers in this top super may have crossed through the queen excluders and joined the double deep hive. It was worth taking a shot.