# Will the queen move up?



## BeePappy (Apr 13, 2013)

The barrel of bees we were supposed to get from the steel barrel did not work out. When our mentor moved the barrel the comb broke lose, and fell into the bottom of the barrel. There was water in the bottom of the barrel. All was lost. very tragic as there was perhaps 35 to 40# of comb and honey, and thousands of bees in there. So he gave us a hive log. This has plywood nailed to both top and bottom. per his instruction, I cut 1-3/4" holes into the top plywood, and the bottom board. I put a layer of newspaper between the log and the bottom board, then put my two deeps from the queen less hive onto that. The idea being that the bees will chew away the newspaper, and join colonies. Hopefully the queen will move up and make use of the many frames of comb, all cleaned and awaiting her eggs. There is wire mesh stapled onto the hole in the log that the bees used as an entrance. The log bees have a lot of comb, so probably have enough food. They'll probably need water though.
the bees on the outside of the screen I thought were bees escaping from the log. Instead they were bees who were from the other hive trying to get in. I guessed they smelled the queens pheromone, my mentor said more likely they wanted to rob out the log. When I moved the log up to the hives (200ft or so) bees from the queen less once again gathered on the screen.


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## RayMarler (Jun 18, 2008)

Maybe she'll move up. Maybe they'll just stay down, and use the hive boxes as honey storage supers, keeping the broodnest down below in the log. It will depend on your flows.


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## BeePappy (Apr 13, 2013)

RayMarler said:


> Maybe she'll move up. Maybe they'll just stay down, and use the hive boxes as honey storage supers, keeping the broodnest down below in the log. It will depend on your flows.


Thanks. Those boxes have honey in the corners of the frames. No brood, no eggs, no larvae. I didn't plan on leaving it all together like this. I was in the hopes the queen and her girls would move up into the boxes, and then I can take them off of the log and put them back on their original SBB. 
I need to secure this contraption as it currently is pretty top heavy, that I know.


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## WWW (Feb 6, 2011)

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## CajunBee (May 15, 2013)

Would the reverse work? ie. Put log on top and let them move down into the boxes? It's my understanding, they like to build from top down....of course I'm just speculating (No experience).


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## AR Beekeeper (Sep 25, 2008)

If you can put a frame of eggs/young larvae in the super the phermones will attract the queen and she will come up to investigate.


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

Bees like to have the brood right below the honey, so if there is not too much honey in the top hive they will move up, with one BUT.

1 3/4 holes, the bees do not like having a hive divided by such a small hole. They will if need be, but only if forced. You may get lucky, but a surer plan would be rather than mess further with your bottom board, I'd suggest getting a piece of ply, or some kind of board, and cutting a hole in it equal to the internal size of the log hive. Nail it to the log hive, and put the lang hive on top. This will be a much more open connection and the bees and queen will feel fine about moving around the whole area.

Put three strips of wood under 3 sides of the super to be the same as the runners on the bottom board, so the bees will have a front door. Long as the queen is not blocked from laying by honey, she will move up.

Once she is up and laying in there, there will still be brood in the bottom and if the top hive fills with honey she may be forced down again. You are really wanting to get rid of the log as soon as possible so give the top hive plenty of room to store honey. You could also use an excluder to confine the queen in the top hive, wait 3 weeks then remove the log.


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## BeePappy (Apr 13, 2013)

AR Beekeeper said:


> If you can put a frame of eggs/young larvae in the super the phermones will attract the queen and she will come up to investigate.


Interesting. So then would she stay up, or just come to look and smell?
I can pull a frame from another hive. (originally that's what the plan was to make a queen in this colony, give them a frame with fresh eggs on it)


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## BeePappy (Apr 13, 2013)

Oldtimer said:


> Bees like to have the brood right below the honey, so if there is not too much honey in the top hive they will move up, with one BUT.
> 
> 1 3/4 holes, the bees do not like having a hive divided by such a small hole. They will if need be, but only if forced. You may get lucky, but a surer plan would be rather than mess further with your bottom board, I'd suggest getting a piece of ply, or some kind of board, and cutting a hole in it equal to the internal size of the log hive. Nail it to the log hive, and put the lang hive on top. This will be a much more open connection and the bees and queen will feel fine about moving around the whole area.
> 
> ...


This plan sounds about right I guess. Not sure I get the part about the 3 strips of wood under 3 sides of the super. I'd need a diagram. by Super, you mean one of the deeps? (brood box) The plywood top on the log, is what the comb is attached to. When I drilled the 1.75" (might actually be 2.5") hole, I hit comb, and a few bees. We didn't like that. So I don't know how I'd do a larger hole. Your sig. is great!


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

Yes, instead of super maybe I should have said the bottom brood box.

Sorry not technological enough to do a diagram of the 3 wood strips. But the idea is that if you set the hive (or bottom brood box) straight on the plywood, the bees won't have an entrance. So I suggested lifting the bottom brood box off the ply by say, 1/2 inch, using 3 strips of wood, set under 3 sides of the box, with no strip of wood under the front end of the box so that would be the entrance. It would be the same as the 3 strips of wood used on many bottom boards. Just, they are not permanent so would not need to be nailed.

The comb in the log will be attached to the top, and the sides. This is because the log is long and thin. In such a shape they will attach the combs to the sides. Provided you are gentle you could remove the ply on top and the combs will not fall. Just prise it up slightly & stick a knife in to slide under the plywood and cut the comb away from it.

End of day you do not have to do all this, what you are currently doing might work. But it might happen straight away, or you might be waiting a very long time.


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## RayMarler (Jun 18, 2008)

AR Beekeeper said:


> If you can put a frame of eggs/young larvae in the super the phermones will attract the queen and she will come up to investigate.


This is great, I'd forgotten about this trick when I replied earlier. Put a comb of young open larva in your bottom brood box. The queen will come up to check out the strange smelling brood and then claim it as her own by spreading her pheromones on it. Check back in ten minutes and she might be there. If not, check back later. Once you see her on the comb, then lift the hive boxes and put an excluder on the bottom so she is trapped in the boxes.


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## BeePappy (Apr 13, 2013)

RayMarler said:


> This is great, I'd forgotten about this trick when I replied earlier. Put a comb of young open larva in your bottom brood box. The queen will come up to check out the strange smelling brood and then claim it as her own by spreading her pheromones on it. Check back in ten minutes and she might be there. If not, check back later. Once you see her on the comb, then lift the hive boxes and put an excluder on the bottom so she is trapped in the boxes.


So this is like a baiting lure trick to get the queen up into the brood box, right? I have two boxes on. I could take one and set it aside for the time being or would that be too disruptive? I would need the ability to load the frame of brood/larva into the box, and then access it quickly. I'm telling you that top box weighs like 80 - 85#. It's an awkward lift so I'd get my beek wife involved this time. I do have an excluder, have never used it so may be the time. I'm not adept at spotting a queen yet, so two sets of eyes are better than one. Let's suppose then that the queen comes up, we spot her, I could pull that frame and transfer it to a 5 frame Nuc I have, blocked off with screen, and then I can focus on moving the boxes back to their original location back on the original bottom board. Once there I add in the frame with the queen. The log bees will follow on their own time to their new home, and the log would no longer be in use. Would the queen accept a situation like this? That would be taking her from her brood, comb, and home. I could put the excluder on beneath the bottom box (on top of the bottom board) to keep her in there.
All of these actions rely on the log bees chewing through the newspaper, mingling and accepting their new hive mates. I can't do any of these other things until after that has occurred. My mentor told me to wait 3 or 4 days and check for that. He also mentioned the use of something called "Bee B Gone" to force the bees up into the boxes including the queen all in one shot. I'd have to research that some.


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## RayMarler (Jun 18, 2008)

Yes, it is a bait frame to draw the queen up. 
With a box that heavy, is it capped honey that you can extract?
When you trap the queen above in your boxes, there will still be brood and stores in the log. The bees in the log will then make a queen and the log will not empty out, but become a queen right hive again. What is the goal you are trying to achieve by all of this? If you want the log hive into a boxed hive instead, why not just cut open the log and tie the combs into frames and move those frames into hive boxes? There are many options and possibilities here, depending on what it is you want as an end result.


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## BeePappy (Apr 13, 2013)

RayMarler said:


> Yes, it is a bait frame to draw the queen up.
> With a box that heavy, is it capped honey that you can extract?
> When you trap the queen above in your boxes, there will still be brood and stores in the log. The bees in the log will then make a queen and the log will not empty out, but become a queen right hive again. What is the goal you are trying to achieve by all of this? If you want the log hive into a boxed hive instead, why not just cut open the log and tie the combs into frames and move those frames into hive boxes? There are many options and possibilities here, depending on what it is you want as an end result.


There is a lot of honey in those frames. These are the big 'deep' frames. They are starting to backfill what would normally be brood areas I suppose. I don't have an extractor as we're just starting out, and only have the two hives. I had planned on just doing gravity/strain with buckets, if there was anything to extract out this first year. It appears there will be a harvest at this point.
Originally all I was trying to do was get a queen into my queen less hive. Unfortunately the wheels were already in motion with these other things when I discovered the "easiest method" of obtaining that result. The log hive was not expected, it was supposed to be a barrel cutout. So now I'm locked in to the current situation involving two colonies. Performing a log cutout could be done. I've been studying many different cutout vids and have learned a lot from those, and here on this site.
Bottom line I want to save the Italian hive, which I suspect is perilously close to the point of no return. I don't want to un-do what I've done with the log hive at this point, so getting the queen into the boxes I have a solution for that now thanks to your plan. 
So if successful with 'stealing' the queen from the log hive, they will take care of that situation themselves and create a new queen. Then the question is to keep the log as is, or cut out the log and transfer to a box. Question would then be at mid August would the log hive have the necessary time to build up their colony in a box for over wintering? Or if I just leave the log hive as a log hive, and place it somewhere where it can prosper on it's own. I guess it could be a reserve hive or source for new blood-line.


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## RayMarler (Jun 18, 2008)

Yea, I would try to get the log hive queen to come up into the boxes.

Move the full deep of honey to your other hive for storage. Move a frame of eggs into the remaining box on top of the log and try to get queen to come up. If she does, just move that box to it's own stand, give them the box of honey back from the other hive (make sure you don't move the queen). 

Set the log up as a log hive, block the top hole, unscreen the side entrance, and let them make their own queen and be a log hive. You can then capture swarms from it as they happen.


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## RayMarler (Jun 18, 2008)

Additionally,
With only 1 3/4" holes giving access to the boxes over the log, the queen may not come up and instead the bees will make queen cells in the box with the frame of eggs and you will get a queen in it that way. If all you wanted was a queen in that hive, and since you had another hive for resources, you could very easily have just inserted a frame with eggs once a week until they made a queen. You could have then just set that log up on it's own or do whatever else you wanted with it. The way you are going about requeening your queenless hive seems like a lot of work to me with questionable outcomes. But this will be a great learning experience and time will show what the outcome will be. Good luck and have fun with your adventure!


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## BeePappy (Apr 13, 2013)

RayMarler said:


> Additionally,
> With only 1 3/4" holes giving access to the boxes over the log, the queen may not come up and instead the bees will make queen cells in the box with the frame of eggs and you will get a queen in it that way. If all you wanted was a queen in that hive, and since you had another hive for resources, you could very easily have just inserted a frame with eggs once a week until they made a queen. You could have then just set that log up on it's own or do whatever else you wanted with it. The way you are going about requeening your queenless hive seems like a lot of work to me with questionable outcomes. But this will be a great learning experience and time will show what the outcome will be. Good luck and have fun with your adventure!


(side note: I did measure the hole saw and it's 2.25". Don't know if that makes much difference or not) 

Thanks for all of your insight Ray. Yes, you're absolutely right about taking a situation and complicating it 10fold. But, I think about all I've learned from this situation. I'll always remember the moving frames of eggs/brood to help other hives out. Being first season beek, I think there's a certain amount of fear in the decisions we make, and how those decisions impact a living organism. Gaining knowledge will make the decisions somewhat easier, and also give us a catalog of information to draw from. Who know, 2 or 3 years down the road I might be able to assist a fellow beek right here on this site in a similar situation.
Thanks again!


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## DocHivetool (Jun 20, 2013)

Nice vid on drumming. As a beginner I had to pick up the lower half of my jaw when the hive in the video walked on into the new hive box from the log. Sweet reminder of the adaptability of the honeybee.


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## BeePappy (Apr 13, 2013)

Well the best laid plans ... update. We inspected the strong hive, which would be the 'donor' hive of a frame of brood/eggs to the weak double deep log hive. This hive is booming. Saw the queen, she's got a lot of eggs laid, good brood, larvae, all looked good. There are two supers on this hive, noticed some of the honey was getting capped off.
Put the frame in a Nuc, replaced it with one with only foundation (that's all I have) then went to the log hive. Pulled off the two boxes, inspected frames once again seeing only some stores, some pollen, little honey in the corners. No brood, eggs, larvae. Once the boxes were pulled, took a look at the newspaper, it was not touched. No chew through. nothing. So, I put the frame of eggs into the brood box of the weak hive, buttoned it all up. Hopefully they'll make a queen. The converted the log hive back into the log hive it was before. Put it on a better base, gave it a new top. So it will become an incubator for more bees.


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## tommyt (Aug 7, 2010)

Why don't you trap them out
I'm surprised no one mentioned that 

They are simple and just about fool proof


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