# What a mess....



## Cleo C. Hogan Jr (Feb 27, 2010)

If it was the mess you describe, and I have seen situations like that, you can simply take a large piece of brood to anchor the bees in your box, and then just take the bees,. You could also place a large piece of brood in another box, and leave it behind to catch those bees that are in the air and immediate area, then later join the bees back together, or, if enough start a new colony.

cchoganjr


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## robherc (Mar 17, 2012)

When I do removals here in Southeast TX, I usually take as many of the bees as I can (bee vac's GREAT for that), then tie 1-2 combs of mostly brood, with an adequate amount of honey/nectar for the bees to eat for a couple days (in case it rains the next day or something) to bars & throw out the rest of the combs. I started doing this after my first several removals ended up with more comb than they could guard properly, resulting in an epidemic of SHB, followed by hive death or absconding, along with a Wax Moth infestation. The lesson I took from that: keep enough brood & stores to "anchor" the colony & keep 'em from starving right off, but no more. It's easier for the bees to build more combs than to deal with thousands of SHB larvae ruining all their honey.

Also, now that it's been a week, you might want to try removing some of the now solid masses of comb in the botttoms of your boxes, leave the comb on the lid or something for long enough to ensure that if the queen was on it, she can get back down into the hive, then replace the removed mass with a few frames for the bees to draw. That way you can start converting your hive over from a "gum" in boxes, to a manageable, inspectable hive


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## Cleo C. Hogan Jr (Feb 27, 2010)

Good answer from robherc... If you have stacked brood comb against the walls of the hive, the bees cannot work the back side and SHBs will emerge from them, can overwhelm the colony, and the colony will abscond.. 

If you have another deep, just as soon as you can, transfer your frames out of that box into a clean one. You can wind up with terrible SHB and waxworm problems.

cchoganjr


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## Rob73 (Apr 19, 2009)

Thanks for the advice. Sounds like I need get in there and see how they are doing. Wax moth seem to be more of a problem here than the small hive beetle. The beetles are here, ya just dont see them in any great numbers.... YET! I cant remember what comb I put where. I can tell you that there was way more honey in the comb than brood. I was as gentle as I could be handling the brood comb, and I tried to stack it in a manner in which they could work it. But, like I said, it looked like a big mess in the end. 

I do see why the other keepers wouldn't come. I spend about 3 hours or so, it was in the sun, 93 or so degrees. Fighting to keep my chain saw from getting pinched, a big sticky, smokey mess. I about went down from the heat.

I will give them a little while longer and then I will open it up and go in. I have gone over every other day or so and the entrance is busy with traffic. It looks good from the outside, but, I do know how looks can be deceiving!

I noticed while I was in there, it seemed that there were about 4 races of bees living together in there. Some small dark ones, really dark, almost black. Big ones, light ones. It was kinda weird. Is that normal in a colony out in the wild?

Rob


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## Cleo C. Hogan Jr (Feb 27, 2010)

Yes, it just means the queen was bred by multiple drones. Must be different bees in the area.

cchoganjr


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## Rob73 (Apr 19, 2009)

I know there are at least Russians, Italians, and some BeeWeaver. That what I have anyway.

Rob


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## TxGypsy (Mar 17, 2012)

I know that the advice given is probably the smarter route, but I'd have to try and save some of the comb you brought back. 

I'd tie the straightest of the comb into empty frames. Put the salvaged comb into the bottom brood chamber. Place a queen excluder above that and place any crooked/broken/unsalvageble comb that still contains brood above the excluder to let it hatch and keep the queen from laying in it while you are waiting and then melt down the comb once everything has hatched and manage as usual from that point.


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## Rob73 (Apr 19, 2009)

I tried tying the comb into some empty frames, it just oozed out. I may be able to do it if it is out of the sun for a bit. Putting that comb over a queen excluder sounds like a dandy idea! Why didnt I think of that! HaHa. Does anyone use the old black comb for anything? That whole log was dark black comb.

Rob


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## chaindrivecharlie (Apr 6, 2008)

Yep, melt all that dark comb down and strain the wax out.


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## robherc (Mar 17, 2012)

I used bits of old black comb as a rather effective swarm lure this year...even caught a swarm unintentionally when I took too long before cleaning a couple old black combs out of a ruined hive lol.

Other than that, based on my own experience, I'd caution very strongly that you need to get in there and check on the status of those old combs in your hive. It can take as little as 2-3 days for SHB and WM to get out of control in a hive that has more comb than they can effectively defend. I lost my first few hives due to a mixture of causes including primarily too much comb to defend (and thus SHB and WM infestation) and invasion of Red Imported Fire Ants into the hives. I now have my hives pretty effectively "ant proofed," but just last week I lost a new hive (from a removal) to SHB due to my making a mistake that allowed the combs to overheat, melt, and collapse into a mass at the bottom of the hive, so the bees couldn't get to all the parts of the comb & prevent the SHB from laying it full of eggs.


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## odfrank (May 13, 2002)

TxGypsy said:


> Place a queen excluder above that and place any crooked/broken/unsalvageble comb that still contains brood above the excluder to let it hatch and keep the queen from laying in it.


A hack beekeeper friend just brought me a cutout with the bees in a box and the comb in a bucket. I did the above method, dumped the bees onto drawn comb, QE and empty box on top, brood combs carefully arranged on top of the QE, feeder bottle also on top of the QE. Bees came up, tended the brood, removed it after it hatched.


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## Rob73 (Apr 19, 2009)

I see what you mean about the shb & the wax moths. By the time I got back over there to check on em, thats what was going on. SHB & wax moth larva working their magic. Just like you said robherc, all that comb was a big lump in the bottom of the hive. I put them in a clean single deep hive body. They had eggs and larva in a few drawn out frames that I put in the first day. So, they have way better living conditions now! I busted up the big lump of old comb out in the sun about 15 feet from the hive. There was some honey still in the middle of it that I figured they could use. I am not sure how long the shb & wax moths can endure 100+ temp, in the direct sun on bare dirt. Hopefully the hot temp will get them before they can do much more damage.

Next time, I will be way more prepared for that. I am so glad I asked for help. You guys were dead on!

Rob


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