# I may have split too early.



## BeeNurse (Mar 23, 2014)

I have three hives, two doing OK, one busting at the seams. I found lots of capped and uncapped brood. I did a walkaway split. Now I'm doing the research, what an idiot !! In Upstate NY, I'm told I should have waited till Dandelion's are in bloom. Put feeders on both. THEN since I was on a roll, I switched the deep brood hives on the other two. I'm going to keep my fingers crossed, and check in two weeks, any suggestions.


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## Tenbears (May 15, 2012)

If in doubt just knock down all the queen cell in two weeks and give them a frame of brood and eggs to build a new queen with. Not the best but works, You will probably be Ok


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## giarc18 (Mar 25, 2015)

I'm interested to see how it works out for you. 
I want to split my one hive that overwintered and is doing extremely well right now, but it is still very cool here in NW Indiana. 
A lot of trees starting to bloom this past week and dandilions just starting to pop over the weekend. But its still in the low 40s at night and mid 50s daytime with only an occasional 60-70. I don't want to wait too long, but there still a possibility for freezing weather at night. 
Any insight on how cold is too cold to split?
Seems our weather always goes from cold spring straight into summer .


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## gezellig (Jun 11, 2014)

I don't see any problem with you having reversed your hive bodies. We usually do it in February here, which is before dandelions. AS LONG as it doesn't split the brood nest/cluster between the boxes to be bottom part of now bottom box, and top part of now top box. It depends on the location of that cluster, but generally speaking it's usually ok. 
About the split, did you see drones in your hive? If not, it maybe be a little early. If you did guess than 24hrs ago, you might consider putting it back together.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

It would probably have been better to wait, but I'll bet the dandelions will be blooming any day now so you're probably not as far off as you think. They will likely do fine.


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## suburbanrancher (Aug 5, 2011)

To time my splits, I wait until I see walking drones in my hives and then wait a week or two after that. If you have a lot of other beekeepers around you, that's a good way to know when you can make splits and expect your queen to be mated. Good weather is also key.

ETA: I wanted to add that my bees made new queens several weeks ago when drones were just coming out and the weather was less than stellar. They're laying like champs but I hope they were mated well. Only time will tell. I say this to help you not feel as bad.


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## vnatzke (Jan 12, 2013)

I too just made a split. I had one hive that was bursting at the seams, and it was either split or put a third deep on top. No dandelions yet, but the grass is green. I sure hope she gets mated!!!!!


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