# linn hobbyist



## robherc (Mar 17, 2012)

Last I checked, it's not legal to keep a hive without removable combs/frames....why would you use an illegal hive body (peat pot) for a swarm trap instead of just a nuc? Or are the apiary laws different up there?
As far as the vermin go, just put a "chicane" on the entrance that forces them to make 2 tight 90* turns to get in...won't stop the bees, but will stop mice/moles/voles/rats/etc. (see "Is Entrance Reducer Necessary" thread in "Top Bar Hives" forum for 1 such design)


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## linn (Nov 19, 2010)

Hi,
I am talking about swarm traps. I did put a nail in the entrance to deter vernom. I also used a little old comb. In hindsight this was probably not a good idea. Maybe it makes more sense to use a nuc as a swarm trap. It is strange how one always sees these peat pots advertised as swarm traps in various beekeeping catalogs. I use 10 frame deeps. We haven't had a problem with mice in the hives but we use mouse guards. We also had a great refurbished barn cat who kept guard over the hives. Unfortunately, he has since died.


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## Specialkayme (Sep 4, 2005)

Welcome to the site!


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## robherc (Mar 17, 2012)

linn said:


> Maybe it makes more sense to use a nuc as a swarm trap. It is strange how one always sees these peat pots advertised as swarm traps in various beekeeping catalogs.


Yeah, peat pot as swarm trap = you have to do a cut-out once they move in...maybe destroying a bit of brood in the process.
Nuc as a swarm trap = they move into a hive box and draw on frames from the start...much easier to manage 


...that's my $0.02

-Rob

P.S. I didn't mean to say that the peat pots are illegal as swarm traps, just that they sorta become illegal hives after the bees move in...either way, nuc boxes make more sense to me.


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## linn (Nov 19, 2010)

Hi Rob,
Thank-you for your help. I do have a couple of nucs around. I guess I was saving them to do a few splits. We are really trying to avoid swarms and trying to do swarm prevention without increasing the number of hives. Last April we tried a few swarm prevention techniques. One thing we tried was a modified demaree split. Queen on the bottom with eggs and entrance facing forward,queen excluder next, shallow super of honey, imire shim with entrance facing rear, second super with brood, inner cover, outer cover. It was not text book. One of the reason it was not textbook was that we ended up with a queen above the queen excluder. We looked carefully at each frame with eggs-no queen. We looked for the queen on each framed with capped brood-no queen. I figured there was a greater than 50 percent odd that the queen was in the bottom super. This was the first problem. We ended up with brood in the honey super and eventually a supercede cell in the honey super. We had a warm spell last year and then the weather turned cold so there was about a two week delay before we checked. We figured that both the bottom and top super could access the capped honey super. The hive was kind of light on stores so we needed to feed. 
Thank-you,
linn


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## Mbeck (Apr 27, 2011)

Welcome


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## AmericasBeekeeper (Jan 24, 2010)

Welcome Linn!


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