# Creating a Preemptive Swarm; The Taranov Manouver



## HIVE+ (Jan 4, 2012)

Frank, a good explanation of the procedure and a good idea to combine with a Snelgrove board. Last year I used the target box to support the ramp, so the bees hived themselves.
Might mention the 4" gap between ramp and original hive.


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## Billboard (Dec 28, 2014)

I too heard that was a very good way to Prevent swarming and even a good way to split, perform a artificial swarm. And yes there's a few YouTube videos on this topic.


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

HIVE+ said:


> Frank, a good explanation of the procedure and a good idea to combine with a Snelgrove board. Last year I used the target box to support the ramp, so the bees hived themselves.
> Might mention the 4" gap between ramp and original hive.


I have used the 4" gap method now about three times with completely predictable results. Some of my hives are on blocks etc and one row close to the electric fence so could be a little tricky to get that measurement. Just came across a new vid today where the fellow set the ramp up 10 feet or more away and it seemed to work just as well. He also used a hive body as the target and had the bees go right into it. I will have to try this as it would simplify things a bit.

I was amazed at how little it seemed to upset the bees. The first season I would have been terrified to do this but now I find it a useful tool for a backyard beekeeper.


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## billabell (Apr 19, 2010)

Here is a good explanation and some very good pictures. http://www.honeybeesuite.com/the-great-divide-a-taranov-split/


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## GaryG74 (Apr 9, 2014)

Search here on BeeSource too, there was a video posted last year (can't remember who posted right now but I'll see if I can find the thread).

Here's the thread from last year by jwcarlson: "Taranov without capped cells" dated 07/10/15. Has a couple of good videos showing the Taranov procedure. Sorry I can't give a direct route to it, maybe someone with better computer skills can do that.


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

GaryG74 said:


> Search here on BeeSource too, there was a video posted last year (can't remember who posted right now but I'll see if I can find the thread).



http://www.beesource.com/forums/sho...-without-capped-cells&highlight=Taranov+swarm Thread by Jwcarlson He has some good photos

The hive does not have to be ready or threatening to swarm. It will work anytime but I would be cautious about doing it during a dearth or robbing was active.

I have shaken the entire colony through an excluder shaker box as Mike Palmer suggests and it works but I think it more disruptive and does not do as good job of demographically sorting the bees. Snelgrove has some good theory about what the motivation signals are to swarm and what age groups constitute the swarm as well as that of the bees left behind. If it is instinctual for the bees you can make it work; if it is contrary to what they want to do "they gonna fight you!" They dont seem to resist the taranov manouever.


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## DirtyLittleSecret (Sep 10, 2014)

Cushman also has a good write up: 
http://www.dave-cushman.net/bee/taranovswm.html


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## Adrian Quiney WI (Sep 14, 2007)

Are you able to assess, from your experience, what proportion of the colony is dedicated to foraging from this method at the time you perform the maneuver? In other words are there as many bees flying back to the colony as there are on the taranov board? Just curious, and thanks for posting this.


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## VickyLynn (Jun 20, 2011)

I have watched this being done, and it is amazing. Those little bees just march right up the ramp and down into an empty deep (with frames) as if they knew their way home. You can see where the queen is on the white sheet that's on the ramp - she is in the middle of this moving mass as it makes its way up. Meanwhile, the air is full of flying bees (none aggressive) who are flying back to the original hive where they came from, just a few feet away.


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

Adrian Quiney WI said:


> Are you able to assess, from your experience, what proportion of the colony is dedicated to foraging from this method at the time you perform the maneuver? In other words are there as many bees flying back to the colony as there are on the taranov board? Just curious, and thanks for posting this.


Adrian;

I dont know what percentage of foragers stay with the bees forming the swarm. There seems to be lots of bees left in the original hive to keep on trucking. There are not many foragers flying from the new hive for about 3 days, probably till they get promoted and orient so I feed for a while till I start to see lots of traffic in and out. You have choices about how you divvy up the open and capped brood with the old hive or take it with the new.


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## Ddawg (Feb 17, 2012)

I Like it! A new (to me) tool to put in the Ole BeeKeeping Toolbox..


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## enjambres (Jun 30, 2013)

Frank,

Thank you for posting this - it is absolutely fascinating. You are very brave to try this on purpose. I had had the (incorrect) impression that the Taranov method was a sort of rescue technique in certain circumstances. But your explanation makes sense, and I can see how you can combine it with using Snelgrove boards. 

I've been doing Snelboarding the old fashioned way of choosing and moving frames with bees myself, but I can see this allows the bees to sort themselves out even more effectively. So it kind amplifies the benefits of the Snelgrove boards' pre-existing bee-centric flexibility. And it would be particularly useful when you haven't got a marked, or easy-to-find, queen. 

I like it a lot and I think I will try it on at least one of my colonies this summer. I'm putting Taranov on my 2016 To-Do list

Thanks for your help!

Enj.


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## shannonswyatt (May 7, 2012)

I've split doing something like this. I just put some frames of brood in a nuc and shake a bunch of frames in front of the nuc sitting on the ground. Works well since the older bees fly straight home.


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## scallawa (Jul 6, 2013)

crofter said:


> He also used a hive body as the target and had the bees go right into it. I will have to try this as it would simplify things a bit.


Just trying to understand the statement here. Do you mean that he shook the bees out into an empty hive and so the older ones returned to the original while the younger and the queen stayed in the new empty hive? Or do you mean the ramp led to a different empty hive?


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## VickyLynn (Jun 20, 2011)

I've seen this demonstrated at a Massachusetts bee meeting. The first picture shows the the ramp set up with the deep box in position behind the top of the ramp where all the bees will drop into. The beekeeper is shaking each of the 20 frames of bees onto the sheet. The flying bees go back to the original hive. The nurse bees and the queen begin marching up the ramp. The second picture shows them towards the top of the ramp and on their way in.


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

I think this is a neat manipulation, but I'm not sure I'd bother.

Generally, I can find a queen without too much trouble, nurse bees are easy to find....they are the bees on the brood.

It seems to me that if you move the parent colony with the queen, the foragers are still oriented to the old location (whether you shake the bees or not)....you can put whatever kind of split you like at the old location.

What my method above doesn't do is create an artificial swarm...but for my own purposes I don't really have a need for an artifical swarm over a split.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

Here's my go at it last summer:
http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?315013-Taranov-without-capped-cells


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## FHinNC (Dec 1, 2015)

I did this method last week from a 2 deep 10 frame hive with about 50 to 60,000 bees(est). After it was all done I think about 75% of the bees flew back to the original hive and the other 25% stayed with the queen in the new hive. The old hive is making queen cells and the new hive is making comb. After 10 days there are 4 frames half full of comb with larvae.


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## Robbin (May 26, 2013)

What happens to the open brood in the old box when all the nurse bees are removed. Will the forgers take over the nursing duties? Take the queen out and this looks like a great way to build a cell starter.


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## FHinNC (Dec 1, 2015)

At the time of the split there were all stages of egg, larvae and brood. The returning foragers performed nursing duties but that same day brood was emerging and the cycle has continued except for making queen cells.


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## shannonswyatt (May 7, 2012)

Yes, field bees will revert. 

I've considered the same for making a cell builder, if you didn't put any brood frames you wouldn't have to worry about knocking down queen cells they pulled themself. I used a modified version for making queenless splits last year and was easy and worked great, so it should work fine for making a cell builder.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

Robbin said:


> What happens to the open brood in the old box when all the nurse bees are removed. Will the forgers take over the nursing duties? Take the queen out and this looks like a great way to build a cell starter.


There's gobs of capped brood in a nearly swarmed colony. The foragers will take over, but when a real swarm happens that's kind of the name of the game too. I took all those bees and then a couple days later they're bearded and covering the entire double deep again. I bet there were close to 10 frames of capped or almost capped brood in the one I shook out.


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## billfosburgh (May 8, 2015)

well this sounds interesting. i think i`ll try this on a hive.


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## Doreen78 (Feb 25, 2016)

Wow, that sounds really interesting. Better than trying to anticipate a swarm and hoping they'll congregate somewhere you can retrieve them...


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

You will find that a lot of young bees will hang onto the comb. You dont shake hard like when clearing for extraction; just enough to make examination for queen cells easier. The queen is the easiest to dislodge. Some of the oriented bees which return to the original hive will easily revert to nurse duties so feeding any open brood in the old hive should not be a problem. 

You can choose to pull some of the frames of older brood and capped brood out. They will not mature in time to add anything to that years harvest in most cases anyway. There is lots of tuning options depending on your motives.


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## doug reed (Feb 1, 2014)

What are the chances of just ending up with a box full of nurse bees? I just tried the Taranov method and it seemed to work just as it's supposed to.I left all brood and stores in the old hive. Then I started thinking: Yeah I didn't have to locate the queen, but what if she had already swarmed and the new queen had not emerged? Or what if the new queen was out on a mating flight?
There were Q-cells with larva, so I wasn't sure if I got the timing right. 
And what about stores? I've heard people say " It's just like a swarm, they bring their stores with them." I felt this was questionable. So I ended up giving them a couple frames of honey and pollen to ease my mind. As to whether I have a queen in the new hive only time will tell. If not I'll add a queen or Q-cell


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## shannonswyatt (May 7, 2012)

Check in a couple days for eggs.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

doug reed, when in doubt, don't be afraid to give them something to eat. Especially if the weather looks questionable over the next few days. Either in the form of syrup or stores in comb. You can't really do it wrong. When I shook mine out, I found a frame with eggs first and put it in the box for them so that if they needed to raise a queen I'd know. I wasn't sure if the queen had swarmed yet or not. Later in the process I watched her walk into the box, but it gives them an anchor and gives you a little peace of mind.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

I have not tried it, but it would seem like a good method to get a lot of nurse bees for a "swarm box" for a cell starter.


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## Gasmanone (Feb 3, 2017)

crofter said:


> Several years ago when researching swarming and swarm prevention I came across reference to a Taranov swarm procedure. It is a way to separate a colonies bees by age and stage very much as the bees arrange themselves when they swarm off into the trees. The big difference is you can set the time and place and have them conveniently in your hands or have them walk into the new hive.
> 
> I found it a good way to do a split and leave behind the foragers while pulling off the queen and nurse bees. I have a terrible time finding my dark queens and have wasted a lot of time searching when I want to replace a queen. Basically it amounts to making a ramp and throwing a towel or blanket over it and shaking all the bees out on the ramp. The ones that have flown and oriented immediately return to the original hive site (or the box you put in its place) and the other young bees and the queen, walk up the ramp and form a cluster under its lip. This can be picked up and dumped in a box of foundation or drawn comb. They dont fly so there is about zero chance of them not accepting the box you put them in.
> 
> ...



>>Lovely idea for a must try in a few months time in Yorkshire,UK. Can you give a little more on the Snelgrove board ? Please? I have one, never used it, and understand the principal, BUT I was going to put the weaker hive at the bottom of the stack, and bleed the flying bees down the ways to add extra help. Am I OK on this or a little confused ? Advise Appreciated << George


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

Gasmanone said:


> >>Lovely idea for a must try in a few months time in Yorkshire,UK. Can you give a little more on the Snelgrove board ? Please? I have one, never used it, and understand the principal, BUT I was going to put the weaker hive at the bottom of the stack, and bleed the flying bees down the ways to add extra help. Am I OK on this or a little confused ? Advise Appreciated << George


I am not sure what you mean by "weaker hive". After you separate with a taranov swarm the original location will be strong on forager bees and the others you collect on the ramp or in the remove box will be strong on nurse bees.

To set up Snelgrove's classic swarm prevention you would have the queen in the bottom box with only a bit of open brood to anchor her. All other open and capped brood goes in top box above the division board. The majority of the nurse bees will follow the brood and as bees from the top box are bled down to forage from the lower box as soon as they orient. Another method puts the queen in the top box but the end game is pretty much the same; the queen is separated from either flying bees or separated from the majority of the brood. Either situations fullfilled seems to kill the swarm inclination.

In the UK you should have no problem picking up a used copy of Snelgroves book, Swarming: Its control and prevention. Mine came from the UK via Abebooks.com which is an excellent source of used books on many topics.


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## Gasmanone (Feb 3, 2017)

If aiming for a preemptive swarm control procedure e.g. Snelgrove B., what are the advantages of a Taranov split prior to a SB ?? Advise as I have come through my first winter with a late made up nucleus on a single deep and wish to increase my one colony for security and safety, comfort, reasons Thanks


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## Vance G (Jan 6, 2011)

WOW!! Mr Carlson I just watched this for the first time and you are the fastest moving beek I have ever seen and those are some runny bees! Regular track stars! THis is simply a better plan than the humongous ramp I made and tote around! As the snow swirls and piles up outside it is good to see beekeeping! Only two months til the taranov procedure might be helpful or necessary.


jwcarlson said:


> Here's my go at it last summer:
> http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?315013-Taranov-without-capped-cells


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

Vance G said:


> WOW!! Mr Carlson I just watched this for the first time and you are the fastest moving beek I have ever seen and those are some runny bees! Regular track stars! THis is simply a better plan than the humongous ramp I made and tote around! As the snow swirls and piles up outside it is good to see beekeeping! Only two months til the taranov procedure might be helpful or necessary.


I get work done quickly, Vance. :lpf:


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## zonedar (May 14, 2015)

Dumb question. How does this splitting technique effect overall honey production? We have one good flow here, Blackberry. How much would this set it back, over all, 'swarmed hive' v 'old hive'?


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## MissHoney (Apr 17, 2016)

Instead of waiting the 16 days for a new queen + flight time + 21 days for brood (yes, I realize you leave brood in there from the old queen), could you perhaps use this with a bred queen and just introduce her after 24 hours (following favorite/successful methods of requeening) to the queenless split?


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## MissHoney (Apr 17, 2016)

zonedar said:


> Dumb question. How does this splitting technique effect overall honey production? We have one good flow here, Blackberry. How much would this set it back, over all, 'swarmed hive' v 'old hive'?


Depends on the amount of bees, drawn comb available... It will set both back some, as you are dividing the work force into two groups. Their main concern will be to raise the brood they have (capped or newly lain), and rebuild the colony numbers (or raise a queen in the case of one half of the split). Providing drawn comb, a bred queen, and food (nectar flow, pollen, substitutes, etc.) all help for a faster rebound.


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## shinbone (Jul 5, 2011)

What is the purpose of the white sheet? Why not just dump the bees directly onto the wood ramp?


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## shannonswyatt (May 7, 2012)

My guess is you could get more production if you just made the hive queenless and gave it a cell. They won't swarm without a queen, and without no queen laying for a couple weeks to do you free up the nurse bees to forage. The original hive is going to have to have some percentage of foragers revert to nurse bees, so you have reduced your total workforce. The swarm with the queen is basically like the perfect package of bees. They are all young the hive should be able to stay strong will the queen lays up the new hive, but they are not going to be big producers, since they will still have a bunch of nurse bees doing nurse bee things. 

In the end though you get more production from a hive that doesn't swarm versus one that does. If you are doing this to prevent a swarm it is probably worth it.

Plus it is cool to watch them. I need to film it the next time I do it.


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

The idea is to pull out brood and young bees at such a time that they will not mature to be foragers anyway during your flow (unless you have a summer long flow) The remaining foragers will have only a smattering of brood to feed so they concentrate on putting honey up. Raising a new queen takes almost no resources. The old queen, the brood and young bees would have contributed very little except definitely inducing a swarm which would have removed almost all the foragers.

Pulling the queen near the start of flow has been used to increase honey production.

The queen and young bees you pull off into another hive will draw comb wonderously because of their age and the need for laying space for the queen. This colony will not swarm because it has no flying bees.

The Tananov swarm that JW pulled off looks huge and could probably have been made into many nucs. That age class of bees make great cell starters!

Shinbone the cloth on the ramp softens the landing if nothing else. I think some articles do talk about cloth draped over the sides creates a dark space that attracts the bees to cluster in. In JW example he uses a baited hive body with an open feed hole under the end of the ramp. I have not tried that way but it would save one move.


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## shinbone (Jul 5, 2011)

crofter said:


> I think some articles do talk about cloth draped over the sides creates a dark space that attracts the bees to cluster in.


Maybe the cloth is a simple way to provide a large continuous surface to catch all the shaken bees, and then for the bees to easily walk along and up without a physical interruption? You could do the same with a big sheet of plywood, but that would be a PITA to move around . . . ?


Also, what is the critical angle for the ramp, meaning what is the minimum "steepness" required for the Taranov method to work? My hives sit low and the surface slopes downward towards the entrance. The hives would have to be raised a couple of feet for the ramp to slope upwards towards the entrance. Raising a full hive is a lot of work, so I don't want to raise it anymore than necessary. Hmmm . . . .




.


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

shinbone said:


> Maybe the cloth is a simple way to provide a large continuous surface to catch all the shaken bees, and then for the bees to easily walk along and up without a physical interruption? You could do the same with a big sheet of plywood, but that would be a PITA to move around . . . ?


If I remember correctly around your hives would not be a good place to trip and fall with 10 lb of bees on a sheet of plywood!:no:

I think the main thing is to keep them out of the grass. That seems to confuse them more than being on a uniform surface with all approaches taking the up to the brink of the ramp. Doesnt have to be fancy; I am sure a telescopic cover and a cement block would do the trick.

If you saw a hive getting ready to go bye bye it is not the time to start fabricating something fancy.


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## shinbone (Jul 5, 2011)

crofter said:


> If I remember correctly around your hives would not be a good place to trip and fall with 10 lb of bees on a sheet of plywood!


Yes, and good memory! I am starting to think that my particular hive location may make the Taranov Maneuver impractical for most of my hives.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

Don't overthink it. Shake bees out onto something with a convenient place for them to cluster. It doesn't even really need to be close to the original location or even "in-line" with it. The sheet, for me, was just to keep them out off the ground and out of the litter. Even so the whole bottom board was covered on the bottom with clustered bees. I didn't realize it until I put it down on top of something and killed a ton of them when I was done.


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## shinbone (Jul 5, 2011)

jwcarlson said:


> Don't overthink it. Shake bees out onto something with a convenient place for them to cluster. It doesn't even really need to be close to the original location or even "in-line" with it. The sheet, for me, was just to keep them out off the ground and out of the litter.


So, you think I could place Taranov ramp _behind_ the hive being shaken, and it would still work?


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

Definitely; even put it on the ground!


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## Harley Craig (Sep 18, 2012)

shinbone said:


> So, you think I could place Taranov ramp _behind_ the hive being shaken, and it would still work?


absoutly on that sloped roof no need for a ramp, just set sheet down behind the hives with a hive backwards with the opening facing the downward slope and shake everything on the sheet, all flying bees will end up in the air and will return to the hive. I have done this on flat ground with zero slope, only down fall is is takes a bit longer for them to start the march sometime. Taking a hand full of bees and dumping them in the dark hive will get the ball rolling as they will fan at the entrance.


dont even really need the sheet up there, other than the fact that it would be cooler than the hot black roofing.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

shinbone said:


> So, you think I could place Taranov ramp _behind_ the hive being shaken, and it would still work?


Absolutely.

You could move the whole hive, put an empty box there, and carry it 100 yards away and do it too.


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## gww (Feb 14, 2015)

I have never made a split and I keep coming back to this method, just cause it seems kinda neat and I have no drawn comb and so seems like it would work well. I would also think if you did not move any brood to the young bee/queen part of the split, that it would really give a good brood break to both sides if you were interested in such a thing. 

Do you think setting this over the queenless portion of the hive that has the brood but no queen would really cause a brood break?

When you guys that have done this do it, What combs do you move with the young bees. Brood? Stores?

I watched one vidio that said you did not want to feed the young bee portion for three days untill the got organized to defend the hive. Thoughts?

I had read some where that if you bang a couple of times on a hive that the bees would fill up on honey and be nice afterwards. Would banging on the hive make mad bees or full bees that had something to start with in thier bellies for when they got to the new box?

When I got my swarms, I just put them in empty boxes with foundationless and no feed and surprizingly they survived. The shook bees sure seem like they would be close to that.

If all my questions are over thinking too much or stupid, Just ignore me and keep going with the thread and I will get what I get.

opcorn:
gww


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## texanbelchers (Aug 4, 2014)

shinbone said:


> What is the purpose of the white sheet? Why not just dump the bees directly onto the wood ramp?


As far as I can tell it helps keep them from getting lost in the grass. They can easily walk up the sheet to a common point instead of collecting all over the box/ramp/ground.

I have tried setting the ramp on a box, but they didn't migrate in by themselves. Maybe I'm just too impatient. 

EDIT - Clearly I wasn't at the end of the thread before I replied.


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## Nordak (Jun 17, 2016)

I am going to be making a cell starter later this week. I'm going for broke on it as far as population. Is there an advantage to the Taranov procedure that would be of benefit for the cell starter vs. just shaking in a ton of nurse bees? It seems going back in to find the queen just adds another step over just shaking frames of bees in on a queenless starter. Would love to hear thoughts on this. There's probably a glaringly obvious benefit that I'm overlooking.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Is there an advantage to the Taranov procedure that would be of benefit for the cell starter vs. just shaking in a ton of nurse bees? It seems going back in to find the queen just adds another step over just shaking frames of bees in on a queenless starter.

The end result is virtually the same. The field bees will fly back. The nurse bees will not. In both systems.


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