My new hive swarmed

Ponker

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My new hive swarmed. I bought two on April 20th and one swarmed yesterday on the 30th. When they delivered my bees they told me that I should feed them because the rain washes away the nectar and pollen. I had a lot of clover (along with everyone for at least 4 sq miles) and fruit trees all over my general area were blooming... anyway, I didn't feed. SO I'm checking my bees yesterday and they filled the sky over their hive and settled in a nearby tree.

I called the woman who sold me the bees. She told me, "they do that sometimes." She really was bothered I called and didn't want to help me at all.

I placed an ad in a local FB group to see if anyone wants to try to catch this swarm. Its big, really big.

This is so disappointing. She told me that the hive won't necessarily die...

There is a bee group in a town North of where I live so I'm going to contact them to see if anyone is available as a mentor. The bees and boxes were incredibly expensive and I was told to call anytime for help but it was just a nice thing to say when they delivered my bees.
Swarm 4.30.16.jpg

This is about 20 feet behind my hive. I'm so sad.
 

Maggiesdad

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Ponker, steel your heart! :hugs Bees will break it, that's for sure!
...And then your wallet.:confused:

First things first, are any bees left in your hive? What style is it? Have you had a lot of rain in you location? How many inspections since install? What did you find each time? Did they have a pollen patty? Are they still on the tree this morning? Double you have a suit or jacket? Was the queen marked?

Don't give up:\
 

Latestarter

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Sorry, but sometimes a newly installed package or even a newly installed captured swarm will "abscond" after installation. There are many reasons this could happen. If it happens within a week or so of installation, there's a good chance that hive will die as the queen may not have laid any eggs for a new queen to be produced by the bees that remain (if any) behind. There are a number of things you could try; capture and reinstall in a different hive body. Capture and reinstall in the old hive body (prob not the best idea). Just let them go :hit and try again. It's a loss, and it happens.

Another thing you need to keep in mind is that some bee groups/hives are "pre-disposed" to swarm. It's just the genetic makeup of that queen's line and they will repeatedly swarm and there'll be nothing you can do about it except re-queen them and get that pre-distribution out of the genetic pool. You could go online and order a new replacement mated queen to be over-nighted to you. When you recieve it, open the hive for the newly installed swarm and find the old queen. Kill her and throw her as far away from the hive as you can and place the new caged queen in the hive IN HER CAGE, as if you were installing a new package. After a couple of days, the hive should have accepted her as the new queen and either released her, or you can go back in and release her. This will eliminate the old genetics and re-start the brood rearing from scratch... A hive "re-boot" so to speak.

The swarm that you pictured really isn't a "LARGE" swarm... Especially if it consists of a package recently installed... A large swarm could be 5-10 times that size. A fully mature hive could have 70-80 thousand bees and a swarm typically contains 1/2-2/3 of the hive population. A typical package consists of 3-5 thousand bees. If the folks you asked to help you capture it are experienced, and you told them the swarm is from a package you recently installed, they may not want it because it's not from an established hive and they fear it won't survive when they take it, or it will abscond again from their hive...

Like Dad said, this turns out to be a kinda expensive hobby, and a LOT more work than most anticipate when they start. :rolleyes: Hope things improve for you and that you're able to re-capture your lost colony and re-install it.
 

babsbag

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This is far from a cheap hobby, especially when you often get little in return even if the bees do manage to stay alive.

I had a hive swarm once, it wasn't a fresh package but I was able to catch the swarm with a homemade bee vacuum. I took a shop vac and left the lid open a little so the vacuum wasn't as strong. I also made sure the foam filter was well secured so no bees would get drawn into that and I sucked the bees right up and them dumped them into a new hive. Since mine wasn't a package they did leave a queen and bees behind. It actually worked but the hive died that winter. If I do it again I will requeen the captured swarm.

Hope you can get them.
 

Happy Chooks

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If you can get a NUC box with some frames, you can easily capture that swarm. Look at it as free bees.

Some possibilities. Did you purchase your bees as a NUC? If so, there could have been a queen cell in it, and the queen swarmed with some bees right before the queen cell hatches.

If it was a package, do you have a screened bottom board? If so, it should be closed until they are well established.

Absconding is when all of your bees leave. With a swarm only some of them leave. Do you have any bees left in your hive? I agree that cluster is not a large one.
 

Ponker

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Sorry for the late responses. I just brought home five little Nigerian Dwarf milk goat does and two little boys, one bucking and one wether as his pal. Delilah is in milk so I've been learning to milk. She really needs to hone her teaching skills because its taking me a long time to get it right. I'll get some photos and add some in another thread pretty soon.

First things first, are any bees left in your hive? What style is it? Have you had a lot of rain in you location? How many inspections since install? What did you find each time? Did they have a pollen patty? Are they still on the tree this morning? Double you have a suit or jacket? Was the queen marked?

There are bees left in the hive and they are working like nothing happened. Langstroth 10 frame hive. We had a horribad downpour and storm during the night and in the morning, I noticed the swarm. I did ask the woman whom I purchased the bees if the storm or rain had anything to do with it and she brushed me off. Said no absolutely not. I have not bothered them since install twenty days before the swarm.They did not have a pollen patty. They stayed on the tree a full day and then disappeared. My jacket still isn't here. I ordered from Kelley Bees and it was a mistake. I didn't see their horrible reviews until after I placed my order. The queen was not marked.

@Happy Chooks I bought two full hives of bees from a local beekeeper. They delivered the hives and set them down. They said we should feed them and showed us the feeder in the top brooder box. She also had duct tape over the top brooder box hole which we removed after two weeks as instructed. Initially I ordered 2 nucs and upon speaking with her further, decided to buy two hives from them as well. She told me they'd have the nucs in the hives before delivery.

@Latestarter I asked her which bees these were and she responded that these were native wild bees collected from our local area.

I'm happy to know that it was a small swarm. It looked pretty big, like 2x the size of a football.
 

Latestarter

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Sorry you lost that swarm, maybe you'll be able to recover the next one that happens and get a "free hive" out of the deal. Sounds like a natural occurrence, especially if the hive they swarmed from is still doing fine. I would check that hive a gain over the coming weeks to ensure you're seeing new eggs/larva/brood so you'll know that they re-queened themselves.

Congrats on all your new goats! Waiting for those pics! :pop
 

Happy Chooks

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Ah, goat babies. :celebrate

Sounds like they were fed too much and the queen had no room to lay. Glad the hive is still doing well. Give them a couple of weeks post swarm and then look for eggs/larva like Latestarter mentioned. The new queen needs some time for her mating flights, then to harden before she begins laying.
 
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