Viscious bees

[Kate Atchley]

One of our members has asked for help with a truly viscious colony not far from homes. These bees, for instance, were stinging her through her gloves as she cleared the path, some 6 metres from the hive which she had not approached and which had not been opened for more than a week.

Requeening is an option and I wondered if anyone has experience of this and can answer these questions:

How soon after culling the queen is requeening best done?
Is it best to requeen with queen on frame(s) or in cage?
How soon will the bees behaviour change - ie do the remaining adult and brood bees from the old queen continue to be viscious or does their behaviour change with the new queen?

Thankfully, really viscious bees have been rare in my many years of beekeeping. We think the queen in this case mated with the only known colony in the area: bees kept by a family for many years which we assume have markedly contrasting genetic make-up to our member's bees, which accounts for the aggressive behaviour associated with hydridisation. Any thoughts on this?

In preparation, a friend has made me a beautiful fragrant, freshly-cut cedar "QX box" - one of Thornes' frameless sale wire excluders fitted in the bottom of a deep-depth box. The "vicious" queen is, of course, unmarked, having been left alone as much as possible since her 3-frame nuc was set up in May (now full brood box + 2 supers), so we may have to resort to using this. Meanwhile the QX box lives in my car, exuding its sublime scent!

There's a great video on requeening here which folk might like to look at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmmtjFgdqz8. This guy was running his colony on 5 brood boxes instead of using supers ... you can read about it on the BeeSource forum: http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?246483-Requeening-A-Vicious-Hive

Looking forward to more from you

Kate

[Jon]

1. How soon after culling the queen is requeening best done?
2. Is it best to requeen with queen on frame(s) or in cage?
3. How soon will the bees behaviour change - ie do the remaining adult and brood bees from the old queen continue to be viscious or does their behaviour change with the new queen?

You should be able to just swap them as a colony knows it is queenless in 15 minutes.
Find the old queen and remove it, wait half an hour and introduce the new queen in a cage in the center of the brood nest. Leave the tab closed.
Wait 24 hours and check the behaviour of the bees towards the cage. If they are trying to ball it, close up and check again the next day.
When things seem to have calmed down a bit, open the tab. Check 2 days later that the queen is out of the cage but don't check for eggs for at least a week as they will still be nervous about a new queen and could ball her.

The other way I requeen is by first removing the old queen then combining with a queenright nuc via newspaper.
Place a second brood box over a sheet of newspaper above the colony to be requeened and place the frames from the nuc in the centre of the brood box. Block off the free space with spare frames or dummy frames.
Again, leave for at least a week.
This works best if the nuc is sitting beside the colony to be requeened or has come from several miles away.

A third way is to split the aggressive colony like an artificial swarm. leave the queen on the original site on her frame and put the rest of the brood and bees on top of the box on its own floor in a second brood box.
All the older flying bees will return to the box down below.
A queen can then be introduced via a cage to the top box. It is much easier to introduce a queen to younger bees.
When she has been laying for a couple of weeks, remove the older queen and combine via a sheet of newspaper.

Assuming the new queen is better stock you will see an immediate improvement in temper as this in part is determined by queen pheromone.

All these methods work but there is no 100% guaranteed method of changing queens.

[fatshark]

And a fourth way which I have used successfully on an unpleasant colony is to cage the queen directly over emerging brood - using one of the Nicot 4" square push in cages. I don't always trust the push in aspect and so usually strap the cage in place using a couple of elastic bands. The queen is immediately accepted by the newly emerged brood and, after a few days, can be let out.

[Jon]

Hi fatshark. Good advice re. the elastic bands as I have one of those I used to use and the bees got in too quickly and killed her.

[Adam]

The temperament can sometimes improve with a new queen, sometimes it doesn't.

I have requeened a colony with a youngster (of similar breed) and the behaviour changed for the worse - they were also throwing up queencells so the conclusion was that there was something wrong with that queen. Even after she had been in for 2 or 3 weeks, there was a supercedure queencell in the hive so the colony was united with another and the temperament improved - back to how it was.
Another time after requeening, a colony continued on it's miserable way for around 2 months, then suddenly the temperament changed - as the old bad-tempered bees died off. However requeening can improve matters.

I've got one that's in a queencage now - been there for 24 hours so far. I plan to leave her for another day or so before breaking off the plastic tab. The candy behind it is like a brick so I'll be well gone before they get to the queen.

[Adam]

Jon, Fatshark. You have a point - never to rely on push-in things in the hive as they tend to fall off; queencages need to be fixed by something - elastic bands, string, paperclip, shoelace will all work.

[Adam]

Another point - It's said that feeding the bees when introducing a queen aids success. I guess if the bees are busy doing things, then they're happier than if they are idle and waiting for the sun to shine.

[Kate Atchley]

Job done! Now we'll see whether they calm down.

Introduced new queen on the wide press-in cage as you suggested, fatshark. They're very busy on the ling heather so haven't fed them. Two supers on and filling fast.

Sad that aggression and vigour go hand in hand! The brood pattern was exceptional - barely any empty cell across the frames - and they'd built up from a 3-frame nuc in May to this large colony with masses of stores, and in the West Highlands where forage is meagre compared with many locations in the UK.

Kate

[fatshark]

Fingers crossed Kate

I've just requeened a colony that was mildly irritating in April, distinctly tetchy in May, boisterous in June, downright aggressive in July and avoided whenever possible (by me) in July. On Saturday I put the clearer board in and removed the old queen. On Sunday the bees were psychopaths ... I escaped with one sting per completely full super* and staggered away as fast as I could after hanging the new caged queen in place.

I now have to go and release her :(

* ... I've never really believed the aggression = vigour relationship, but this year they have coincided

[Jon]

fatshark
When you have a bad colony it stays bad or gets worse over time.
People hang on making excuses re weather etc but it is best to bite the bullet and requeen.
As soon as the new queen is introduced and laying I always kick myself for not having done it months before.
It really changes your beekeeping when you have spare queens as you don't have to take any nonsense from aggressive colonies.

[fatshark]

Jon you're absolutely right ... and I'm kicking myself twice this evening as the caged queen was dead in the neck of the JzBz cage when I went to release her this evening. B*gger. She was a stunner. That's two this season that have succumbed within three days within JzBz cages. I suspect the queen candy was too soft. I'll now have to go through the hive, tear down any QCs they've started and add another queen - this time using one of those Nicot cages. And to make it worse the next few days are threatening rain and cool breezes ... perfect conditions for all the little psychopaths to be at home :(

[Jon]

Sh1t happens as they say.
I have introduced 20 queens successfully to nucs this summer and when I demonstrated one to our queen rearing group on Monday which I had introduced the day before I found her dead in the cage!
Fortunately I had opened a couple of nucs just before which had queens out and laying.
At the end of the day it is a percentages game and some will be lost no matter the best practice you follow.

Do you introduce with or without attendants. I usually put 3 attendants in the queen cage.

[fatshark]

No attendants.

I checked the cage from yesterday ... She wasn't stuck in the candy, just curled up dead at the bottom. If the hive thinks it's not queenless - for example it contains well developed capped QCs - could they get at her through the cage? It was a standard JzBz one.

I've just shaken through the colony, knocked off a couple of late-developed emergency cells they'd started, and popped another queen in under one of those Nicot cages well secured with elastic bands. They were bad tempered but not outright evil ... perhaps they've finally accepted who's boss?

Some chance ;)

[Kate Atchley]

Job done! Now we'll see whether they calm down.

Introduced new queen on the wide press-in cage as you suggested, fatshark. They're very busy on the ling heather so haven't fed them. Two supers on and filling fast.


Kate

Phew, the new queen was accepted and all seems well with her ... but the bees are still more "lively" than anyone would wish.

Let's see if that changes for the Spring.

A work in progress I guess.

Kate

[Adam]

It's always a relief when you see that a queen has been accepted. :)

[Adam]

No attendants.

I checked the cage from yesterday ... She wasn't stuck in the candy, just curled up dead at the bottom. If the hive thinks it's not queenless - for example it contains well developed capped QCs - could they get at her through the cage? It was a standard JzBz one.

I've just shaken through the colony, knocked off a couple of late-developed emergency cells they'd started, and popped another queen in under one of those Nicot cages well secured with elastic bands. They were bad tempered but not outright evil ... perhaps they've finally accepted who's boss?

Some chance ;)

If there are laying workers in the hive they will kill the queen and her attendants. If you put in attendants (from a safe source of course) then even if the bees in the hive ignore her, she will be fed and looked after.

[fatshark]

Kate
Give her a chance ... brood from your new queen should be coming 'on stream' over the next couple of weeks. I'm not sure when overwintering bees 'start' from - you might be unfortunate to have some of the tetchy ones still in the hive next Spring.

Adam
No laying workers. I used a Nicot cage and a second queen was accepted quickly. I didn't even have to release her - they tunnelled under the side of the comb and she was free within a couple of days. Interestingly the hive temper has improved appreciably, despite the fact that most/all of the bees would still be from the poor stock. I suspect this might be due to the addition of 12.5kg of fondant :D

[marion.orca]

Fatshark - they are my bees that Kate so kindly helped me with and when I removed the Nicot cage, the Queen was nowhere to be seen - she had already it seems made her own way out or was helped along the way, so not having the experience that Kate has, mild panic on my behalf set in. The next visit I made wasn't too bad and I expected there still to be some of the " originals " around, which there were, but again - Queen not seen, despite a lovely yellow dot. A further visit, and their horrendous reaction can be seen under the Bee Health thread, sub-titled "Microfibre", which I think should go some way toward the explanation of their behaviour during that visit. So, as soon as we get a window in the weather here, it will be interesting to see their behaviour when I move the crown board down after they have finished cleaning the super.