Spring is really here. Birds are singing and butterflies are now on the wing. Most hives around Wellington will be bringing in honey from early bush flows. Some of my strong hives have stored half a box of new honey, (this and the reserves make a full box of stores on the hives). Its amazing the different coloured honey in some hives, light and dark. Different hives seem to be working different sources.

All this honey coming in tends to crowd the bees, which could be a forerunner to swarming. Quite a few hives are now building queen cell buds along the top and bottoms of the frames. I usually cut out the ones on the top bars and sides and leave those along the bottom bars. This make it very easy to check a hive every 10 days for queen cells by simply tilting back the super and looking along the bottom for developing queen cells.

Generally, bees build queens cells when conditions are perfect. A flow on, good supplies of pollen coming, bees filling two deep supers, no room to expand and headed by an old queen. Left to their own devices, they will swarm. Consequently, it is most important that you inspect hives regularly for swarm preparation; ie queen cells with eggs or larvae in them. If the brood is concentrated in the top box, reverse the supers to give the queen more room.

You can quickly judge if a hive is over-crowded when the bees cover all frames and are down on the bottom board. If you have brood in two supers, add another. Either move the honey frames to the outside or up into the middle of the next super. This leaves room for the queen to lay in the middle of the super.

If you have more than one hive, equalise them up. First check for disease and then take one or two outside brood frames & bees and add them to the weaker hive. Remember to find the queen first, otherwise you could be transferring your queen into the other hive and then you will have another problem - having to buy a new queen for a queenless hive. Most of the time these bees will be accepted without them fighting, however I prefer to sprinkle a little sugar syrup over the bees in both hives before I equalise them. Bees with full tummies don't tend to fight. Repeat this every few weeks until the hives are of equal strength.

Another quick method is to swap the position of a strong hive with a weak one during the day. The field bees are quickly accepted and this boosts the weak hive considerably. This method can also be used to reduce bee numbers if a hive is making preparations to swarm.

Normally at this time of the year you should have about 4 - 5 full frames of brood, (this could be spread across a number of frames and supers).

If your hive has more than three developing queen cells (not supersedure cells in the middle of the frames), its going to swarm so you had better work fast. The idea is to reduce the field bee population by artificially swarming the hive.

To artificially swarm a hive, take two frames of honey (one with some pollen), and two frames of emerging brood, (make sure it does not contain the old queen). One of these frames should have a well developed queen cell in the centre of the frame or cut one out and put it in the middle of the frame. Put the brood frames in the centre of a new super and the honey to the outside of these, fill the rest of the super with drawn frames. If you don’t have frames of honey, add a top feeder (an inverted tin with 6 tiny holes in the lid). Place this on the old hive stand and then either put the rest of the hive behind the original hive on a new stand (with the entrance facing back), or use a split board and place the rest of the hive on top after killing all the remaining queen cells.

The field bees will return to the original site and boost the nuc population. The original hive will be depleted of field bees, which should stop the swarming instinct.

Check after three weeks to see that the new queen is laying then you can unite them back together again at the flow using a sheet of newspaper. The new queen hive should be put on top of the old queen hive. The bees going down through the paper usually kill the old queen. By using a swam cell you may be perpetuating the swarming tendencies of the old queen, so when practical, replace the queen with one from known non-swarming stock.

Just to recap. - Remember to keep the stores up (always have a minimum of 3 frames of honey - below this - feed) and give the bees room to expand, ie add an extra super (bees in the bush areas are now bring in honey). --- If the bees make preparation to swarm, we suggest you artificially swarm the hive. To requeen a hive, make a 4 frame nuc placing it on top of the existing hive, unite once the new queen is laying well using newspaper. Remember to ALWAYS CHECK FOR DISEASE BEFORE SWAPPING BROOD OR REMOVING HONEY, (equalise hives if you have two or more hives to make management easier).