Robbing and Regrets

Regret is a difficult emotion. My first swarm hive, Hyron, has been colored this entire season with regret. When I hived the swarm colony in their hivebox, it wasn't a nice place. I regreted that I wasn't more prepared for a swarm.

I put them in the box I had set up as a swarm lure box, but it wasn't lovely - there were remnants of wax moth damage on the frames, it was my oldest deep box, it didn't have a screened bottom board or a good cover.

I haven't liked this hive. I tried to inspect them a few weeks ago and the guard bees fastened onto my jeans and stung me more than I have ever been stung on a hive inspection. They have insisted on staying in the bottom box, despite my best efforts to entice them to build upwards.

Toward the end of June I began feeding them with a Boardman feeder so I wouldn't have to open up this angry hive to put a baggie feeder in and get stung just to be nice to them. This, of course, is my latest regret because the Boardman, I believe, was the start of all of my troubles today.

I also regret that I didn't follow my inclinations two weeks ago. On that inspection, I thought I should combine Hyron with Aristaeus because both were slow to build up swarm hives and could complement each other and perhaps get big enough by fall to make it through the winter well. I didn't do that because I couldn't bring myself to the idea of killing one of the queens.

Well, today I stopped at home for water and a break in the middle of my 8 mile walk and glanced out at the bees on the deck to see full-scale robbing in progress at Hyron. I suited up and went out to take off the Boardman feeder (empty by that time). I set it on the deck rail and as you can see below, the bees clustered all around it.


I didn't want the hive to be destroyed, although I may have been too late, so I quickly installed the robber screen I made in 2006. I wanted to completely close up the hive, if possible. I put a top bar over the normal opening of the robber screen and will leave it that way all day.

The value of a robber screen is that the robbers want to enter the hive through the hive entrance. The bees who live in the hive are drawn to the queen's pheromone and will find an entrance to the hive, as they follow the hormone. So the robber screen protects the entrance and provides an alternate entry for the bees who live in the hive.

I think the hive is a goner, though. A few moments ago I saw a bee inside the screen carrying a pupae. Most of the time in robbing, the robber bees rip the caps off of the honey and maybe they also ripped caps off of brood as well.

Despite the robber screen, the bees still cluster all around the hive box in funny places like on the bungee cord (see above). There is one bee sized opening at the upper right (as we face it) corner of the robber screen and bees are coming and going through that. I don't know if they are robber bees or not.


Sad day in my bee yard. All of the other hives are behaving normally.

Bees Arrive: Bee Season Begins!

At work today, I received a call from P.N. Williams to tell me that my bees (the two nucs I had ordered from him) are here and I need to pick up the bees tonight. Today was a long work day for me. I started at 9 AM and worked all day and without a break, I went straight to Emory to teach a class from 7 - 9 PM. My daughter lets my dogs out during the day on Mondays because I get home late.

You always pick up nucs after dark so that the bees are all at home tucked into bed. I drove south to P.N.'s place and got there at 9:30. My car is packed with furniture that needs to go to the mountains and other stuff (see the package of paper towels in the picture), so before I could put the bees in the car, I had to rearrange things. Here are the two nucs, bungee cords holding them closed, in the back of the car. This year, as he did last, P.N. cautioned me about going over any bumps on the way home. Atlanta is full of potholes, speed bumps, and rough pavement - it would be impossible to get home without bumps. Last year when I arrived home the back of the car was full of bees, mad at the bumps, who came out to see what was what. This year as you can see, the nucs were calm and the bees were not stirring.


I walked around the house to the deck (remember last year when I carried the bees THROUGH the house - see April 2006 archive) and set each nuc beside the hive where the bees will live.

I removed the bungee cords and let the door drop open. Each nuc was full of bees. There may be more bees in each of these nucs than are still alive in Bermuda....I put a feeder on each of the hives and came inside to fix the frames so that I can install the bees tomorrow.

Building a more sophisticated robber screen (still for the construction-challenged)

OK, first of all
1. Measure the height of the shim needed to put behind the adjustable window screen and mark the wood.
2. Saw along the marked line

3. At the approximate center of the shim, drill a hole with a drill bit smaller than the center of the thread of the screw you are going to use

4. Lubricate the threads of the screw by scraping it across a bar of soap....this (for the construction-challenged) helps the screw go into the wood smoothly and with less effort.

5. Screw the screw eye into the sides of the shim, using the drilled hole to help you get started. You can put the blade of a screwdriver into the screw eye to turn it more easily.
6. Voila! The finished robber screen, ready to be used with bungee cords.