Some bees have moved into my compost bin. I want to keep them but I need to put them into an actual bee box. What do I do?
Some bees have moved into my compost bin. I want to keep them but I need to put them into an actual bee box.
Some bees have moved into my compost bin. I want to keep them but I need to put them into an actual bee box. What do I do?
I covered up all of my skin and then opened up the lid to look at the hive. I put my phone on a tripod so I could look at it again once I had closed it. I was worried that the bees would be aggressive but they didn't try sting me or anything when I opened it up.
Honeybees are bros.
Without a suit you should still get some smoke going just in case. You need to find a queen and where you put it, that's where the hive will start. I suggest regular wood crates or a hollow log if you don't want to buy an actual hive. If you buy a hive, go with LR or DB hives! Get 2 full bottom supers and 1 top half super. The bottom one is for bee breeding, the middle one is for bee honey storage and the top half super is for your own honey. As I said in my prev post, dont harvest anything this year and wait for next harvest in spring and summer.
grab them with your hands and put them in a box?
whats the problem here?
might get some pointers in Wrong board
bees are cool, wish you luck
Make a queen excluder and capture the queen, if possible. Then move the queen into the new box.
After that, smoke and scoop the bees into a trash bag and dump their stupid asses into the new bee box.
What this anon said. Get a new box and frames, smoke 'em, find the queen, get her in there. She'll be too fat to fly, so you don't have to worry about her escaping.
Then put something under the hive to catch the bees, maybe even the new box will fit. Smoke 'em again, and wait a few minutes. As a reaction, they fill their stomaches with honey. Scoop the bees into your container, get as many in there as you can. Dump them in the top of the new hive. They'll realize the queen is there, and they'll stay.
You need to get as many bees out of the old hive as possible though, and then remove the nest. You can remove the honey for the bees to collect (they'll need it in the winter, since their harvest season is probably closing wherever you are), just leave it next to the new hiev, but you shouldn't leave the larval cells intact. The bees might get consfused by that, since they want to protect their sisters above all else, and the larva will still "smell" like the hive. Give them to your chickens.
Depending on your latitude, it might be hard for the bees to prepare their nest in time for winter. You'll need to give them a sugar water source, maybe some pollen too.
But most of all, protect yourself. If you were collecting a swarming group, they wouldn't defend themselves much, but those ladies have a hive to protect and they'll frick you up if you're not suited.
You can mist them w water instead. It will have much the same effect, and stress them less.
pro
how do i identify the queen?
The queen is larger than a worker.
>What do I do?
Accept that it's their compost bin now.
Build a bee box and put it 50+ feet away from the compost bin. Bees will move in when they swarm.
Can't be too close to the original nest or they won't take it.
Assuming you can find the queen....You don't even need a specialized bee box. Just get regular two boxes and stack them one on top of the other. You can also buy a queen separator and put it between the boxes so the bottom one is for bee breeding and the top one is for honey production. You will need to cut out the walls of honeycomb when it grows for the honey though. Also don't cut any honey they produce now cause they will need it to survive the winter!!! t. reading to start a bee farm
That's your bee box now
Why dont you just make a new compost bin instead?
Well the issue is that i am moving out of this rental place in about 20 days and i would like to a) take my compost with me and b) take the bees with me but i cant just pick the whole compost bin up and take it because it has no bottom
How far away are you planning on transporting the compost and bee hive?
If the place you are moving to is within 10 miles then you cant take the bees because they will fly back to that spot where the bin is now.
if the queen is in the new box and the bees are put in there they will stay with the queen. their job is to protect the queen and the hive she is in
All the scout bees will return to the location of the original hive if its within 10 miles and they will die there. Seeing as it is fall soon, the bee commune might not build back strong enough for winter and then they could all possibly die
Is all of the compost yours?
>What do I do?
Serve them with an eviction notice.