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Author Topic: Drift?  (Read 7783 times)

Offline FRAMEshift

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Drift?
« on: January 30, 2011, 08:07:51 pm »
I'm designing a new expanded bee yard.  It will eventually have  24 long hives in 4 rows.  That would be 6 hive boxes per row and the long hives can be split to hold two smaller colonies each.  So I could have as many as 12 colonies per row.  If I put these in a straight line, will I have a problem with drift?

 I'm not so much concerned with population imbalances.  If the hives are out of balance I can move frames from one hive to another to even it up.   But I don't want to lose lots of bees as a result of fighting.   I have read that 3 is the maximum number in a row without having a problem.  What is your experience with drift?  I guess I'm asking how much effort I should put in re-design of the yard to avoid drift.
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Offline iddee

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #1 on: January 30, 2011, 08:44:51 pm »
Paint different designs on the front of the boxes or use different color boxes to reduce or eliminate drift.
"Listen to the mustn'ts, child. Listen to the don'ts. Listen to the shouldn'ts, the impossibles, the won'ts. Listen to the never haves, then listen close to me . . . Anything can happen, child. Anything can be"

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Offline Countryboy

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #2 on: January 30, 2011, 09:02:59 pm »
Some bees, like Italians, are worse about drifting than other strains of bees.

Fighting will not be an issue.  Guard bees only fight worker bees who show up with an empty belly.  If a bee comes to the entrance of a hive, and it is full of nectar, that bee has no problem entering and joining that hive.

For whatever reason, (queen with weak pheromones?) some hives in a beeyard lose bees.  Other hives in that yard will consistently have more bees coming in than flying away. (queen with stronger pheromones?)

And if the bees do drift a little, so what?  It's unlikely to be an issue unless the drifting is like this. Bees Drifting Onto A Pallet Of Hives

Offline AllenF

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #3 on: January 30, 2011, 10:53:30 pm »
I just took 4 or 5 spray paint cans with me and painted up the bottom boards and the front of the bottom box different colors in my rows.   Do it on a cold day and everything will be fine come spring.

Offline BjornBee

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #4 on: January 31, 2011, 08:56:53 am »
Anything to set one hive apart from the next is good. Different colored paint on the front. A brick on one and a cinder block on the next, etc. A bucket always here, or a small tree there. It all helps.
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Offline Acebird

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #5 on: January 31, 2011, 11:11:42 am »
Quote
It's unlikely to be an issue unless the drifting is like this.

How does one differentiate between drift and a hive that is overheated?  I thought that when the bees cling to the outside of the hive it lacked ventilation.
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Offline FRAMEshift

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #6 on: January 31, 2011, 12:53:24 pm »
How does one differentiate between drift and a hive that is overheated?  I thought that when the bees cling to the outside of the hive it lacked ventilation.
It's a joke.  The video is not drift.
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Offline Finski

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #7 on: January 31, 2011, 01:48:41 pm »
.
This Hungarian guy is not afraid of drifting

http://farkasmez.hu/gallery.html

I scatter my hives to avoid drifting
.
Language barrier NOT included

Offline Countryboy

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #8 on: January 31, 2011, 09:23:28 pm »
How does one differentiate between drift and a hive that is overheated?  I thought that when the bees cling to the outside of the hive it lacked ventilation.

An overheated hive is a dead or dying hive.  An overheated hive is not the same thing as a hive with poor ventilation.

You have to look at the whole picture to know if you are looking at drift or if it is a case of poor ventilation or extremely hot weather.  With hot weather or poor ventilation, your hives will beard some.  Most of your hives will look similar.  With drift, you will have a stronger hive surrounded by weaker hives.

It's a joke.  The video is not drift.

The video is a case of extreme drifting.  It is not a joke. (I have no idea why you would even think it is a joke.)  A few hundred hives were being moved through a holding yard, and bees got disoriented.  For whatever reason, many of the disoriented bees decided to adopt this pallet of hives as their home.

Offline iddee

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #9 on: January 31, 2011, 09:37:28 pm »
>>>The video is a case of extreme drifting.<<<

No, that is not drifting. Drifting is when foragers return from the field and go into the wrong box. Then continue returning to that box.

What you have is lost bees taking up with the nearest hive. That is entirely different.
Anytime many hives are moved from one area, a hive or two should be left to catch the stragglers. That is not drifting.
"Listen to the mustn'ts, child. Listen to the don'ts. Listen to the shouldn'ts, the impossibles, the won'ts. Listen to the never haves, then listen close to me . . . Anything can happen, child. Anything can be"

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Offline Michael Bush

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #10 on: January 31, 2011, 09:42:33 pm »
Mine are all touching.  Do they drift?  Probably. Do I care?  No.

http://bushfarms.com/beesmisc.htm#hivestand

"The percentage of foragers originating from different colonies within the apiary ranged from 32 to 63 percent"--from a paper, published in 1991 by Walter Boylan-Pett and Roger Hoopingarner in Acta Horticulturae 288, 6th Pollination Symposium (see Jan 2010 edition of Bee Culture, 36)
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Offline rdy-b

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #11 on: January 31, 2011, 09:56:49 pm »
Its your vid--but to me it looks like you where pulling honey and the bees got disorientate -by use of fume board -or perhaps a bee-blower-those bees whernt free flying drift--any way if you have drift in your yard -mostly at the ends of the rows-use it to your advantage and set your comb honey suppers on those hives.
countryboy has a lot of cool vids hope he shares them all- needs to fix his location on the avatar so we know hes
from ohio-- :lol: RDY-B
« Last Edit: February 01, 2011, 01:04:19 am by rdy-b »

Offline AllenF

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #12 on: February 01, 2011, 12:08:28 am »
Countryboy has a lot of good videos there.   Just watched maybe half and ran out of time before bed.   I really like the queen hive tool test.   

Offline hardwood

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #13 on: February 01, 2011, 12:23:51 am »
I just checked out some too...nice!

Countryboy, I see that you're into heirloom tomatoes too...we might need to start a seed swap!

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Offline Acebird

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #14 on: February 01, 2011, 09:37:30 am »
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Mine are all touching.  Do they drift?  Probably. Do I care?  No.

And I was told you couldn't learn beekeeping on the internet and viewing videos.  Videos and discussion afterwards blows away any form of publication when it comes to learning.  Academia would be lost today without graphic representation.
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Offline hardwood

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #15 on: February 01, 2011, 10:14:59 am »
I haven't ever witnessed it, but that video looks like what I've heard a AHB raid can look like.

Scott
"In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person's becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American...There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag...We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language...And we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."

Theodore Roosevelt 1907

Offline AllenF

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #16 on: February 01, 2011, 10:49:37 am »
Or when you are refilling your bottle of bee quick and spill it into the top of a hive.

Offline rdy-b

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #17 on: February 01, 2011, 01:17:18 pm »
Quote
Mine are all touching.  Do they drift?  Probably. Do I care?  No.

And I was told you couldn't learn beekeeping on the internet and viewing videos.  Videos and discussion afterwards blows away any form of publication when it comes to learning.  Academia would be lost today without graphic representation.
yea that makes me chuckel because i have heard that the driving force behind the internets rapid sucess is porn-RDY-B

Offline lenape13

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #18 on: February 01, 2011, 02:02:06 pm »
Seven of my hives are lined up in a row, but each on is a different color.  It helps with the drifting, but, more importantly, it breaks up the monotony of a single color.  It adds more color to my garden!  The rest of my hives are scattered on others' properties for pollenation, so color delineation for drifting isn't really a factor.

Offline VolunteerK9

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Re: Drift?
« Reply #19 on: February 01, 2011, 04:03:53 pm »
Countryboy has a lot of good videos there.   Just watched maybe half and ran out of time before bed.   I really like the queen hive tool test.   

I agree. Some pretty darned big 4 deep hives too.

Countryboy, just curious but why on the video of you checking on your 18 day packages, you filled up a frame feeder with syrup and then put on an excluder and 2 supers?