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Author Topic: Cut out using bee vac  (Read 2588 times)

Offline philinacoma

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Cut out using bee vac
« on: May 20, 2010, 03:16:56 am »
I have a cut out in the wall cavity of a back yard bungalow. Pulling the outer cement sheets off will probably be not too bad appart from the asbestos in the sheets. The feral nest has been there for a couple of years and from the looks of the numbers of bees flying around it could be a pretty sizable one.

At the moment the weather is getting cool (late Autumn), although Sunday is meant to be 18C so I hope to collect them then.

My question is regarding the use of the vac. This will be the first time I have used a vac. Once I remove the outer wall, I plan on using the vac to collect the bees first then once they are not there to bother me, I was going to collect the comb. Do I then open the box with the bees in to put in the framed comb? Or put it into another box and hope they survive until I get them home and put the frames in when they are at the new site? Any other recommendations?

Given the lateness of the season, I would not want to lose brood. The house belongs to the customer's mother who has just gone into a nursing home and they are renting the house out so they need to remove the bees otherwise I would try to talk them out of moving them until spring.


Offline JP

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Re: Cut out using bee vac
« Reply #1 on: May 20, 2010, 10:47:52 am »
Use the bee vac to remove enough bees so you can see what you're doing. If you can see the comb sections plainly already use the vac at a bare minimum. Cut and transfer comb sections with the bees on them.

I finish my cut outs at dark or go back at dark and remove the set up.

If its dark enough, you can shake the bees right into the set up at the site. I usually set the hive box on my tail gate and shake the bees into the box. They will fan and orient for several minutes. Let them if you have time.

After they have mostly oriented, smoke them down into the set up and add your top cover.


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Offline Robo

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Re: Cut out using bee vac
« Reply #2 on: May 20, 2010, 12:36:21 pm »
Once I remove the outer wall, I plan on using the vac to collect the bees first then once they are not there to bother me, I was going to collect the comb. Do I then open the box with the bees in to put in the framed comb? Or put it into another box and hope they survive until I get them home and put the frames in when they are at the new site? Any other recommendations?
First off, you can't collect the bees first and the go after the comb.  It needs to be an iterative processes because you want just enough suction to barely pull the bees off the comb and you have no way to get the bees that are in between the combs.  I usually start by sucking off as many of the bees as I can and then cut one piece of comb out at a time and suck the bees off and then go to the next comb, etc.  I always look for the queen first before sucking off a comb, and if I haven't found her by the last piece of comb,  I leave it there while I clean up which gives her time to return to the comb if she has been driven off into a crack or crevice.

A good portion of my removals are quite a ways away, so leaving and returning to pick the hive up at a later time is not possible.  That is why I designed my bee vac to allow for sucking up the bees during the removal,adding in the brood and queen,  and reuniting the sucked up bees and brood before I leave the site.  If you have the time, I would suggest building a similar one.

http://robo.bushkillfarms.com/beekeeping/bee-vac/
http://forum.beemaster.com/index.php/topic,14066.0.html

Quote
Given the lateness of the season, I would not want to lose brood. The house belongs to the customer's mother who has just gone into a nursing home and they are renting the house out so they need to remove the bees otherwise I would try to talk them out of moving them until spring.

Yes, lateness in the season is also an issue and I usually try to push them off to the Spring, but sometimes that is not an option and you have to do what you can.
"Opportunity is missed by most people because it comes dressed in overalls and looks like work." - Thomas Edison



Offline philinacoma

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Re: Cut out using bee vac
« Reply #3 on: May 20, 2010, 08:02:35 pm »
All good suggestions, thanks guys.

One of the reasons I had decided to use the vac was that the hive is a fair distance from home and I did not want to travel back again later to pick them up and another is that they seem a wee bit on the aggressive side. I got to about 6 feet from them before I had some going eye to eye with me.

Being a cut out it is going to take me time to access the comb and they are going to get rather disrupted in the process. Therefor I was hoping to reduce the numbers I had to battle with as much as possible. The aggressiveness of the hive can be addressed at a later time through regular means.

Offline Robo

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Re: Cut out using bee vac
« Reply #4 on: May 21, 2010, 08:04:36 am »
Therefor I was hoping to reduce the numbers I had to battle with as much as possible.


A bee vac will definitely helps with that.
"Opportunity is missed by most people because it comes dressed in overalls and looks like work." - Thomas Edison



 

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