View Full Version : Mugged !
Big time !! I just got home to a horror show. It looked just like a swarm had landed in my yard( I get a few every year into bait hives). So I started to look in all the usual places to find them, O ly to look down the garden and see each of my hives and nucs covered in bees. So entrances down to single file and the crowd quickly dispersed. The damage ? 2 nucs with zero honey ( one that had 2 capped brood frames of heather honey and an extra 2 frames of youngsters brushed into it as a starter colony its got 12 very hungry queen larvae in it now) 2 nucs I shouldn't open as I introduced queens 3 days ago and my savage tiny black colony lost barely anything. 1 hive emptied and 2 more mostly emptied. Every colony hit.
The culprit ? Unfortunately, my mentors bees he has 10 or 15 colonies double the size of my strongest here(my best are up at the heather).and they're just a few hundred metres away.
OK , sob story over.
I spoke too soon, it started to build up again so it was clean bed linen for everyone.
It's a bloody glorious day here, not a breath of wind which, since we haven't had many, makes it all the more frustrating. I can see very few of my bees around 2 of the nucs so I may have lost them completely. It would be the 2 I just bought queens for.
Actually my strongest colony was only 14 frames of bees many of his are 6 or 7 boxes of bees.
Were you feeding syrup? It is rare to get a robbing frenzy starting like that spontaneously.
I fed 3 of them about 5 days ago in the dark. The starter colony and the 2 requeened nucs. The others have been fed heavily throughout the season as they were all this years splits or swarms and on undrawn foundation. The bad news for my mentor is that almost all the stores were thymolated hive alive. So I guess hell smell which ones did it when be pulls his supers.
A couple of taps on the requeened nucs got no response and the single brood hive has lost half its bees(I couldn't look for HRH as it becoming dark) big casualty numbers under all the sheets. They were all on reduced entrances except for the 3.5 frames of nasty black ones who've survived almost unscathed. The hives are now on a single hole of Payne's reducer and the sheets can stay tomorrow at least. I've had robbing start, but nothing like this. They're in my garden , I pass them several times a day, so I'd always noticed before it became a problem, but Saturday was the last night of regattas and I'd stayed at a friend's and not got back till mid afternoon, which gave them 2 days to build up to it.
Both the nu s with new queens are still kicking. One of them bringing in a load of pollen too. So I guess she was alive and laying before the robbing started. Let's hope she's not held responsible for it.
Not an ideal introduction.
2.5 days with sheets over them and there's still robbers around 3 or 4 colonies.
Do I need to move them ?
The internet is awash with advice about how to stop robbing but moving them is almost always the best solution.
It feels a bit back to front, moving my hives off my land so someone else can keep theirs , but in the short term its the solution. It's raining now, but 20 mins ago there were still robbers around 3 of them. I was going to overwinter them elsewhere anyway, but hoped to let the new queens settle before moving them....he, ho.
Frightening casualty count under the sheets. On the strongest of mine , nearly a shopping bag of dead. I don't think any would survive a repeat.
You will be able to move them back in a few weeks. August is often a bad time for robbing as supers have just come off and there is a lot of syrup being fed.
If you close up the hives with the robbers in, and then move them, the robbers stay with the moved hive as they will reorientate to it once opened. Maybe some poetic justice that you might be able to steal some of the thieves!
1nuc wiped out, 1 down to less than a frame of bees but with HRH still there. 1 hive(single brood and a super) down to 3 frames. The others have taken big casualties but will make it.
My mentor has also lost a bunch of mating nucs and 5 or 6 nucs and has about 10 supers filled with a lovely thymol scent. So its been a bit of a disaster for us both.
It seems his bees were actively seeking hives, I thought they were scouts for a swarm at first as they were checking out the bait bives in my barn and anything else with a suitable entrance and that's 50m from the nearest colony.
I don't think my survivors would have been in the right mood to accept any invaders shut in(not if their current mood is anything to go by)
What race of bees has your neighbour got? There is always talk about some races being more prone to start robbing than others but I don't know if that is just another old wives tale. If the neighbour still had supers on the bees were hardly at starvation point, assuming he had something in them.
busybeephilip
24-08-2015, 12:22 PM
I do recall reading that good honey gatherers also make good robbers, their senses must be more sensitive. I know that if you are feeding thymol syrup, the bees will activley seek out the smell of thymol with a vengeance as I often discover when i'm preparing the syrup in the garage, they just go mad for it working themselves into a frenzy and will test my garage for many days later. Always a sore point with the war office when they get into the house.
with robbing of hives, if you ever move a box always put something in its place for the robbers as they need to satisfy themselves that the food source is now gone otherwise they will seek out a neighbouring hive very quickly. A nuc with an old frame would work.
robber bees dont like tunnels or maze like screens on entrances and gives the defenders a bit more help
with robbing of hives, if you ever move a box always put something in its place for the robbers as they need to satisfy themselves that the food source is now gone otherwise they will seek out a neighbouring hive very quickly. A nuc with an old frame would work.
Good advice says I. (Can also work if you put a wasp trap in place of a hive if it's been hammered by wasps).
He has the same Buckfast bees as me.
Strangely, I use a caravan on site for all sorts of bee related op's, including adding the hive alive yet there's been no interest in there(other than a few wasps)
I take the point on putting something for them to investigate, as I added sheets to the hives I couldn't wet them and get them down the garden fast enough. I'd put one on go back for the next and by the time I was back the ones blocked by the sheet simply moved to the next hive.
prakel
26-08-2015, 10:07 AM
He has the same Buckfast bees as me.
I wonder whether, despite individual colony odours, it's easier for closely related bees to get an initial foothold when raiding another colony.
prakel
26-08-2015, 10:42 AM
What race of bees has your neighbour got? There is always talk about some races being more prone to start robbing than others but I don't know if that is just another old wives tale.
Manley noticed this claim also, whilst reading the old books.
That the old English bees.....were inveterate robbers seems probable from the prominence given to the question of robbing and fighting by the old English bee-masters and writers. Nutt, Huish, Thorley, Keys, and many others devote quite a lot of space in their works to this matter.
R.O.B Manley, 'Honey Production in the British Isles' 1936
prakel
27-08-2015, 08:38 AM
C.P.Dadant speculated that bees 'learn' to follow the beekeeper from hive to hive. I've never quite bought into that idea but we do know that some colonies definitely seem to home in on the slightest sign of weakness so there must be some level of regular patrols and tentative investigation. Robson in his book 'Reflections on Beekeeping' suggests that colonies are aware of all their neighbouring colonies/nest sites in a certain area and keep an eye on them from year to year.
No doubt in my mind that making nucs and splits then leaving them in the same apiary as the parent colony has a bearing on future robbing.
Another obvious is the alignment of colonies. I know that there are people who seem to think that once bees drift, that's it, they join the new colony but I reckon that a lot of drifters probably do so on a temporary basis and then return home after their next flight; if that is the case then it's perhaps not unreasonable to assume that they take with them some kind of memory of the other hive. But we'll need someone cleverer than me to prove that theory!
I read somewhere that closely related bees have an increased opertunity for silent robbing, but this wasn't a silent event. This was war !(mine lost)
For DR: a bit of early morning reading showed many studies into aggression as an epigenetic response that is almost immediate , but temporary. 1 study involved inserting emerging bees into a African bee colony and then taking samples weekly and analysing the brains of the bees, found that in a very short time the previously calm bees adopted the African bee aggression and brain chemistry.
It finished with the remark that this also applies to vertebrates and that we should not think of ourselves as a fixed being passing through the world, but as a constantly adapting being with the world passing through us.
I got sidetracked a bit on the next part but its interesting anyway. Apparently drone seminal fluid(thought just to aid mobility and supply food for sperm) kills the sperm of other drones by some action as yet unknown. I could only access part of the study and it wasn't due for completion till march this year so I doubt its been published in full yet
prakel
27-08-2015, 10:15 AM
I read somewhere that closely related bees have an increased opertunity for silent robbing, but this wasn't a silent event. This was war !(mine lost)
That's my point... the silent robbing may be the groundwork that helps to set up the full assault at a later date.
C.P.Dadant speculated that bees 'learn' to follow the beekeeper from hive to hive.
During times of no nectar flow, it does seem that bees follow me around from hive to hive as I inspect them. I have had to give up on a couple of occasions as the number of bees increases. Not sure if it's the same bees that follow me or if they are just following the colony odour when I rip the roofs off one by one. The round dance as used for short distances, doesn't give any sense of direction so as soon as the message is out that there's food nearby more and more bees will fly from their hives in search of food.
I spilled some sugar syrup in the back of my car a few days ago - with the tailgate open. Wasps loved it of course. Now, whenever I return home I have a cloud of wasps around the back of my car waiting for me to open it. So they remember and home in as soon as it returns.
. The round dance as used for short distances, doesn't give any sense of direction so as soon as the message is out that there's food nearby more and more bees will fly from their hives in search of food.
.
That explains why I thought there was a swarm arriving in my yard as its equidistant from my hives to his. It looked like scouting gone mad.
busybeephilip
27-08-2015, 09:04 PM
I spilled some sugar syrup in the back of my car a few days ago - with the tailgate open. Wasps loved it of course. Now, whenever I return home I have a cloud of wasps around the back of my car waiting for me to open it. So they remember and home in as soon as it returns.
Wasps apply a scent to mark their food sources so thats why they return to your car (possilbily) If you use a mini nuc box that was raided by wasps and set it up as fresh again the wasps will hammer it cos of the scent. if you put a wasp trap next to a wasps food source they will mostly ignore the trap untill the scented source is removed. Wasps are clever little things!
Thanks for that Philip , I just made the connection today that 3 of my mating nucs keep getting hammered by wasps, but had no idea they marked them. I'll swap them for some that have been through the soda bath tomorrow.
Hope its not too late.
Wasps apply a scent to mark their food sources...
Have you any idea how to remove that scent mark? e.g. would washing soda work? Or could I mask it with something?
I'm currently 400 or so painful miles away from a small nuc that started being avidly targeted by wasps a day or so before I had to leave. I'm used to seeing wasps sneaking in & out the entrances, at a level that even quite small colonies have always managed to tolerate, or hanging around picking off corpses or downed bees outside the hives, but this was a really persistent flow of zigzagging wasps, something I've never seen before. I reduced the entrance to a beeway or so, blocked external access to the mesh floor, & removed the syrup that I'd foolishly given the colony, but the wasps were still threateningly keen, & I think you've just pointed out the reason why. Interrupting their chemical signals would be a particularly neat form of defence.
Soda crystals should do it( I hope so) I've just washed a couple and will swap over frames tomorrow. 2 of the mating nucs had taken a beating but still have enough bees for the job. When I looked in earlier it was 5 wasps for every bee that entered. My records show that these 2 nucs were emptied of their last virgins and bees, so I guess the scent marking is my problem. From my previous jobs round of grafts I lost 50% of the queens and bees.
Now I know why. I should know by tomorrow eve. If the soda has done the trick.
Anyone ever tried the banana skin thing against wasps ?
In my experience a problem with wasps is almost always preceded by syrup feeding.
busybeephilip
28-08-2015, 09:36 AM
Anyone ever tried the banana skin thing against wasps ?
I have used bananna skins with what ever other liquid mix you fancy in my traps, mead works well too, and cider / cidre and add a teaspoon of vinegar to give the fermented smell.
Wasps also seem to associate the color yellow with food, so a yellow cone in the trap will work better.
There is a USA website that uses poisoned bait, the wasps gather and bringing it back to the nest so slowly destroying the brood, involves poision mixed into tinned meat eg tuna, catfood or fresh mince meat. going to give it a try once i devise some way of keeping animals/ birds away from the bait but I've never seen wasps hunting tuna or mince but would be great if it worked
prakel
28-08-2015, 09:52 AM
going to give it a try once i devise some way of keeping animals/ birds away from the bait but I've never seen wasps hunting tuna or mince but would be great if it worked
There was a tv programme some years ago which showed beekeepers in Greece using poisoned meat in metal cages suspended from trees. I'd imagine that an old bird cage might answer.
chris
28-08-2015, 10:02 AM
In my experience a problem with wasps is almost always preceded by syrup feeding.
There are a lot of wasps around here,they use the same water source as the bees. I haven't fed syrup since 2008 and I never have a problem with wasps robbing.
There are a lot of wasps around here,they use the same water source as the bees. I haven't fed syrup since 2008 and I never have a problem with wasps robbing.
That sounds a promising approach. Do you not feed at all, or do you feed fondant instead?
I usually avoid feeding if I can, but this year... well, I made a commitment to raising 3-4 nucs (from an original 4 colonies), and overshot a bit (because I wanted to be reliable), and then the 3-4 nucs turned out not to be needed after all, so now while I'm looking for alternative homes for queens & nucs I'm currently tending 11 fascinating, fully-formed, up for it, but mostly rather undersized colonies. (Oh yes, and there was my first try at running a Mini Plus, which accounts for the teeniest one! In its own garden just now, & with luck maybe not yet discovered by wasps.) Feeding a bit of syrup to help them build up seemed like the way to go, until the wasp interest started building up as well. Would you feed fondant in the circumstances? Or just avoid being daft enough to get into the situation in the first place? :-)
There is a USA website that uses poisoned bait, the wasps gather and bringing it back to the nest so slowly destroying the brood, involves poision mixed into tinned meat eg tuna, catfood or fresh mince meat. going to give it a try once i devise some way of keeping animals/ birds away from the bait but I've never seen wasps hunting tuna or mince but would be great if it worked
This approach really worries me. How long does the poison persist? What happens to the critters that eat the wasps?
Also, I must confess to rather liking wasps. Beautiful nests. And they have their place in the system. If they're becoming a problem, then it tells me I've got my own system wrong, invited them in by leaving easy food lying around.
Admittedly I missed at least one train on Tuesday because I was hanging round the hive entrance picking off wasps by hand, but it didn't feel like a good solution!
gavin
28-08-2015, 11:18 AM
You do live in Wasp Central :). Looking back, I'm pretty sure that I've had serious wasp attacks when I wasn't feeding (rarely did!). Weak colonies tend to get picked upon, sometimes with hundreds joining in and many loitering on the outside walls of the hive in cooler periods.
Yes, we have great wasps locally :-) The colony in the bathroom wall is doing ever so well this year. Start of the season I thought I might be imagining that I was hearing it, because none of the housemates seemed to notice it, & I thought wasps didn't return to old nest sites, but by now it's making a steady roaring sound, especially early in the morning. Great pets, much less trouble than the mice. I can hear them from my desk, very comforting.
Hmmm. Pity if not feeding isn't the whole answer (I know you're a great exponent of non-feeding! ;-) ). And I have had weak colonies before, but they've been pretty good at holding their own, somehow, so far. Even this week, it wasn't as bad as you've just described. The attackers were coming more in a steady trickle of ones and twos. A lot of wasps were just diving underneath - I read that they can pass food to each other through the mesh floors, which is why I've blocked off access to that - and I took away the syrup because Stupid Beekeeper had left it in a tray sitting right on the floor... doh. I also realised that they were slipping past the entrance. It as a great, silly long slit - manufactured, I'd never make one that big - and I'd roughly whittled pieces of wood to block each end, but noticed on Monday that, although there wasn't enough space for a bee, a determined wasp could ooooze through. They are so slim! Sleek little predators. So those little gaps are blocked up now, and the entrance is down to a beeway or so... The wasps seemed to want to slip past when the entrance was clear, and veered away when it was full of bees, so I'm hoping they're just after easy sugar, not crunchy protein snacks, and hoping the colony will still be holding on when I get back. They're only a divider board away from the colony next door, & I've hopefully found a queen-home or two already, so I could just unite them.
I hate being away, I'm always missing some bee action or other!
chris
28-08-2015, 12:28 PM
That sounds a promising approach. Do you not feed at all, or do you feed fondant instead?
I don't feed at all. Gavin's memory is probably good. Things are never that simple.
So do you never ever have small nucs? Or are you willing to let them starve if need be?
For me, never feeding would be the ideal, but I'm not sure how to get there.
In terms of avoiding wasp problems, setting in a frame of capped stores would be best (assuming you have some stores spare from another colony)
Fondant is less attractive than syrup.
I have used bananna skins with what ever other liquid mix you fancy in my traps, mead works well too, and cider / cidre and add a teaspoon of vinegar to give the fermented smell.
Wasps also seem to associate the color yellow with food, so a yellow cone in the trap will work better.
There is a USA website that uses poisoned bait, the wasps gather and bringing it back to the nest so slowly destroying the brood, involves poision mixed into tinned meat eg tuna, catfood or fresh mince meat. going to give it a try once i devise some way of keeping animals/ birds away from the bait but I've never seen wasps hunting tuna or mince but would be great if it worked
I actually meant putting the skin in the hive to make the bees more aggressive. If I'm not mistaken, banana skin smells very like alarm pheromone.
I use mince meat in my wasp traps(not poisoned). With a plastic bottle type trap press it into the threaded top before inverting then simply use water for drowning them.
prakel
29-08-2015, 09:13 AM
I actually meant putting the skin in the hive to make the bees more aggressive. If I'm not mistaken, banana skin smells very like alarm pheromone.
If that's the case wouldn't the most important result be a colony of stressed bees?
The bees I've got now, after a lot of work, are very calm but they don't demonstrate any undue weakness with regards to wasps. In the past I had the pleasure of working a hundred colonies of some of the nastiest bees you could imagine, it wasn't at all uncommon to be greeted by them bouncing off the windscreen before the vehichle had even stopped moving. You definitely wanted to make sure that there were no chinks in your armour before getting out. No fun, no pleasure at all. A danger to everyone.
For sure it would stress them, but better stressed than overrun ?
If placed in the hive the affect should be local and temporary, only used at all until they got the invaders under control.
Maybe I'm a bigger softy than I thought but, I never tolerate bees stinging away from the hive( with the odd wind driven collision aside). I have a public footpath that runs through my fields, so I've a duty to them as well.
I asked the question a couple of weeks ago as to whether really aggressive bees defend the hive entrance any more effectively than calmer bees and I don't think anyone put up any real evidence yet. A colony which aggressively defends an area up to 50 feet away from the hive entrance must spend a lot of energy and resources in the process which might be better allocated elsewhere. Keeping wasps at bay is as much to do with colony strength as it is to do with aggression.
prakel
29-08-2015, 09:54 AM
I asked the question a couple of weeks ago as to whether really aggressive bees defend the hive entrance any more effectively than calmer bees and I don't think anyone put up any real evidence yet. A colony which aggressively defends an area up to 50 feet away from the hive entrance must spend a lot of energy and resources in the process which might be better allocated elsewhere. Keeping wasps at bay is as much to do with colony strength as it is to do with aggression.
The colonies I mentioned previously were all very powerful and highly productive when compared to the others (there were other factors involved too) but it's obviously impossible to know whether they'd have been even more productive without that energy expenditure -I can't actually think of a reason why they wouldn't have been.
re colony strength, I know what you're saying but it's that old chestnut which I keep going back to, without wanting to split hairs, it's what I refer to as colony cohesion for want of a better word. We see mating nucs which the wasps keep well away from because they're 'right' so not necessarily 'strength' as it mught be understood in the numerical sense.
prakel
29-08-2015, 09:57 AM
For sure it would stress them, but better stressed than overrun ?
I don't know. Are stressed bees worth anything?
For sure it would stress them, but better stressed than overrun ?
If placed in the hive the affect should be local and temporary, only used at all until they got the invaders under control.
Maybe I'm a bigger softy than I thought but, I never tolerate bees stinging away from the hive( with the odd wind driven collision aside). I have a public footpath that runs through my fields, so I've a duty to them as well.
If I'm not mistaken, banana skin smells very like alarm pheromone.
Yes, definitely. I got to know that smell very well during my first couple of summers. In fact, it got to the point where if I smelled an overripe banana, I assumed someone was cross with me! - even if I was nowhere near an apiary.
Anything which increases stress in a honeybee colony is going to lead to problems later on.
There is a delicate balance in a colony and it can reach a tipping point for a variety of reasons/stressors.
CCD is/was thought to be multifactorial based on various stressors working in combination, mites, virus, nosemas, nutrition, climate, pesticides and miticide residues in the hive.
re colony strength, I know what you're saying but it's that old chestnut which I keep going back to, without wanting to split hairs, it's what I refer to as colony cohesion for want of a better word. We see mating nucs which the wasps keep well away from because they're 'right' so not necessarily 'strength' as it mught be understood in the numerical sense.
I've seen this too. I was annoyed with myself a few posts back. I described my attacked colony as "weak". I'm not sure they're weak - haven't really paid enough attention to them to be sure, it's been such a busy summer - all I know is that they're small. I've seen tiny colonies with really impressive morale. ("Morale" is the word I tend to use. Probably too anthropomorphic - I should maybe say "cohesion" as well, makes fewer assumptions, nice choice of word.)
prakel
29-08-2015, 11:07 AM
I've seen this too. I was annoyed with myself a few posts back. I described my attacked colony as "weak". I'm not sure they're weak - haven't really paid enough attention to them to be sure, it's been such a busy summer - all I know is that they're small. I've seen tiny colonies with really impressive morale. ("Morale" is the word I tend to use. Probably too anthropomorphic - I should maybe say "cohesion" as well, makes fewer assumptions, nice choice of word.)
Don't know, I quite like 'morale'!! Either way, it's exactly what I'm trying to explain whatever we choose to call it.
A queenright colony will certainly defend itself better than a queenless colony. You even see this with mini nucs.
Don't know, I quite like 'morale'!! Either way, it's exactly what I'm trying to explain whatever we choose to call it.
I think you're on to something massively important and mostly hidden, it is transferable but difficult to measure and only becomes evident over time. Some practitioners of walk away splits have a grasp of it, where a split from a thriving colony confers some of its "morale" onwards, be it beneficial microbes or some expression of epigenetics who knows, but it's tangible to the careful observer. It is not to do with the queen herself! as a successful nuc will continue to thrive queen after queen, but is something to do with the bees, comb and brood. If we could bottle this magic potion we'd be rich beyond our wildest dreams.
prakel
29-08-2015, 01:24 PM
Some practitioners of walk away splits have a grasp of it
Maybe there's something in that. Did plenty of those in the past.
The converse is also true. Some never seem to thrive no matter what changes are made. Some of my apideas produce queen after queen, up to 3 and very occasionally 4 in a season, and others produce failure after failure.
The converse is also true. Some never seem to thrive no matter what changes are made. Some of my apideas produce queen after queen, up to 3 and very occasionally 4 in a season, and others produce failure after failure.
That'll be due to the ley lines being all wrong.
You need to move to Anglesey if you want to get your ley lines sorted.
The converse is also true. Some never seem to thrive no matter what changes are made. Some of my apideas produce queen after queen, up to 3 and very occasionally 4 in a season, and others produce failure after failure.
I don't have as many as you - but you could well be correct! At first I thought it was location as I have mini-nucs secreted in various locations around the garden. However that idea seems to be fading. More recently - late in this season, I shook out a couple of mini-nucs and started again with fresh bees to rear a couple of late (supercedure) queencells as the remaining bees in the mini-nucs had been singularly unsucessfull all summer. I think the bees were - by the time I shook them out - just old and knackered and having been unsucessfull in the past had few young bees - even putting a frame of brood from another mini-nuc doesn't seem to help to revitalise them very much.
You need to consider feng shui when secreting your mating nucs.
prakel
31-08-2015, 08:20 AM
Or the priinciples behind medieval castle design.
prakel
31-08-2015, 09:34 AM
On the subject of 'cohesion/morale' I've reached the point where I feel that it's probably going to be a waste of my time and valuable resources to give a cell to a colony where cell/queen introduction has already failed for some reason. I reckon that far better results are obtainable by uniting the failed unit to a queen right one and then splitting them again in a couple of weeks. Many will disagree with ths approach and it took me a long time to bite the bullet and implement it even though the idea had been in my mind for a couple of years but I think it's a far more satisfactory approach than trying to force a positive outcome from a 'backfoot' position.
I take it a step further and often shake out the offending bees and either restock the box in a different location with a nuc or plonk it on to an expanding colony with the intension of later splitting.
prakel
31-08-2015, 12:26 PM
mbc: I take it a step further
Excellent practice.
I find that quick action is the key so uniting and then dividing when needed has worked fine for me sofar. It stops loss of morale in it's tracks and keeps the combs alive. Similarly, I jump on unmated queens (not literally :)) pretty sharpish -a month from emergence is definitely more than long enough for an unmated queen to be taking space in my oppinion. Three weeks in preferable.
You are convincing me I should give up on the nuc that was down to a single frame after the robbing. I've given them a frame of stores and 1 of emerging brood and have also been feeding them, but they seem to be doing g nothing, all the others are well on there way to getting over it, as there's been a decent flow from some late blackberries over the last few days(another week or so of it to go).
I was going to give them another 2 frames of brood today, but I suppose I can still do that and unite them if that doesn't perk them up.
They live!!! My wasp-targeted colony only had two hand-sized patches of brood, and too few bees to properly look after the frame of brood I stole to reinforce them, but with their reduced entrance and an absence of syrup they were nonchalantly defending themselves against the occasional wasp when I got back for a visit yesterday. So they were tiny, but not weak.
Tiny enough that I decided they'd be hard pushed to build up in time for winter so I've united them with their old queen's much bigger nest, and the queen they raised is off to a new life in someone else's hive. Two happy endings, I hope.
I'm getting a sense that the cooler weather might already be having an impact on the wasps? There were fewer in the apiary, and one or two were hanging around, sheltering on warm woodwork or under overhangs, as if they no longer had homes to go to. The wasp colony in my wall is still going strong, but then it is in a lovely warm spot. It has started to make a purring noise which I remember from previous years, but don't think I've been hearing this year. Is that a sound they make when they're warming themselves up on cool days & nights, perhaps? Does anyone know enough about wasps to fill me in? And is anyone else finding that the wasp presence has started to diminish?
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