Robbing Apideas

[fatshark]

Same here ... only mark them when I remove them from the mini-nuc and place them in a queen cage. That way they get an extra day or two to smell OK before they're released into the hurly burly of the hive. I haven't clipped mine this year.

Last few of the year marked this morning and into strong nucs (essentially full hives split in half). Last few cells from the Ben Harden setup into the vacated mini-nucs with the hope of late season mating and over-wintering. I'm running a much smaller number than Jon is, but this will be the third cell in each this year. All remaining mini-nucs are now double deckers and I've also built frame feeders for the top storey of a Kieler rather than use a third layer with fondant ... I found this tended to 'leak' down into the hive too much last winter.

[Jon]

I put the fondant in a plastic bag and make a couple of gashes in it with a knife.
I was surprised how little fondant they consumed last winter, about 10% of what I put in!

This is make of break time for my final batch of about 30 queens which are now about day 12 from emergence.
Yesterday was a perfect mating day.

[fatshark]

I realise we're wandering well off-topic here ...

Just a regular plastic bag, like one of those thin sandwich bags? I presume you just mould it to shape in the feeder compartment of the Apidea? Doesn't the cluster end up much higher in the box or do you run them single storey for the winter?

Perhaps it's time to start an overwintering mini-nucs thread?

[Jon]

Perhaps it's time to start an overwintering mini-nucs thread?

Mr Nellie can spin it out.

Yep just a regular plastic Tesco bag.
I only overwintered 4 and they were doubled up ie 10 frames plus a super with fondant on top.
Also acts as a good layer of insulation.

Others I know overwintered single apideas last winter but it was very mild.

[Neils]

normally be more than happy to, but there isn't really an obvious break in the thread flow, last 2-3 posts excepted, to be able to split it to be perfectly honest. It might be just as easy to actually start an overwintering thread.

[nemphlar]

Picked up what appeared to be cast last night, put them in box with the idea of checking round today,turned out to be the apidea I was going to try and overwinter on a double. The apidea was full of brood and they still deserted, although all the nucs were under serious threat from robbing , can't remember seeing such a frenzy across all hives.

[Jon]

I had an apidea in the garden try and abscond today. The excluder was on so the queen could not leave. The bees settled about 100 feet away on top of my shed beside where I have a colony and a few nucs.
I brought the apidea to the cluster and most of them went back in.
When they start this absconding lark they repeat it every day and I find they eventually kill the queen.
Having brood in the apidea seems to make no difference.
The best thing to do is to cage the queen and either leave the cage in the apidea or else introduce her to a nuc or a colony which needs to be requeened.
I have watched this absconding mania quite a bit and although the queen excluder stops the queen leaving, but they will either abandon the apidea and leave the queen with only a couple of bees, or else kill her.
In then former case the wasps will be in quickly.
You definitely need to take action once they try and abscond.