So, you got your bees last year, you got them through the winter, they are exploding in this fine spring, and then the queen cells start. What now? Hope that they go away?! Cut them out in a panic? Get on the internet to order a new queen as obviously this old one wasn't doing her job right? No, someone said artificial swarm.

OK, there are different flavours of artificial swarm. The first question is ... where is the old queen going (assuming that you can find her, and if not seek help). Some say take the old queen out in a nuc box with a few frames. That isn't my advice because you will then have a populous and queenless colony. Two results:

- the flying bees are now queenless and likely to be tetchy and troublesome
- new virgin queens will take an age to come into lay as they usually do in a populous colony

Here is what I said in an email to a year 2 beekeeper the other day:

1) new box on the old site

2) frame with the queen goes into this having removed any queen cells on that frame

3) if you have any empty comb to spare, put at least one in (the flying bees will need somewhere to dump their goodies, and otherwise you might still get more queen cells because they've no space). Otherwise foundation.

4a) reduce the queen cells to one in the old box (shake bees off but not the frame with the Q cell to be kept - shaking is risky - to make sure you miss none), OR

4b) reduce Q cells to two, leaving still open cells. Leave a week. Move the box to the other side of the original hive if you can. Flying bees join the old queen, box gets depleted, the bees will allow only one queen and she will not swarm due to the depletion, OR

4c) Split the old box into two boxes (or more) with one queen cell in each. Insurance against a failure of mating or hatching.

I tend to do 4c but the others are good too. If 4b then leave only open cells to guard against losing a cast with a virgin, and to make sure that there is a good grub inside the cells.

Doing the artificial swarm this way round ensures that the flying bees (the ones that could cause trouble) are queen-right and so well-tempered. The queenless part has few flying bees.

Also, there could be a risk that either part might starve in poor weather. Leave them honey stores, or feed, particularly if poor weather is forecast.

Any comments folks?

Gavin