Do you have any suggestions for keeping small secondary swarms hived once captured.
They leave with annoying consistency no matter how many times I re-hive them.
Hi
Keeping a swarm of bees in a hive cam sometimes be a challenge.
You say specifically 'secondary swarms' or casts. This is usually a small swarm which is issued by a large colony soon after the main swarm has left.
When bees decide to swarm they create a new queen, or often several new queens. Just before the new queen hatches, the old queen leaves the hive along with a large portion of the workers. The new queen hatches, flies out to mate, then returns to the hive to start laying eggs. If more than one new queen is allowed to hatch, a secondary swarm is produced. This cast, much smaller than a regular swarm, is lead by a virgin queen.
When the cast finds a new location the virgin queen has to fly out to mate with some drones before she can begin laying eggs.
I'm wondering whether, if you hive a swarm with a virgin queen, perhaps when the queen leaves the hive to mate, the workers all follow her in the same way they did when swarming.
When I hive a swarm, I like to try to simulate the action of a natural swarm as far as possible. I either put the hive on a board on the ground with the back raised, or put a board up to the entrance to create a ramp. Inside the box I
usually put a frame of drawn comb, including some honey if possible. I put a swarm lure inside or a few drops of lemon grass oil on the top bars. In fact I think the lemon grass oil may be more effective and is certainly a lot cheaper.
I dump the swarm on the board and allow the bees to run up the ramp into the hive entrance. Once the swarm is inside, you can gently lift the hive body and insert a queen excluder between the bottom of the box and the floor. The queen is then trapped inside. Since the swarm won't leave without her, the swarm is also physically prevented from leaving.
The queen excluder can be left on for perhaps a week, by which time the workers will have started to build honeycomb and very unlikely to leave. The excluder should then be removed to allow the drones to come and go as usual.
If you believe you have a cast with a virgin queen you should make sure you remove the queen excluder as soon as possible. I would only leave it for 3 or 4 days. This will allow the virgin queen to leave on her mating flight before she becomes too mature to mate successfully.
You might also make sure that ants or other pests are not able to enter the hive. In Southern California we have tiny black Argentine Ants which get into beehives sometimes and usually cause even established colonies to leave.
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