Cut Outs

[SIMON WAKLEY]

Hi,

I would like to hear from anyone with experience of doing cut outs what are their successful actions etc. Specifically do you vacuum ALL the bees up, or try to leave as many on the brood as possible while putting into a frame. If you do vacuum them up, how soon do they need to go onto the brood afterwards. I would think as soon as possible. Do you seal up the hive for 48 hours afterwards (as I heard suggested on a youtube video). Do you put ALL the honey into the hive crushed up into a pan or??

Also I have a couple of friends who want to get rid of the bees in their house, but don’t want to have to do a cut out and repair all the damage (Older House – repair would be tricky and expensive). Anyone know of a good way to get out the hive WITHOUT a tap out or leaving all the honey behind.

[Mike Tornabane]

There are a lot of factors on how to do a cutout and work with the bees. You may not want to use a bee vac the first time as there can be a learning curve where they don’t make it. If it is indoors, you will most likely have to use it. You will want to get the bees off the comb so you can set it down, trimming it to size.You can brush or shake the bees into the box. I would not seal up the box for 48 hours. I may leave a small amount of honey comb for them to eat, but too much will attract ants and other colonies which will spook the bees possibly taking off.

I can have a look at your friend’s house and give them a proper assessment on what it would take to complete the job properly.

They can contact me 323-393-5058 -Mike

[susan rudnicki]

Simon—where are you located? I am the Forum moderator and have been doing cutouts for 7 years, since I was trained in the old BackwardsBeekeepers club. Kirk Anderson headed the club and is still my mentor. The first 2 years, as I learned and apprenticed with others, I did all my work with no vacuum and did not charge. When I did a huge wall cutout that took 2 days, and had no vac, I changed my mind about their usefulness. I now also charge for the work. I use a small bucket-type vac for smaller jobs and a large “blows the bees into a hive body” vac for big jobs. All the brood in the latter are framed up separately in another hive body. The vac box accepting the blown in bees has a plastic screen on top, between the vac motor and the bees and the suction can be modulated via a opening with a sliding door. It is very important not to use too much suction, which will damage the bees and suck up nectar inadvertently—both issues with survival. Once all the brood is framed with rubber band retentions around the frames to hold the combs upright (you want to place them in the box in the SAME order and orientation to vertical as they were in the original cavity) they can be stacked on the other box, and the plastic screen pulled out, allowing the bees below to naturally migrate up onto the brood again. I open the door way in the bottom box after awhile for returning bees to find their kin, and leave the boxes ON THAT SITE, strapped with ratchet straps, for at least two days. This gets everybody into the new hive. Close them up and transport only at NIGHT. You DO NOT seal them up for 48 hours, unless you wanna lose the returning foragers. The point with vacuuming up bees is to get them out of the way of being stepped on, drowning in the spilled honey, flying all over the neighborhood, or getting cut while you are trying to section the combs. Also, do not smoke the bees heavily prior to working—they can so gorge on honey that the vacuuming can cause them to internally rupture and die over a period of days afterward. They are only fierce the first 10 minutes or so. I often remove my gloves after that period so as to handle the combs/rubber bands easier. NO—there is no way to get the bees out of a cavity except by opening it. Poisoning leaves the honey/brood behind to rot and attract vermin, a trap-out also leaves that stuff behind. Lots of people don’t wanna do it right and open the wall, but the fact is, they are left with the structure in the wall if they do not—exterminators do not remove the structure unless they are paid EXTRA, by the way. If you have no experience or equipment, I highly recommend you get with someone who does—this is not for the amateur.

[SIMON WAKLEY]

Hi,

Glendale, CA.

Thanks to you both for your information. It does seem like there are several way to go bout it, but one of the points I was missing is to keep the comb all oriented the same way, I knew up had to be up, but I was not trying to keep it in order etc. I will try to keep as many bees on the comb as possible.

I was told to put all the hoey on a tray above the brood and the bees would put it back into comb, but that does seem to attract robber bees and you should certainly reduce the opening either way. Most wild bee hives have a TINY opening.

Leaving the bees on Site is also a good tip as I have always moved them and that’s possibly too many changes at one time.

Thanks

Simon

[susan rudnicki]

Simon—Unless the honey is in old darker, more rigid, comb, it will flow out of the cut combs and drown a lot of bees. I put it in zip-lock bags, smashed a bit, and slits cut into the top side with a razor blade. The bees will re-harvest it at their leisure without getting coated with it. Place the bags within a feeding shim (a med. hive body or a purpose built feeding shim) ON TOP of the top box of frames (where the brood should be) Bees naturally go UP in covering the brood. It is also important not to try to “economize” on the space in the frames by lining up brood combs in the frames, when they were “stacked” within the old occupancy. So, even if the broodcomb does not take up the whole frame, don’t be tempted to “puzzle piece” it in there. Bees need it “stacked” like the baffles on a radiator, for best thermoregulation.

[SIMON WAKLEY]

Hi,

I don’t quite follow the stacking you are talking about. The feral comb is often oddly shaped and rarely fits into the deep frames I have that well. I have puzzle pieced the offcuts together so I am not sure what I should or should not be doing.
If I put little pieces in frame, I will use up a LOT of frames and wind up with a lot of empty space – that’s OK?

I do have a 4″ high feeder langstrom frame which I now put some of the old comb into and place that above the brood. I have quite a bit of frozen honey waiting to be fed to my next hive. It’s got to be much better than sugar water.

[susan rudnicki]

Yes, it is hard to explain—but when you see the colony in situ, you know how the combs are usually hanging in the area with “bee space” between the multiple combs? Each of those combs is ideally placed in the same spaced relationship, or a series of hanging frames in the hive body. That’s what I mean by “stacked” Say a small cutout has only 4 combs, the size of your outstretched hand. You don’t wanna “line up” the combs in one frame or two frames, but make 4 medium frames hold one comb each, all stacked next to each other This is the original arrangement of the combs for thermal regulation—typically the brood toward the middle of the “stack” and the honey/nectar combs toward the “outside” for thermal insulation of the brood. Is that better?

[susan rudnicki]

In big colony cutouts, I try to make as few cuts as possible to the brood combs and use the right size frame for the combs. So, sometimes the frames are mixed mediums and deeps—no problem as long as you use a deep box. ALSO–one of my mentors showed me a cool way to secure the combs UP AGAINST the underside of the topbar, so you don’t have GAPS there—bees hate to fill in a gap at the top of the comb but readily extend down to the bottombar from a comb edge. The trick is to use small plastic zip ties as “tourniquets” around the rubber bands and stretch the band from the topbar side upward, to increase the pressure and keep the comb in contact with the topbar underside. It is hard to describe, much easier to see from a demo. Don’t know how to do that for you except maybe by phone Skype.

[Author]

Posts