🚫Swarm Cells!! How we STOP Early Swarms!! 

Hello Kamon, You made reference to the propolis on the rebates of your hive walls. As a UK beekeeper of over 60 years, all my hives ( Modified Dadants ) have the rebates 1/4" to 5/16" deeper, with an aluminium metal strip set for the frames to run on, giving beespace above and below the lugs. You won't believe how much better this is for quick inspections, as it allows the whole block of frames can be levered across the hive by your hive tool against the aginst the frame side bars. I hope I don't offend, but you seem to work hard by standing end on to the frames, whereas, standing to the side of the hive, you can leaver the frames apart much easier. The other thing I do, is I always use a division board in place of the last frame in the brood boxes. This makes it very easy to pull this board first and then you can slide half of the frames apart to quickly inspect the brood, and experience will let you get a very good idea what the stock is doing, by just lifting two or three frames. Kind regards, Tony Marsh.

I can't remember when I heard "fiddle-faddle" in a month of Sundays... Great video.

I just did this yesterday so it makes me feel like I’m headed in the right direction. Only one hive beetle spotted. Great camera work “L”, Thanks for the video.

Spent most of the day yesterday doing just that. Made several splits. Thanks for sharing!

First let me say Thanks for wearing a suit sometimes. My husband is Highly allergic and sees other guys wearing tank tops. Anaphylaxis isn't fun. Enough said. This video is has been great because in NW Georgia I opened my hives the end of February to fine packed boxes and swarm cells. Took me back I'll tell you. Wasn't looking for that this time of year. Emotional wreck. Elated to see they all wintered but one. But what do I do now, Holy Smokes. The videos you are making now are really helping me a lot. Thanks Kamon, much appreciated.

Can you tell us what you did with the nuc box. Add a queen, queen cell, let them make their own? What was in the frames you put in it? I Need to be doing this with in the next month. Thanks

Thanks for sharing kamon. I really appreciate you and your team showing and teaching us.

Great video! It's good to see Great beekeepers in real bee suits. Do you have new queens ready to go into those splits? Could you have used a frame with a couple of those big swarm cells in the nuc for them to requeen themselves?

Great video! And I love your use of professional terms such as “fiddle faddle”. 😂👌🏽

K&L, thanks again for another great video! I think we all have this issue to work on in the South. The cold days keeps us at bay then we get a warm day and there they go if we aren’t on top of them. I wish someone would invent a feed supplement that would take the swarm out of them! lol

I'm always amazed how strong your colonies look. Being in KY I can usually gauge what my bees are doing within a week of you all posting your videos. God bless

Hey there Kamon & Laurel, This question may be very clear to you, but here I go. What will you do with all the bees you shook In to the nuc box? We have a hive showing these same signs with queen cells. We are starting our second year and have not dealt with strong spring hives until now. My husband and I are really enjoying the bees together, but so much to learn! We really enjoy your videos and live in NC in the mountains , so we feel your information is very helpful! Thanks!

Great video! Very professional and knowledgeable. I am still somewhat of a new beekeeper with two mature hives going. I just did a bee removal of a small swarm on the side of a neighbors house for for hive #3 and they are doing good so far. I cant believe how strong your colonies were for so early in the spring. Thanks again and greetings from Central Texas.

Thanks for the video again. Not a problem watching as always. :) So... almost like a kind of Demaree Method reduction (kinda). And yes a great queen always trumps a king drawn comb frame.

Nice presentation. I was taught years ago never to cut out queen cells and to move the queen and a box to a new location. I'm glad to see that a swarm can be curved if swarm cells are being built. I'm in Southeaster Pennsylvania. With the wacky weather this spring (usually is) I finally got into the hives a little bit today. Food is fine but they are busting with bees. Plenty of Drone in capped stages too. I'll be checking the weather to see if I can get into the colonies again this week just to be sure there are no swarm cells developing. We really don't have a flow, so I'm not too concerned just yet. I didn't see any sign of an impulse. I did add more boxes for her to expand out.

Kamon! You rock, I always learn something from your post. Going to miss you this year at the CCBA conference, you are the most adorable beeK (even over the Canuk lol)

Up here in PA, but seeing the same thing! I think I am going to go the "split" route as I could still use a couple of colonies. Winter was warm, didn't lose any, but ended up with a super weak one and a drone layer (doing some combines.) Queens are not easy to find this early, so crossing my fingers and doing "walk-away" splits, leaving the queen cells in the new boxes. Great video as always!

Great tutorial as always.

Great binformation guys.....

Olá Mr. Kamon! Excelente video. Parabéns pelo Excelente trabalho e é bom quando tudo corre como o planeado. Saudações Apicolas de Portugal.

I had questions going through the video but you answered them all by the end of the video except for the queen for the nuc but you answered that in the replies. Great video.👍

Great information Thanks for sharing

Thanks for this video 😊

Really great video. Thank you, I learned a lot.

We are a full month ahead of where we typically are, so did this last month with a lot of scramble-prep. I always get concerned about chilled brood when reducing the population.

Thanks !!

Great video. 👌

Thanks Kamon!

Excellent video and I liked how you reduced the population and scrapped the bottom of the frames. Great ideas Kaymon! What are your plans with the bees you shook in the nuc?

Great video

Good job thanks for the videos I’m in ky helps plan the next 7 days

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Hi Kamon, great video! Love your hives, because I do mine the same , I love the rustic look!😂 I'm interested to know what you would of done if you didn't spot the queen? ( I'm sure that's a rare event! ) Are your splits going to initially produce their own queen or have you already got cells/ queens? .. . Cheers Peter

I have been removing queen and swarm cell since March 9. Colonies I split on the 9th and removed all queen and brood frames made more and had to split again same colony on 25th of march.

Good stuff

Haha my wife came by at the end of the video and said is that Kamon what's he doing in a suit.

That propolis on the end frame bar is a pita!

Question for you... what kind, size and length nail do/should you use to build frames? I have a framing jig but not sure what size nails to use to assemble the frames or how many to put where? I'll be nailing by hand with a hammer.

nice phat brood

what a great video!! so well done!! man...nice looking colony!! So the whole once queen cells are capped bees are going to swarm might also be fiddle fiddle? ;)

you’re welcome for the video. 😉

Hey Kamon. Thanks for your video. They are always very informative. I do have a question about the hive you featured. I thought that a major catalyst for swarming was a hive that had limited space for the queen to lay eggs. The hive you highlighted seemed to have a good deal of space although there were a lot of bees. Can you clarify for me?

My 5th year at queen rearing. 1st time problem. Grafted 30 cells. Harvested to incubator when capped. Cups were full of royal jelly. Only 18 were finished. Placed in nucs 2 days before emergence. Pulled out today. Only 3 out of 9 emerged after 2 days later. The others were still capped with a dried up pupae inside. Still plenty of royal jelly in cup. Incubator was set at 93-94 deg. Had to be something I did to have that many bad. Any thoughts will be appreciated. Thanks.

You mentioned that getting rid of some of those drones may also help with varroa, but did you inspect that discarded drone brood for varroa?

Surprised you use a 2 gal framed feeder with temps in the 50s.

Swarms and more swarms. Ahhhh!

Hi Kamon, I had a colony preparing to swarm, found 1 capped cell…. I decided to pinch the parent queen(mainly due to the nasty temperament of the colony. Shook off all frames to inspect for other cells, what do you think about this move?

Ha Kamon I was told that they do not swarm untill 1-3 days before the swarm q emerages now that was new to me ever since I have been a bee keeper I have read and watched youtube videos, that say that as soon as the swarm cell is capped they swarm what say ye thanks have a blessed day

2 questions why do we not want Queen cells in the the Box that you shook the bees into and what are you going to do with the bees? You shook into the Box thank you.

Hello Tennessee, I have two Questions. What are you going to do with the bees you shook off? And second question, if the swarm impulse continues in that colony would you consider doing another split and taking that queen with that split?

Hello !! Do we have to wait until there are swarm cells to do a split if we don’t have a queen to give the split ? We have a booming hive this April and we’d love to split it. There may be queen cells when we inspect this weekend, but in case there aren’t… can we split and the new hive will make a queen ?? Or do we need to give them a queen / a good queen cell? We may not be able to wait for your next live chat ! Thank You

Kamon: it appears that you shook the bees off a frame from one hive into a nuc box with another frame from a different hive . Can you mix bees from different hives like that? Can I supplement a weaker hive with a couple of frames from a stronger hive? Thanks

"we're gonna need to do some editing anyways", leaves clip in anyways :)

so can u just do single brood chamber and shake n look for queen cells and prevent swarming

Just curious Kamon, could you make a split by moving the queen with some non queen cell frames to a new box and leave the the others behind to make a new colony.

I want to encourage swarming. I use two deep boxes and I need to switch to one deep and one medium due to lifting restrictions. Would less space encourage swarming in the early Spring?

Had to do just that the last couple of weeks.

When should I start thinking I need to replace the queen? I have a really large Queen that is not laying a very good pattern at this point in the season. Honey flow is not on yet in Arkansas I am probably 10 days away. Am I worried too early or should I wait till the flow to determine if the queen needs to be replaced? All info is appreciated. Have a Good Day.

Was going to pose the same question until I saw this post... maybe the frames in the small box had eggs of the correct age to where they could raise their own queen? But then why not just leave a few already raised queen cells.... this new beek is kind of confused. I'm in a similar situation: seemingly overcrowded yet mine don't have queen cells (yet). Should I add a third box and pyramid? Or add a super? In my area, tallows already have candles... or should I shake a few frames of bees into a nuc box like Kamon did and donate 2 frames of brood in all stages and hope they raise their own queen? Any suggestions/help would be appreciated. Thanks from a new beek in the Houston (TX) area.

You said in 5 days you'd check it and knock it down to a single box and add honey supers. So you split the hive in 2 and add honey super to both of those?? Why not just run 2 deeps? Personal preference?? Thanks in trying to learn

What would happen if you took one of those queen cells & put it into an bee'less new broodbox?

Hello by what I could see it still looked like there was lots of room for her to lay . Ya there was GOING to be a bunch hatching out real soon . With all that room to lay would that still cause them to swarm or was that one because of over crowding an not needing room . Another question I have a few hives I am wanting to change into single brood management this honey season ( now ) . My comb is now into its second season on these hives I am wanting to try . Is that comb to old to change them into honey supers. ?? THANKS

Why would you cut your hive to a singe deep before putting the honey supers on top as you mentioned? Would a double deep full of bees not produce more honey than a single?

Can you keep a hive from ever swarming if you always crush the queen cells/swarm cells?

Hello Kaymon, first i will appreciate if you could write the name of the music you've put. Second i noticed here in Lebanon that we get a swarmy year then the next year bees have a Little less swarm instinct and after it again another swarmy year. I'm wondering if you've noticed something like this.

What do you use in your smoker to make it have smoke this long?

👌👌👌👌👌👌

Never mind saw your answer. Below,. Thx

Kamon, could you have taken another 2 frames of brood away and held them off for an extra week or two? Seems like a lot of work to keep pulling brood every 5 days to a week. Bob Binnie often takes them down to a certain level to get them to peak after the honey flow. But hey, those bees look fabulous and ready to make you some honey-money soon.

I wonder if a person can check mites by using all that drone cone?

Do you have a recipe list for your pollen stuff

Some say once they get into swam mode that even with all your tricks, they go ahead with it. Seems that it basically a roll of the dice. Your just trying to use a load set.

Are you putting one of your grafted queens in that nuc? Or you just putting them in a weaker hive?

Is that the normal # of shakes you do to make a nuc?

During times of swarm tendency is it ok to checking hives more than once a week?

What will happen with the split?

How do you know there getting ready to swarm or just attempting to raise a queen to replace the old one that might have died? I have a hive that has a bunch of queen cells but I’m not finding the queen and I’m not seeing any new eggs.

cant you put the frame with queen cells in nuc with extra bees for a split

Why don't you want queen cells in your splits? Seems like you'd be one step ahead if they already have wet queen cells to make a new queen and hive.

What if you had found capped queen cells

i need those queen cells . Got some nasty..i mean Nasty bees.

Pov: the bee is attacking and the keeper is smoking your face

keep posting

Why didn’t you just split it? You found and isolated the queen, you have plenty of brood, plenty of bees, and queen cells.

What do you do with the extra frames you put in the nuke