Guilfordbeekeepers.org

I offered to perform my first trap-out for a neighbor this past week, who had a colony move in to an outside porch column. The hole was created by a woodpecker about 12' off the ground. We "think" the bees have only been in there since earlier this spring...

I watched every YouTube video I could find and read/watched Wally's amazing guide here on the forum! Here's where I'm at:

This is basically day 4. I'm only seeing one or two bees leave the cone every 5 min or so. They have stopped making any attempt to poke around and try to find another entrance. As of yesterday, the bees had filled 3-4 medium frames in the 5-frame nuc, so I added another nuc on top (with a frame of resources), but I have not removed any frames to look for the queen or see if they've started turning one of the EGGS I gave them into a new queen. They have clearly accepted the box I gave them and are bringing pollen directly into it now.

So... I'm impatient, but don't want to take the box down too soon. At what point can I remove and replace with another box? If this colony originated as a swarm earlier this spring, I can't imagine it's very substantial or has a big population still in the column.

Since I can't figure out how to make my photos small enough to post directly, here's a link to my Google album if anyone's interested (let me know if this method works out): https://photos.app.goo.gl/XXdZbc97qnLBHbg26

What % of a colony are foragers? In 4 days, you have only caught foragers. Any house bees and developing eggs and larva are still in the column. You will have bees coming out for a MINIMUM of 5 weeks and my personal maximum is 11 weeks. I would check the eggs you put in there for queen cells between 5 and 10 days after install. No later.

Thanks for the feedback! If no queen cells on the frame I gave them (and assume no queen from the original colony) after 5-10 days, is it best to introduce another frame of eggs, or go ahead and introduce a new, mated queen?

That "IF" is a 5% chance, but if it happens, you can do either. If you have a favorite queen you want to breed from, use her eggs, If you want to diversify your stock, buy a mated queen and introduce.

Update on my trap-out: I opened the box this weekend on day 7. Found a solid 5-6 frames of bees and at least 4 queen cells on the original egg frame I had given them!

I took this box down and immediately replaced it with another (waited until the next day to come back and introduce a frame of eggs to it). In just the one day, there was already a frame and a half of bees.

So far, this trap-out seems to be working out as planned. Pretty exciting way to get "free" bees and start multiple new colonies!

Unless you have more than one queen you want to raise from, you can just move a couple q cells from the frame and place in the new catch box. It will put you a week ahead on the second box.

Well, consider this second box in the uncooperative 5%! I checked it today at Day 6, and there is not a single queen cell on the frame I gave them. There are 4+ frames of bees,and I decided to introduce a mated queen to them rather than transfer another frame of eggs from a donor hive.

Although I didn't check every frame since I was 12' up the ladder, only later did I wonder if the reason they didn't build queen cells was maybe because the original queen had left the column and was in the box... I guess I'll see in a few days.

Side note: I also noticed a pretty strong fermented-honey smell from the base of the column, so I assume this means the SHBs are taking over the original hive? If so (even though it's only been 2 weeks), is it out of the question that the queen would have already absconded?

It's never out of the question, since the bees don't read the rule book, but if it happened, I would think she would keep on going with a handful of workers, rather than go in the box.

Final update: this trap-out ended up starting two new colonies for me. After a total of around 5 weeks, I just pulled the second box off and moved it to its permanent home. I took down the cone and covered the entrance in the column with 1/2" hardware cloth - to let bees in to rob it out while keeping birds and critters out.