How to split a colony

How to Split a colony using a top bar hive

By Isaac Semwanga

Hello fellow beekeepers, thank you very much for supporting God’s creation by hiving his creatures.  Bees are the only insects that make food (honey) for human beings! And we hardly exist on earth for long if bees varnish! They help human beings by pollinating crops as well as store honey (food and medicine) for man.

Of course there are crops (such as Vanilla) that don’t need bees for pollination but man wish bees would do the job because it is hectic!

Splitting bees

Splitting a colony is the only way beekeepers in Nakasongola (Wampiti in particular) can get new colonies for the empty hives since swarms are becoming less and less.  

Yes, swarms would colonise empty hives during swarming seasons but this stopped because honey hunting is no more (this involved destroying nests and the bees had to look for new nests and end up taking hives), colony management is high (some beekeepers don’t allow there bees to swarm), and bee population is declining!

Currently, members don’t have skills for rearing queens and there are no packed bees which one can buy and install in the new hive.

Therefore the only alternative for natural swarms to colonise beehives is to split existing colonies in order to get new colonies for empty hives.

For the past 2 years, members have been trying out this method but with limited success of 1 out of 10. With effect of considerations like moving combs with clinging bees, combs with eggs, pollen, larva and some honey bees still don’t last long in the new beehive! Well some bees are patient enough to eat the sugar syrup or honey you provide to them before absconding!

From my own experience, I have had success with 8 hives out of 10. I am going to illustrate my procedure of splitting hive below.

Although African bees are known for absconding so easily, but they don’t easily abscond from a hive they have lived for some good time. Yet they can easily abscond from a new hive!

Selecting and maintaining good traits of bees

Bees have characters that line up following each generation and this linage can be maintained if followed up closely by splitting the bees.

Some bees collect and store honey than others while others rear babies much more compared to honey stored. Some are docile and easy to work with. Other bees don’t easily abscond.

Procedures followed in splitting a colony

Before you plan to split a colony, please consider the following;

• 1.       Strength or size of the colony. Always split strong big colonies which have enough nurse bees, nectar/ pollen and brood
• 2.       Season. Never split a colony during dearth period. Make sure there are abundant flowers for nectar and usually the colony should be on the buildup stage.
• 3.       Presence of queen cells. This ensures that the bees themselves were planning to swarm in the near future therefore your coming-in just helps you to take the swarm into your hive directly before the bees fly away from your apiary.
• 4.       Presence of eggs and young larva. The bees can feed the larva and breed a queen in the newly created hive from the hatched eggs or larva.
• 5.       Smoke the new hive with wax or propolis to give it a nice scent. You can also rub the hive body with lemon grass just give the new hive a nice smell.

Splitting exercise

Bring the empty hive close to the old colonized hive

Transfer 2-4 bars full of brood and eggs

Transfer 2 bars with honey

Transfer one bar with pollen

Arranging the bars in the new hive

Just leaving 2 empty bars at the side of the entrance, install 1 bar with honey and pollen, install 1 bar with honey followed by brood (eggs and larva) and then 1 bar with honey.

Leave 4 empty bars following the last honey bar then install a follower board or anything you use to reduce on the size of the hive.

Move the old hive with old colony into a new spot and then install the new hive with a new colony into the old spot. This helps the new colony to collect more bees from the field to increase the population.

Considerations.

• Use less or no smoke. To avoid driving bees off the combs yet you need them into the new hive.
• Do the splitting activity late in the day when more bees are back in the hive. This ensures more bees being transferred into the new hive.
• Always move combs or bars with clinging bees to ensure that there are enough nursing bees in the new hive.
• If during your transfer, you never had a queen cell on any of the combs, you can help the bees choose a cell to make a queen by expanding two cells with newly hatched eggs. This helps the bees so much.
• Honey combs installed on both sides act as blankets for the larva. Always ensure that you have got enough bees in the new hive which will sit on the combs usually with larva and warm them.

Note:

Transferring old colony

Since the bees are used to their hive, they will not think about absconding from their hive too soon even if you change their location.

Bees in the new hive

Since the bees are in a new hive with no queen, they need something keeping them secure. Therefore leaving them in the old location, helps them to continue their daily work as usual; going into fields and coming back without losing their spot. And they don’t lose any bee from their population since all bees know the location and surprisingly, more bees can join them from the old hive when they mistakenly fly back to the old location! This helps on building more strength to the new hive.

Always provide the new bees with a small space which they can warm and guard well.

Never forget to share with us your experience!

Keep the bees buzzing!