> >SO naturally I do not want to look thru this hive for a queen.  What is the
> >quickest way to flush out a bad queen in a mean hive without pulling apart
> >their home? ...
 
> ... On advice from a queen breeder, I turned the mean hive at 45 degree angle and placed another hive
> so the entrance was where the mean hive had been.  The new hive was stocked
> with unsealed and sealed brood with attendant bees  and a quiet queen - it
> does not have to be very strong as it will immediately be reinforced with
> all the foraging bees from the mean hive.  However all bees raised from then
> on will be descendants of the new queen and the hive seems to quieten down
> almost immediately.  You are left with a mean hive with only the nurse bees
> and the queen.  After a week, it is usually possible to work through this
> hive and locate the queen quickly and kill her...
 
All this advice is right on the money, but I should mention that the bees
*must be flying freely in considerable numbers* (without stopping to
circle when coming and going) for these ideas to work.  This usually means
a flow is on.
 
Otherwise, the bees will not drift into the new hive.  They will just come
back into the old hive no matter where you put it!
 
Such circumstances are less ideal, but here are some more ideas:
 
Smoking just before dusk (use a teaspoonful of 34-0-0 fertilizer in the smoker if
necessary) and quickly breaking the hive up into several one box hives,
each on a temporary floor of its own, may calm them down enough that each
part can be checked quickly for a queen the next day.  (Don't put any of
the splits exactly where the parent hive was).  Smaller hives are usually
much friendlier and are also much easier to check for a queen.  If you
find her the next day, you can kill her and introduce a laying queen in a
mailing cage and re-assemble the whole hive the way it was before.
 
In the worst case it will become obvious in 3 or 4 days at most where the
the queen is.  At that later time you will have to decide whether queen
cells are now established in the splits and how best to recombine the
parts.
 
Allen