John Lewis wrote:
>
>A neighbor has a feral hive within the wall of his house. He wants it
>removed and I would like to capture it with its queen. My only other
>attempt at capturing a feral hive was a complete disaster.
>
>It would be appreciated if someone could share some techniques, hints and
>anecdotes on how to capture feral hives in trees, walls, etc.
 
We do remove feral hives as a service to neighbours but within cavity walls
is a a difficult proposition.  There are techniques such as one-way passages
to close off re-entry but to capture the queen and hive you must expose the
brood comb and cut it out as gently as possible.  This must be attached to
wired frames (I use a length of string wound around and tied, others
recommend rubber bands).  The frames with brood can be placed in your hive.
If you do not disturb the bees greatly you may locate the queen and if she
is confined to your hive box and all unsealed brood removed you do not have
to worry too much about straggler bees.  There is no point in transferring
sealed or unsealed honey comb to the box - better to give them a well drawn
frame to hasten the replenishment of the population.
 
The difficulty arises if you do not find the queen and are left with a mass
of bees in the wall space.  To enable them to settle you must place your
hive box so that they will enter at the same place they previously entered
their hive.  If this can be achieved the hive can be left to settle for a
day or so and then removed at night when all the bees are in.
 
We no longer remove bees from cavity walls because of the high failure rate
in getting the hive box in the preferred position and because of the
demolition work necessary to get access to the comb.
 
Betty McAdam
HOG BAY APIARY
Penneshaw, Kangaroo Island
j.h. & e. mcadam<[log in to unmask]
http://kigateway.eastend.com.au/hogbay/hogbay1.htm