Greg Z from Mystic, CT writes:
"My plan of attack is to block all the entrances except the main entrance
at the top of the hive with silicone caulking...Now my questions...I imagine I
will need to put a queen into the hive I plan to set on the step.  When should
I add this queen?  How long should I leave the hive on the step to ensure I
have most of the hive?  ...will the bees ever stop emerging...? ...having the
bees actually "rob" the honey out of the old hive.  How is this done?"
 
I can't say I'm an expert in this area, but I have read about how to do it,
"heard" comments on it from other posters on this list, and have a few ideas
based on my current experience of doing it right now (in process).  I used
"Great Stuff" foam insulation rather than silicone caulking, but I suppose
either should work.  Another alternative would just be to cover the extra holes
with small pieces of screen.  The important point is to have no bees coming or
going out except by one entrance (the main one is probably as good a choice as
any).  Posters to this list have suggested putting frames with drawn comb and
or foundation in the hive body and then introducing a queen to it after they
start getting it built up.  What I did was what was suggested in Eva Crane's
book (I think the title is "Bees and Beekeeping: science, practice, and world
resources") and that was to put one or two frames with a laying queen as a
nucleus hive for the other bees to join.  Things seem to be going fine with
that setup.  In other words, I started out with a queen there already and just
a couple of frames of bees, the rest being empty/foundation.  The recommended
time to leave the hive in place was about 6 weeks.  That would give you time to
go through about two generations of workers, and since no new nectar or pollen
would be coming in, the queen should decrease laying during that time.  The
colony numbers should then be low (in theory) and not able to protect their
stores from robbing.  Posters to this site have suggested bringing in a
different hive at the end to do the "robbing" of the stores left in the wall.
The book said you can just take off the one-way exit cover and let the hive you
have in place do the robbing.  I think either way will probably work, but have
not yet decided exactly how I will do it.  I'll make that decision when I come
to it.  With bees robbing, fighting and stinging, I'd say there is a good
chance that the old queen will be killed in the melee.  If not, then there will
be no stores or sufficient workers to recover, and the remaining bees should
starve and die out.  When the hive has been robbed out with little or no
remaining brood (in theory) then it should be possible to seal all entrance
holes and have little to worry about, especially since you have a garage you're
dealing with.  Otherwise, the wax comb might melt and stain the walls if the
temperature is hot.  Those are just some of my thoughts.  My "experiment" seems
to be working.  I'll bet there are several ways it could be done and probably
they would all work.  Good luck and have fun.
 
Layne Westover
College Station, Texas