Native rescue and split of a dual queen

Hey hey! Been a while I know...

I was called out to an older gentleman's home month ago to inspect his Tetragonla hockinsi hive on fears that they have perished. Sadly they had. His hive was completely destroyed by small hive beetle (SHB), an invasive pest here in Australia brought over with the European honey bee. 

Australia's native bees do have ways of defending themselves against SHB by smothering invaders with sticky resins once they enter the hive. Older and more experienced hives are also better able to defend their entrances against SHB, however this doesn't help in the short term.  This is how new or inexperienced hives can be quickly devastated and overrun, despite how healthy they may initially be.

The good news is SHB in the Northern Tropics of Queensland tend to be more seasonal due to our extended periods of drought.  Once our periods of rain occur however, these little turds will stop at nothing to pick on our poor native bees.

In any case the gentleman I visited was in need of a new hive. He had made a native hive box himself out of reclaimed and untreated timber and I was lucky enough to have a hive myself on standby that was harboring two queens in a single hive.  This is not a common occurrence however the two queens were getting along just fine sharing workers and resources. You can see in the image below the two distinct brood clumps, both at different stages.

 

Since these little creatures were going into a new home they would need a little extra help defending their entrance. Usually i do this by inserting a small piece of U bend pipe into the entrance however I had run out of the right size during the time of the split, so I made an artificial one on the inside instead using some cerumen (native bee wax) I had cleaned and stored from previous rescues.

By making a temporary tube like this, the tiny bees have a smaller and elongated entrance to help defend their new home whilst cleanup and construction happens in the rest of the hive.

 

I also poured a thin layer of melted cerumen over the inside of the hive and squished a few larger droplets of wax randomly around to help give them something to build on and also some resources to use while they settle in.

Both halves of one brood was transferred into the new hive box along with some pollen pots in one corner and honey pots in the opposite corner. Unlike their southern counterparts, hockinsi in the tropics tend to prefer to have separated honey and pollen pots. The reason for this is still unclear however here we are with a few weeks rations of food and pollen with little spills. I only gave a small amount as both hives will be swapped daily to share workers while repairs occur over the next week or two. This will help boots immediate numbers, reduce clean-up time and give the new hive a little boost while the new hive grows.

After 3 days the little bees have almost entirely cleaned up their entrance hole and have reasonably defended their new home. Once the new hive has enough numbers without the support of the original, i will be sending these little critters to their new gorgeous home, where no doubt they will be cared for. I will be checking on them every few months just to make sure they grow and become a healthy and strong hive.

Just to finish the day, my chickens got a frozen yogurt treat to beat the heat! The good little girls kept away from my natives while I was doing the transfer so they definitely deserved a cool reward.

(left to right) Gremlin, Kiev, Schnitzel and Parmigiana