# Walk-away Splits



## Ernie (Jul 22, 2007)

Now that the dandelions are in full bloom, I'm getting read to do a walk-away split here in the next week or so. 

The hive I'm anticipating splitting has swarmed on me two years running around the first of June. They always build up their population very fast and strong and it's an old hive. At least four years old but probably older. 

The split will be conducted by simply moving one of the full deeps to another location (approximately 200 yards away and facing a different angle). I'll replace it with an empty. I'll then feed both hives for about 3 weeks to help them along. 

An advice y'all can give me on this? I've had trouble with this process in the past.


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## Michael Bush (Oct 26, 2008)

If the brood is fairly evenly distributed between the two deeps this may work fine. The problem is it may not be. With four eight frame mediums I often use this method as the brood is usually in about three of the boxes, insuring that a good amount makes it to each side of the split. If you WANT the hive 200 yards away, that's fine, but there is NO advantage to putting it 200 yards away. I'd put it next door. Or, if you have a place 2 MILES a way, you could put it there.


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## Ernie (Jul 22, 2007)

Are you saying that 200 yards isn't enough to prevent them from returning to the old hive?


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## Michael Bush (Oct 26, 2008)

No. 200 yards will make no difference at all. Either face them both to the old lcoation or shake some extra bees in the new location. Put the hive wherever you want it to be.


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## Ernie (Jul 22, 2007)

Hrm. I wonder if that's why my splits had trouble last year. They seemed to start out ok but within a few weeks one of them was already foundering and the other didn't survive the winter.

So what other tricks might I do (other than moving them 2 miles away) to increase the success of this venture?

Thanks for your advice, by the way.


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## Michael Bush (Oct 26, 2008)

The most straight forward way is to shake extra bees in the hive at the new location. The simplest is to set two bottom boards facing the old location and put the two halves there so the bees don't know which one to go back to.

www.bushfarms.com/beesplits.htm


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## Ernie (Jul 22, 2007)

Your website looks like a WEALTH of information. Thanks for the link. I'll go browse and see if I can get a better understanding of what you're saying.

I'm at that point where I'm trying to go from a guy who has a couple of hives to a commercial beekeeper and it's really a struggle. I'm finding that my knowledge isn't suitable for larger scale activities.


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## talkingamoeba (Aug 18, 2007)

My 2 cents- each part needs to have eggs or young larva, unless you know which half has the queen, the queenless part will need larva or eggs to raise a queen.


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