You may have a beehive that is always cross.  Every time you try to work with it, the bees sting you.

You should do something about it.  First you should make sure that there isn’t something that is making the bees cross.  Maybe:

• some livestock are bothering the hive
• a tree branch is blowing against the hive
• ants that are attacking the bees,
• they have lost their queen
  

1. Keep Good Records: Record:

   • when your bees are cross,
   • when you get stung, or when your bees try to sting you.
   •  which hive(s) are the cross one(s).

   If it is always the same hives that are cross, then you can do something about it.  Some honeybees are more defensive or cross than others.  This is a characteristic that is usually inherited.  Some bees are cross because their parents were cross.  The easiest way to change the characteristics of your bees is to re-queen.   Remember, she is the mother of every bee in the hive.
2. Introduce a new queen:  The first step is to kill the queen from the cross hive.  Then introduce the new queen as described in Topic 13.  The best idea is write in your book which hive is cross and when you find a capped swarm cell in another hive, use it to re-queen the cross hive.
3. Give Eggs:  The first step is to kill the defensive queen.  If you have a new queen or capped queen cells, then wait 24 hours and introduce her as you learned in Topic 13.  If you don’t have a new queen to give your hive, wait 4 days after killing the queen and go back to your hive and destroy any queen cells your bees have started.  This is to make sure that your bees don’t raise a daughter from the defensive queen.  Now take a frame of eggs and young larva from one of your quiet hives.  Brush all of the bees off of it and put this frame in the middle of the brood box in your cross hive.  Mark the frame so you can find it again.  Check it carefully 2 to 3 days later to make sure the bees have started to raise a new queen.  This one will be a daughter from your gentle or quiet queen.  After 6 weeks to 2 months all of the bees in the hive will be her daughters.  It should not be cross any more.