-
Hi everyone,
I've been checking my hives on warm days over the last month. All is going well, with brood production picking up as the month has passed. Except for one.
This hive has a fall queen in it, and has no brood. The queen is there, but no brood. I've fed sugar syrup, and pollen substitute. To no avail. I've even put a frame of brood from another hive in, but nothing seems to help. So maybe someone here can help me. The hive is very very strong. I do have a small hive that I've brought through the winter that I can combine with this one if it comes to it. Either way I need to do something so the hive will be ready for the main flow in the next month.
Thanks
Billy Bob
-
If the queen is there and not laying it's because the bees and that queen because of some combination of genetics and weather etc. have decided not to make brood yet. If they had and the queen was fertile you'd have mostly worker brood. If they did and the queen was NOT fertile there would be lots of drone brood.
Is this queen any different in genetics from your other hives?
I don't know the normal seasons in your area.
IMPOV, if the hive is strong and has a queen I'd give her more time to start laying. If it's weak, I'd kill that queen and combine it with another weak hive that has some brood. Of course if she's laying a lot of drone or the hive is failing in general I'd replace her.
Combining it right now won't make more bees. There are plenty of bees in your other hives to raise the brood that's in them. Giving one of them the bees in this hive doesn't get you more brood, and if the queen DOES start laying (or would have) then combining resulted in less brood. Giving them some time doesn't cost you anything.
If you give her more time and the first flowers are blooming and she's not making brood, I'd requeen.
If it's timing you're worried about, and this hive is strong and if you can get queens shipped right now, you could buy a queen and split that hive with the new queen. That way you have some brood and then if the other half of the hive (with the old queen) doesn't start raising brood you can combine it with the split.
-
try spliting hive in half make sure both have about same amount of brood and honey kill old queen put one half on weak hive order queen for other half put newspaper between weak hive and half added make sure to order queen ahead of time
-
Bill bob, you stated that the hive is very very strong,so the queen must of been laying before,has she got plenty of room above her to lay in?.as long as they are strong this time of year I don't think you have much to worry about.I've seen them stop laying for awhile then go back & do fine something may have happened,what kind of feeder are you using? if they are being robbed hard by another hive that may stop her for awhile.there can be a number of things.I've even heard that a lot of lighting & thunder,would stop her for a while, don't know if there is anything to that are not,but sometime they just do what we don't want them to do.
-
Sounds like a 'sterile' queen.Unless she was a virgin I'd kill her as quick as I could get a replacement.Without brood your hive will go downhill so fast it aint funny.
---Mike
-
Thanks,
When I checked the hive last year (in Oct.) she had 4 to 5 frames of brood. In the 3rd week of Jan. of this year there was none...no worker, drone...none. As I have checked over the next 5 weeks still none.
I have another hive from the same line and she has 4 1/2 frames of brood as of today.
Its been a warm Feb. with plenty of pollen comming in. Some of the Braford pairs are going to be blooming by next week.
The box is strong, and I can give her more time, but every hive I have has some brood in it.
-
Get a queen NOW/ASAP. If you have pollen coming in and the other hives have brood, all the triggers are there for her to be laying. Only reason for her not to lay lie within her, not the weather, the food, etc. Find her, kill her, wait 24 hrs., then introduce new queen in cage with candy in release hole.
-
I wouldnÂ’t split the hive, kill the queen and put a comb with eggs from your best colony in the middle from this hive. Mark the frame and after 10 days control this frame and remove all queen cells without one. The queen will hatch after 17 days and 14 days more you can control the colony again and they should have eggs.
This works ONLY if your other hives have already DRONES FLYING.
If you combine this colony with a weak colony it dos not solve the problem, it mast be a reason why the colony is weakÂ… most a poor queen.
Are you 100% sure there are no brood in the STRONG hive? Normally the colony canÂ’t be so strong anymore without brood (young bees) for a long time. Remember it takes 21 day for the last bees to hatch and you sad the 3rd week of January there were no brood in the hive. This means more than 6 weeks without brood and more than 9 weeks without any eggs.
-
I agree with beeman. You have one month until your flow starts and you need 40 days to get your numbers up for a good crop. The $15 bucks will be made up in honey.
Re-queen quick!
Bill
