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Lost Queens

2K views 2 replies 1 participant last post by  steve 
#1 ·
I am new to bee keeping and have two hives. I lost both queens and by the time I realized what was going on I had little capped brood left. Okay, duh. I suspected Varroa mites as I saw no evidence of swarming and the hives are packed with bees, honey, and pollen, but no few capped cells and no eggs. One hive had a supercedure cell that had not hatched.

I confirmed Varroa mites with the ether test and added Apistan strips. I ordered new queens, but I’m wondering how this will work. Assuming there are no supercedure queens hatching and no laying workers, can I add these queens with any success? What about nurse bees for the new larva assuming the queen takes? Since nurse bees are the early part of the worker’s life, will they be too old by the time the new queen starts laying?

Any help is highly appreciated.

Steve
 
G
#2 ·
Hi Steve,

Do you know why the queens were lost? Was it because of varroa? Read up on FGMO for varroa control. It's not organic, but it's better than apistan.

The new queens should be ok to add. Leave them in the queen cages and let the workers free them. Should take 24 to 48 hrs to do it.
Don't worry about the older bees. They may not be as good at the jobs that younger bees do, but they can still do it.

Billy Bob
 
#3 ·
Thanks for the reply. I think I lost the queens to Varroa though I can’t say for sure. The hives were packed with bees and I saw no evidence of swarm cells so I’m assuming they died and were carted off. There were still some hatching cells and no sign of laying workers so she couldn’t have been gone too long.
 
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