Hive went from full to hardly any in days

[thomas]

Hello

I mention in another tread about finding a lot of wax in front of one of my hives so i reduce the entrance and put on my second treatment of api life-var. I was told to leave the bees in the hive and to start feeding them like crazy and to give steve a call in a week. Steve owns brushy mountain bee farm i wanted to put them in a nuc since there is a small number of bees but he said that the mites was the cause of my hive crashing so i made a lot of syrup ready to feed as for my other hives they are doing well gathering pollen and nector and the queens are laying well this hive still have a queen and i saw some eggs what should i do can i feed them fondant instead of syrup.

Tom

[Maine_Beekeeper]

Hi Tom -
was this hive weaker than the others to begin with? The reason I ask is the wax at the entrance (an I assume all over the bottom board) leads me to think they are being robbed.
I would do more than reduce the entrance - put them in a nuc, feed them like crazy and ADD A ROBBER SCREEN. robber screens are easy to build and make all the difference in my bee yard where I have strong hives and mating nucs both.
You can find robber screen plans/basics here on beesource.
Best of luck.

[thomas]

Howdy

Thank you for the information they were strong like the others were and then i saw some bees with thier wings deformed so i started treating them. And then i went to apply the second treatment and thats when i saw the wax and when i checcked them earlier they had plenty of brood and after i added the first treatment i guess the smell made the queen to stop laying and they got behind. But the thing is i have others that are weak and building up and they are not being bothered by robbing i do not feed them in the yard i have another spot to feed them. But will fondant hurt them if i fed them or should i just feed syrup. This hive is being lead by a young italian carniolan mix but she is not the same color as her sisters that are heading up my other hives she looks more italian and the last time i had this problem i gave the hive a young NWC queen and when her offspring started to take over i saw no more problems and this hive put away more honey then any of my other two but now i have 11 hives.

Tom