4/30/2014 Hive shots

Looks normal to me. I saw drone cells in 5 out of 25 photos, but it appeared that some of those 'sides' were mixed drone and other cells.

Top right of photo 6 may be your queen.

She is in the photo you posted in this thread. Look under the word "amount" in your drone statement, now drop straight down to the top of the frame. You'll see her

I also agree with Graham, the drone amount looks normal.

Yeah I found her as well. I'm not noticing any capped honey but quite a bit of pollen.

Rader Sidetrack said:

I saw drone cells in 5 out of 25 photos

Click to expand...

so if i took 25 pictures that means i've got 12 bars of comb. 5 pictures of drones would then be 2.5 bars of drone.

There is quite a bit more worker brood. With TBH and foundationless, they will build and lay drone as they see fit. It is a good sign the amount of worker brood that is there. How many weeks has this hive been going?

it has been going for 3 weeks.

Looks normal.I run foundatioless langs.I find the proper ratio of drone and worker brood for a healthy hive running foundationless.Years ago when I ran with foundation I never had enough drones for proper mating of my queens.If there's not enough drones I found my bees seemed more stressed and a little more defensive.I can only figure they need the proper amount of bees they feel they need in each caste.Some think drones are a curse and if you have drones you have a lot of varroa.I've found that not to be so.I had a constant problem with varroa running foundation.Why, something else I haven't accurately been able to figure out .I just chaulk it up to happy bees are healthy bees .I really don't know what else to make of it.:scratch:

For being three weeks old it looks good. Nice laying queen and they are building well. You got some good shot to look through. They look to be building the comb nice and straight and that is very good. How many bars total does the TBH have? Or how long is it? Just make sure to keep giving them empty bars and space. Are you in the city? burbs? Are you feeding?

It's around 44 inches long. I've been adding 3 new bars every 7-10 days. I'm in the burbs and I have feed in the hive but they don't want anything to do with it. I've got a baggie feeder and a flipped jar. I had the feed on the other side of a follower board for a while with some holes in it for the bees to travel through. I haven't refiled since I installed them about a month ago now. I moved the jar feeder on the other side of the follower board to see if they'd take it and it's only moved a 1/4 inch. I'm kind of on board with the best feed is no feed so... no problems here with that.