[nbw2020]

Opened up my horizontal layens hive and inspected all frames for the 1st time in perhaps 2 months. This is my first go at using a horizontal layens hive and I hadn't planned on using it this year but one of my Langstroth's unexpectedly swarmed back in the spring and I captured the swarm and queen and put them in the horizontal hive. I've been feeding this hive since then. A week after the split I checked up on it and saw the queen was laying so I left them alone to, aside from feeding, to build out the foundation. I'm using natural wax foundation.

Today (8-28-20) when I did a full inspection I found hardly any capped brood just a few capped drone cells, and I noticed two or three larvae. Did not see the queen. Looks like she either stopped laying or is gone/dead. Bees were also a little aggressive. I possible noticed a supercedure cell. There's also a lot of cells filled with a black substance. Wondering if it is black pollen. I've attached a couple of pictures.

Thoughts on the best move here? If it is a supercedure queen, let it go, or is it too late in the season (USDA 6a/6b)? Buy a queen?

Cheers.

https://imgur.com/gallery/aEX0RLq

https://imgur.com/gallery/3dGGdQy

 

[ruthiesbees]

if it were spring, I'd say it was crimson clover pollen, but too late in the season for that. Possibly kudzu pollen, which is more of a purplish color. As for a supercedure cell, it can be iffy in your area to get a queen mated. I'm rolling the dice here in coastal Virginia with another round of queen cells in the mating nucs, but I still have lots of drones in my larger topbar hives and I've had queens mate as late as October here. But I wouldn't gamble with a larger hive that might be queenless. Would recommend you buy a queen if you can find one. Even the larger operations in FL are shutting down for the season.