I've noticed the last few weeks my hive has been getting weaker. Today I decided to to an inspection. I found empty cells! No eggs, no or few capped brood cells. The bottom hive body was void of any eggs, or brood. There was very little honey and a little pollen. My second brood box has some uncapped honey and pollen stored. Should I combine this hive with another of my hives or add a few frames of capped brood from another hive? It's getting kind of late in the year and I don't know if there will be enough time for them to make their own queen and make brood and still survive the winter. What should I do?
Help I'm queenless!!!!!
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Well, I found a queenless hive myself today, gave them a frame of eggs. Ya know it is much easier to fix a queenless hive in the spring cuz you don't have to move all the full supers!!
inch:
inch:
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Yes, a frame of fresh eggs, just watch very carefully for the queen in the donating hive. If you don't have a flow and you don't have supers on then I would feed.
True, but if they can make their own I'd rather do that. Plus, I'm on a super tight budget. If it was spring I would get a new queen, but here our fall honey crop is not edible.
I also found varoa mites in my hives today
I also found varoa mites in my hives today
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Give them a frame of open brood/eggs every week if you can until you either have a laying queen or it gets too late in the season. I had a nuc last year where the new queen started laying at the first of September and it built up fine and made it through the winter.
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True but this is a good time of year to break the brood cycle and thin out the mites assuming they can build enough to make winter. My queenless hive is FULL of bees just no queen, no eggs, no small larvae.
Since this hive also has mites should I treat it with strips at the same time as trying to raise a queen? I did a sugar shake test today and with a 1/4 cup of bees I found six mites. All the hives I checked today had mites, but that's another topic in itself.
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I can't help you with that one since I do not treat...sorry.
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Not saying if you should or should not treat - that's your call - but they all have mites. You just found them today.
If you were of a mind to treat though it's generally best to do so when there's as little as possible capped brood.
If you were of a mind to treat though it's generally best to do so when there's as little as possible capped brood.
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1. I don't want any chemicals of any kind in my hives, wax, or honey.
2. Like many, I hope to possibly raise bees that don't need treatments and can coexist with mites at a non-lethal level.
Having said that I do use SBB and small cell. The rest is live and let die.
2. Like many, I hope to possibly raise bees that don't need treatments and can coexist with mites at a non-lethal level.
Having said that I do use SBB and small cell. The rest is live and let die.
They all have mites???? Really???? So I'll never get rid of them? If I will not get rid of them then why treat?
What is sbb?
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Screened Bottom Board=SBB
Thanks......
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Too many mites will destroy a colony. Some bees apparently have an inherent natural ability to cope with varroa.
Populations of all creatures live side by side with parasites and disease organisms, and cope with them through resistance and/or hygiene.
If you have a dog it probably has ticks and fleas sometimes. Most of the time the dog can deal, but if it becomes too infested with parasites it could be weakened to the point that it's health or life is at risk. Most people get their dog a flea collar or something during the summer peak of the flea and tick season. Think of varroa as bee ticks.
Wild dogs, wolves, coyotes, etc that can't deal with fleas and ticks die - the ones that don't are resistant enough to do without a flea collar. They still have fleas though.
People who don't treat for varroa are selecting for the same kind of natural resistance.
However, if your bees are regular non-resistant commercially produced stock, and you just don't treat in any way most of them will probably die. So you are well advised to educate yourself before just quitting cold turkey.
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Very well put!!
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Thank you.
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