[Rehric00]

Hi guys and gals...

I inspected my hive today and ultimately added another medium brood box. While I was in there though, I could not help but notice gobs of cross comb, the bees were building comb on top of frames, in the inner cover and even on the bottom side of the outer cover. It was like comb over load. There was also lots of larvae,,,, I could not tell if it was alive or not- They looked healthy, but I did not see them moving, is that normal?

There were even balls of comb, like big chucks of it with larvae. I think I even may have some swarm cells (not good, I want to keep my bees!!) Is there any way that I can just knock those off, or would that be bad?

I was also unable to find the queen- but I am sure shes there, it looked overall healthy (but I am a rookie so who knows). The nectar was just flowing, It was just dripping from some of the frames- good, right?

I may try to get some pics in a few days.

 

[Vance G]

What you are describing is a very over full and crowded bee hive! If you saw swarm cells, they are about ready to leave, at least most of them. Did you ever super them or did some bozo tell you that a new colony NEVER produces a surplus the first year? I would immediately split the colony into about four parts. Give each part a couple swarm cells and destroy the rest. Give each split an uncrowded box of their own with room to expand. This will hopefully cut your loss to swarming and after the swarm fever has subsided, you can just stack all four together and recombine them into one colony for wintering.

 

[waynesgarden]

Some questions. When did you start this hive? How many boxes and what size did you have on the hive when you inspected? You said you think that you have queen cells. Do the queen cells have larvae in them or do you have empty cups? Could what you saw possibly be drone cells?

You won't see larvae moving around in the cells.

Wayne

 

[psfred]

My bees tend to make drones in burr comb between boxes and in other strange places when they get the urge. I provide foundationless frames when I can in the spring located where they can make a comb of drones on demand, but didn't do that in my new packages this year.

In hives with drone comb, they put drones there and make a lot less burr comb.

Peter