[Beaver Dam]

Waiting to see drones before I split.Well today was it. Deep on bottom, 2 meds on top of that. Took a peek lots of bees. My question is what ratio of reg brood to drone brood? Seems like drone brood was in many dirrerent locations. This hive had a lot of drones in the fall where my others didn't.But my other 7 hives last fall were all small hives. Normal?

 

[AmericasBeekeeper]

Perfectly healthy, if you are not raising your own queens or trying to knock up the neighbor's queens, drones are not needed. We are an Africanized area in Hillsborough County Florida. I would replace any queen made in this county. I sure do not want to feed any drones either.

 

[Countryboy]

I have heard the rule of thumb is if your drones are at the purple eye stage then you can start queen rearing.

Purple eye stage is in sealed brood development. If you are seeing adult drones, you are in good shape to do a split and let them make their own queen.

 

[Hambone]

I have heard the rule of thumb is if your drones are at the purple eye stage then you can start queen rearing.

Basic same rule of thumb I have been told. But they went a day or two longer. "If you have capped drone cells you are safe to split."