Newbie here needing advice on what is wrong with my bees. I have no idea if the loses I am seeing on my bees are normal, due to disease or pesticide?
I installed my first package 3 1/2 weeks ago - the queen is laying great, there are 6 frames filled with capped brood, eggs larvae, nectar and pollen. However the bees have already made 4 supercedure cells with larvae in them. I was advised to cut them out and see if they rebuild them but have not done so yet. They are also bringing in minimal pollen even though it is available and instead have consumed almost an entire pollen patty. They have taken less than a quart of sugar syrup.
When I first installed my package I saw 50-100 crawling bees and I assumed they were just normal package loses. Since then there have been what I guess would be normal amounts of 8 or less bees per day dead or dying in front of the hive in addition to the ones the undertakers carry out and drop. I have seen some bees crawling around and a few wingless or one winged bees.
Yesterday I decided to do a mite count and sprayed my sticky board with PAM cooking spray and put it in the screened bottom board. Overnight we had strong winds and rain and when I went to check on the bees today the sticky board had blown forward so it was sticking out of the hive and some bees were landing in the cooking spray when leaving the hive. In front of the hive were approximately 50 dead or dying bees with their tongues sticking out and legs twitching and several crawling bees.There was only one mite found on the board.
I heard that if bees die with their tongues sticking out it means they are poisoned. Is this true and could it have been from the Pam cooking spray? Or do my bees have something else going on and that is why they are replacing the queen? Am I just being a paranoid newbie beekeeper? Thanks for your help and here are pictures of my poor dead bees -
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I installed my first package 3 1/2 weeks ago - the queen is laying great, there are 6 frames filled with capped brood, eggs larvae, nectar and pollen. However the bees have already made 4 supercedure cells with larvae in them. I was advised to cut them out and see if they rebuild them but have not done so yet. They are also bringing in minimal pollen even though it is available and instead have consumed almost an entire pollen patty. They have taken less than a quart of sugar syrup.
When I first installed my package I saw 50-100 crawling bees and I assumed they were just normal package loses. Since then there have been what I guess would be normal amounts of 8 or less bees per day dead or dying in front of the hive in addition to the ones the undertakers carry out and drop. I have seen some bees crawling around and a few wingless or one winged bees.
Yesterday I decided to do a mite count and sprayed my sticky board with PAM cooking spray and put it in the screened bottom board. Overnight we had strong winds and rain and when I went to check on the bees today the sticky board had blown forward so it was sticking out of the hive and some bees were landing in the cooking spray when leaving the hive. In front of the hive were approximately 50 dead or dying bees with their tongues sticking out and legs twitching and several crawling bees.There was only one mite found on the board.
I heard that if bees die with their tongues sticking out it means they are poisoned. Is this true and could it have been from the Pam cooking spray? Or do my bees have something else going on and that is why they are replacing the queen? Am I just being a paranoid newbie beekeeper? Thanks for your help and here are pictures of my poor dead bees -
