My three hives survived the winter. Two are booming, and one is just getting by. Today I went into the third, frame by frame, fearing the worst.
And it's worse than that! If the queen was gone, I could simply take my losses.
I re-queened last July, with a local girl I bought from a friend, part-feral-cutout/part-Carniolan, and last year she was laying fine. So today I saw her (I recognized her!) but didn't see any brood or eggs. Only a small clump of bees are in the hive, enough to cover maybe 2 frames, and there's a very low level of in-and-out activity during the day. I started feeding them a few days ago, 1:1 syrup, before my inspection today, but they've hardly touched it. They're surrounded by capped honey, some of it open and half-eaten, and there were a few small pockets of fresh nectar.
So I thought of dumping a couple of frames of nurse bees in, from one of the other hives, along with a frame or two of capped brood. The glitch was, I couldn't find the queen from the second hive, and I didn't want to dump her in with the other queen. I thought of dumping them in through a queen excluder with a box on top, but couldn't find the queen excluder. So I gave them two frames with clean bee bread, and closed it up. Now what?
The thing is, that hive was one of two that was quite active earlier this year, in the warmer spells. Now there was 1-2 inches of dead bees on the bottom and the hive was littered with dead bees here and there. They seem still to be loyal to their queen, and they are holding off robbers, just hanging out and waiting ... for what?
Questions:
So, it seems like one of those crazy, mixed up situations where there's no one right way to go. :scratch:
Any ideas?
And it's worse than that! If the queen was gone, I could simply take my losses.
I re-queened last July, with a local girl I bought from a friend, part-feral-cutout/part-Carniolan, and last year she was laying fine. So today I saw her (I recognized her!) but didn't see any brood or eggs. Only a small clump of bees are in the hive, enough to cover maybe 2 frames, and there's a very low level of in-and-out activity during the day. I started feeding them a few days ago, 1:1 syrup, before my inspection today, but they've hardly touched it. They're surrounded by capped honey, some of it open and half-eaten, and there were a few small pockets of fresh nectar.
So I thought of dumping a couple of frames of nurse bees in, from one of the other hives, along with a frame or two of capped brood. The glitch was, I couldn't find the queen from the second hive, and I didn't want to dump her in with the other queen. I thought of dumping them in through a queen excluder with a box on top, but couldn't find the queen excluder. So I gave them two frames with clean bee bread, and closed it up. Now what?
The thing is, that hive was one of two that was quite active earlier this year, in the warmer spells. Now there was 1-2 inches of dead bees on the bottom and the hive was littered with dead bees here and there. They seem still to be loyal to their queen, and they are holding off robbers, just hanging out and waiting ... for what?
Questions:
- Might she start laying again?
- Maybe she's laying, and the workers are eating the eggs, until conditions improve?
- What if I give them a frame of eggs and young brood, and some nurse bees?
- Should I give them a chance to build queen cells first? (What method?)
- Or maybe just give them some capped brood and nurse bees, and see how things go for awhile?
So, it seems like one of those crazy, mixed up situations where there's no one right way to go. :scratch:
Any ideas?