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Too many drones?

2678 Views 9 Replies 5 Participants Last post by  Robert Hawkins, 
R
I have two hives started on foundationless frames from nucs. One of them has significantly more drones then the other, I examined it yesterday and it seemed every frame I picked up was crawling with drones. I did see the queen.
This is the hive that when drawing out the starter strips did a solid frame of drone cells, which I moved to the outside. The hive seems to be going strong otherwise, though a bit behind its twin.

At what point is a lot of drones too many? When is it time to requeen?
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Michael Bush

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#2 ·
Sometimes you have a lot of drones because of a drone laying queen. Is there worker brood? Are there large sections of worker sized comb? If you have a queen laying half drones and half workers I'd look for a supercedure cell. The bees almost always replace her if there is worker brood to make a queen from. If half the bees are drones, I'd probably give up on it and combine it with the other nuc for now and when it has built up a bit, requeen it. If there is a fair number of workers but most of the brood is drones, I'd requeen.

If there's just one in ten that is a drone, that's normal.
 
R

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Discussion Starter · #4 ·
I would say it is closer to 3 in 10 at this point.
I started it from a nuc, it is a hive with 2 bodies and I just put a medium on it for honey (the top body is 80 percent drawn out).
There seems to be a decent amount of capped worker comb and I see eggs in worker sized cells.
I wonder if she keeps refilling that frame of drone comb with eggs.
Should I try taking it out to see if that helps?
 
Michael Bush

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#5 ·
Try moving the drone frame to the outside edge and put a frame of honey between it and the rest of the brood. She might lose interest in it then.

If the bees think she'd making too many drones, and if they have the resources (a worker egg) they will supercede her. But I'd keep an eye on them. The only problem with removing it is that they may spend their efforts making more. But if you want to, just pop it in the freezer and later when the hive is going well put it back in on the outside edge of the have (after thawing first).
 
R

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#7 ·
Searcher that's not bad thinking but remember she's responsible for the genetics of the hive. If they have a bad trait, requeen.

Robert try moving the drone comb to the other side of the box. Apparently she's gonna keep laying in the same side you put it.

Hawk
 
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