I inspected my hives today and all of my queens have stopped laying eggs entirely. i found no eggs, even though i found the queens. We are in a drought and the flow has come to a screeching halt.
Are the rest of you regionally experiencing the same phenomenon?
Since June 1st I've been having problems with my there hives (which were purchased nucs back in May) requeening themselves. Especially this month I have notice no eggs no brood in all three. Will check hives again tomorrow to see what I can see. I'm not sure but it may be the type of bee they are.
Corinne
Definitely shut down here!
Well, I have noticed that my once strong hive has become weak (this is the hive that I am having trouble with wax moths right now) and it looks like the queen had stopped laying. I found her, but only 3 frames of brood and that is it. We have had a terrible drought here and horrible heat.
She has started to pick up once again, but I believe she stopped laying when we had that terrible heat wave a few weeks ago. We are expecting another 100 degree heat wave by the end of the week and I will see what she will do.
This has been a terrible year for me with the bees. I will be lucky if I end up with even one hive going into winter.
Out of curiosity, how many of you with queens no longer laying are feeding your hives light syrup?
I am not feeding because they still have enough honey to eat.
You might try it for a week or so with light syrup. See if it tricks them into thinking a flow is about to start, and prompts them to start laying again. That method was described in the '05 pink pages as a way to get hives to start building up for the spring flow in Febuary. I'm not sure if it would work for a late summer drought, but I'll bet it's worth a try.
Quote from: SgtMaj on July 24, 2008, 12:29:22 AM
You might try it for a week or so with light syrup. See if it tricks them into thinking a flow is about to start, and prompts them to start laying again. That method was described in the '05 pink pages as a way to get hives to start building up for the spring flow in Febuary. I'm not sure if it would work for a late summer drought, but I'll bet it's worth a try.
I did think about this, and may start feeding them. In fact, I think definitely
My queens have many larvae, but I have never spotted an egg. I simply lack the skill despite repeated efforts. I have had other beekeepers point them out, but I cannot see them. Perhaps cheaters are in order for me. All of my hives have open and closed brood. I am assuming that htis means eggs too.
If you have eyesight like mine and have never been able to spot eggs before, then it's likely you have eggs now. It's still possible that your queen quit laying more recently, but like I said, odds are she still is.
Quote from: KONASDAD on July 23, 2008, 04:26:39 PM
I inspected my hives today and all of my queens have stopped laying eggs entirely. i found no eggs, even though i found the queens. We are in a drought and the flow has come to a screeching halt.
Are the rest of you regionally experiencing the same phenomenon?
Here in North GA I had 4 hives go honey bound. It freaked me out and I thought I had lost the queens of 4 hives. They gathered more nectar than I anticipated and filled the brood chambers with honey. I couldn't keep up with adding supers. Once I shifted some frames around and gave them more room, the queens started laying again. Don "Fatbeeman" is the one that told me about how they could go "honey bound". He said he was having trouble as a queen breeder keeping enough supers on for expansion. The last thing he wants is for them to become honey bound. Every year there is something new to learn!! Good day to all.
Steve
Feeding is obviously in order now as the hives are too light despite good early nectar flow. Its going to be a hard fall and winter if a VERY strong fall flow doesn't occcur here. The mites are also very numerous now. Its too hot to treat, so sugar shakes will now commence frequently until cooler weather.
We had an over abundance of blackberry this year----the ol'timers here say that means an early fall.
Corinne
Yes, I am truly worried they do not have enough honey for the winter and the main flow is over. One hive may be close to having enough, but this hive with the wax moth trouble is very light. Yes, guess I will start the feeding soon.
Do they actually make enough sugar honey to get them through the winter????
i don't know if my queens have shut down or not and i will probably check over the next few days but other beekeepers are saying that theres not much honey crop around here even though we had an unusually good locust bloom and plenty of poplar bloom. the sourwood also bloomed very nicely but the flow was disappointing.
I still have quite a lot of eggs and such, and a good bit of stores in my hives. I'm going to be doing some splits next week, so that will control mites in my biggest hives.
One of my hives has a queen who has either died or she has shut down her egg production. I haven't seen her lately, but I've only seen her a couple of times since I installed the hive last May.
If the heat is the cause of this, I believe it -- it's been hot hot hot these last several weeks. I see that this hive has low honey reserves in the lower brood box. If feeding is a solution I will try it...maybe it will boost the egg production if the queen is still there.
Quote from: Rex on July 25, 2008, 07:39:41 PM
One of my hives has a queen who has either died or she has shut down her egg production. I haven't seen her lately, but I've only seen her a couple of times since I installed the hive last May.
If the heat is the cause of this, I believe it -- it's been hot hot hot these last several weeks. I see that this hive has low honey reserves in the lower brood box. If feeding is a solution I will try it...maybe it will boost the egg production if the queen is still there.
Hi Rex
We are close in location and experiencing similar trouble.
Annette
It sounds like some of you are honey bound. I had it happen to 2 or 3 of my hives (of 8 total hives) this year. I took some brood frames out of one hive and put it in the honey bound hive. I also took some undrawn frames and placed them next to the brood frame. A beekeeper on this forum told me that doing this would stimulate egg laying and drawing out more comb.
I will check later this week and see what is going on. I have had similar troubles this year as well.
my queens are still laying, but I think they will stop soon. It is very dry and hot here so I think I will not even attempt to get a honey crop this year, I think I better leave it for the bees. Besides all my hives were swarms this year except one and it swarmed twice but it is building up nicely.
I just read a couple nites ago that queens stop laying when it either gets up to 92 or 98 degrees.( Cant remember which one) This is also when the bees have a lot of foragers turn into water gatherers so they can cool the hive
I have 9 hives now and they drink a 5 gal chicken waterer of water every 4 days. They are also drinking alot of syrup. The book says that they will take syrup when its hot because of the water in it
The book is "The Hive and the Honeybee".
your friend,
john
Quote from: WhipCityBeeMan on July 27, 2008, 06:30:33 PM
It sounds like some of you are honey bound. I had it happen to 2 or 3 of my hives (of 8 total hives) this year. I took some brood frames out of one hive and put it in the honey bound hive. I also took some undrawn frames and placed them next to the brood frame. A beekeeper on this forum told me that doing this would stimulate egg laying and drawing out more comb.
I will check later this week and see what is going on. I have had similar troubles this year as well.
When you find the brood nest full of nector (honey bound) the quickest fix is to pull a few frames into a super and put replace them with new frames. The ull frames moved up will bait the super and the replacement frames will give the queen laying space. Use drawn comb as the replacement if possible as it will put the queen as much as a week ahead of undrawn frames when laying brood. Using a frame of brood from another hive as one of the replacement frames will guarantee the replacement frames will be used for egg laying. The brood frame also will tell you if you're queenless because the bees will begin making queen cells.
Note that honey bound mimics a queenless hive with no or little evidence of brood. Treat every broodless hive for honey bound before jumping off a cliff and ordering an unneeded and unnecessary queen.
Quote from: Brian D. Bray on July 28, 2008, 01:23:12 AM
Note that honey bound mimics a queenless hive with no or little evidence of brood. Treat every broodless hive for honey bound before jumping off a cliff and ordering an unneeded and unnecessary queen.
great advice. I wish I had had it before I bought and installed 2 queens to help boost two of the 4 bound hives. Wasted money since the queens were dispatched just as soon as the sugar plug could be moved through.
Steve