Hello there everyone!
In my first two months of beekeeping - starting with 12 hives - I've seen quite a few things already! This is the first emergency I think I've had. I received 6 new packages and installed them three weeks ago.
On the first inspection, two weeks ago, I saw no eggs and found no queen. I went through the frames again and saw two supersedure cells - one of which had an egg in it! "A miracle!" I thought...but a little fishy.
The following week I saw the cell had grown and a fat larva inside. There were eggs in other cells as well - could it be that I missed them before and missed the queen? Nope. This last inspection confirmed that I have a laying worker. There are drone cells scattered all over the frames, no queen and no supersedure cells.
It's all clear to me now. When the queen was released she was killed for whatever reason (maybe the package already had a laying worker??) Or she was balled or just died. Nevertheless, I have a 3 week old package with at least one laying worker and not a lot of resources because my oldest colony is only 8 weeks old on all new equipment.
I have a new queen coming Thursday (the day after tomorrow) but I'm hesitant to put her in. If I shake the nurse bees in the grass somewhere there won't be much left of that colony. Will the foragers still potentially kill the new queen?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks All!
there is no brood other than scattered drone brood?
if you truly have laying workers and no resources to take from your other hive, i think your options are limited. personally i probably would not bother requeening, but if you choose to do that, you need to look on Michael Bushs' page and see about making a push in cage.
http://www.bushfarms.com/beeslayingworkers.htm (http://www.bushfarms.com/beeslayingworkers.htm)
my preference is to walk the hive away from others, shake out all the frames, and allow bees from laying worker hive to join other hives. DO NOT put the original hive back in the yard. if you do, they will return to it, and it is a myth that laying workers can't fly.
if you do a shake out, take a towel and extra box out with you. as you shake out (brush off) each frames, but it in extra box and cover so that bees don't return to frame. when you are done, take equipment and put it away.
Could the package have come with a virgin queen?
Thanks!
At this point I don't have a lot to lose. I'd love to try at least one of Michael Bush's methods, but alas, limited resources. Because I do have a new queen coming I should try to use her somehow. If I shake the nurse bees near my other hives (1000+ feet away). Then replace the hive in it's original location for the foragers to return and try re-queening do I stand any chance of success? Or should I just cut my losses and feed the queen to the chickens? (I wouldn't really do that).
Also, I can't say I'm 100% positive that I don't have a virgin queen in there, but I looked through pretty thouroughly each inspection and I've been pretty successful at spotting queens esp. in new packages. I'm pretty sure it's a worker.
you have enough hives that you'd do no harm to take a frame of brood from several and make a new hive for your new queen. that would make up for the one you are going to shake out.
you can use the old hive for your new one, but i would not leave it out for returning foragers. put it away until you are ready to make your new hive. foragers are not nurse bees. you need those to take care of your new queen and brood.
here is what i would do: take at least 4 frames with brood and nurse bees and put them in a box (nuc if you have one). put new queen in, in cage. don't pull cork. after a couple of days look and see how the bees are treating the caged queen. if it looks like they have accepted her, pull cork and let them eat candy...or if no candy, put marshmallow and let them eat that out. don't worry about the queen being caged for days. sometimes longer is better.
you can pull those frames tomorrow and put the queen in on Thursday. put food on the hive as there will not be foragers to bring in supplies. they don't need to be frames full of brood, but brood in various stages will help keep numbers in the hive up. do it during the warmth of the day so that foragers are out and you take nurse bees. DON'T MOVE OTHER QUEENS.....i know that's a given, but it happens more often than you think :-D
virgin queens are very hard to spot. also, i'd carry that hive that you are going to shake out, away from the others. it will make for a nicer experience for you.
Sounds like a plan. I am already trying to bolster four of the older hives with brood frame exchanges. I suppose I could grab a few frames from the strongest new hives.
Two questions:
1) I'm guessing it doesn't matter mixing Italian nurses and brood with the Carniolan queen??? If it does, My options are once again limited.
2) Even though there are several drone cells on the frames in the hive in question, they are drawn out and also contain lots of pollen! Is it worth putting these in another hive? Maybe freeze them first to kill the drones. The pollen will still be good, no?
Doesn't matter a bit to mix the two different types of bees. Freeze the drone brood and then scratch the cells with a cappings scratcher if you have one (a fork if you don't). The bees will remove the dead brood and clean everything up. As far as your new queen, I would do as Kathy mentioned and take brood and bees from several of your other hives and build a new hive for her.
Well, I did it. I shook the bees in front of my other Carni hives. Most of them seemed to be accepted though there was a little wrestling in front of one of the hives a couple of hours later. Those hives needed a little help. I put five of the frames in the freezer with drone brood to be scratched later.
The hive got 4 frames of brood and the other frames that had no brood from before. The new queen comes tomorrow. This just might work. I hope.