So I have a hive that has been around for 3 years now. And this spring it started off really well, lots of bees and fast build up. I checked it today and I'm confused to what is happening. There is two deeps and two supers, 6 weeks ago I split the hive. There are frames and frames of honey and pollen. The bees are activly bringing in both at the entrance. However, there is no capped brood, eggs etc.. in the whole hive! I was able to find about 6 or 8 small larva ( probably about 5-8 days old) and they looked like they were trapped in a white clear mucus ( they were all spread out all over the hive, not on the same frame). What the heck is going on? If the queen died would there not be laying workers? Why are they so activly collecting pollen if there is no brood? Does anybody have any suggestions about what to do?
Do they have plenty of room to have both stores and brood? I ran out of room a few years ago and wound up with full crazy burr comb and had to catch two swarms and recombine them later.
Sounds like the hive needs a new queen. The crazy burr comb that happens is sometimes a good indicator of a queenless hive.
They could be queenless or they could have lost a queen, replaced her and the new queen isn't laying yet...
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesmath.htm (http://www.bushfarms.com/beesmath.htm)
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesfallacies.htm#nobroodnoqueen (http://www.bushfarms.com/beesfallacies.htm#nobroodnoqueen)