Last Winter I only had one hive out of eight survive. It wasn't doing well, I had a lot of weak crawlers, and it generally just wasn't thriving. I had the inspector out, he looked at my sticky mite count board and like me, couldn't find a single mite. He agreed that they didn't look right, thought there were a few cells (like maybe 4 or 5) that looked like maybe foulbrood. He took samples of comb and bees and sent them in for testing. Everything came back negative. The hive slowly got back on it's feet and put up enough honey for itself, but none for me.
Today it is 50 and my bees are flying. I have 5 other hives now that I started from packages, a cut out, and swarms. Everybody is pooping and dragging out their dead. My other hives seem normal, but this one hive is beginning to show the same symptoms. Many more dead bees in front of this hive than any of the others. Other hives are flying off with their dead, these just plummet off the board and seem to have trouble getting off the ground back to the hive. They also seem disoriented, just like last year.
Do you think it would be worthwhile to try re-queening this hive? Sure they survived last year's horrible Winter, but they were in a sheltered spot compared to the other hives. If they are survivors, but can't put up extra honey, what is the point?
Thoughts?
JC
Give that queen the boot, she's getting old now anyways. See if that fixes the problem.
I wouldn't be requeening in Iowa in January...
Well, of course I wouldn't try to re-queen NOW, I was looking towards Spring. If they follow the same pattern as last year they will struggle along through late Winter and early Spring, and still be around come May.
JC