I bought 3 three pound packages on the 29th of March. I've been looking at them off and on. Today I went in the 3 hives. Two were unreal, 5-6 frames of foundation drawn out, 3 or 4 of it capped brood. Then there's the other one.
Maybe 2 to 3 frames of capped brood. Starting off not bad. The first frame had a few drone cells in the middle of the brood pattern. The further out you went the more there were. The second frame had probable 25 or 30 percent drone cells. The last one was probably 40 percent drone cells. I left a message with the supplier. I realize that new queens may misfire a couple of times but overall I'm looking at the least 30 percent drone. She was a slim queen as well. Size probably don't matter, one of the prettiest queens I "had" was a drone layer.
Am I jumping the gun asking the supplier for another queen at this stage? (3 weeks)
NO.
nope.
If you had asked the supplier for a new queen any earlier, he would have told you to give it a fair chance. 3 weeks is enough time to evaluate and decide you need a new queen.
You have 3 packages from this supplier. 2 of which are doing great. Those are your baseline to judge what the last one should look like. This is one of the reasons that people are told to get at least two hives when they start. With the information you have on the first two you have a solid baseline as to what the last one should look like at this point. Don't only ask the supplier for a new queen, demand it at this point if they give you any slack. And remember bad press always makes people move their butts faster. Word of mouth can make or break a business...
Sounds about right. I have one question. Was there drone brood in worker cells. I suspect so. A queen should not be laying any brood in worker cells. How strong is this hive? If it is starting to get weak, you may want to get a new nuc. My first nuc failed, the queen had defective wing virus, the supplier provided a working hive as a replacement. Produced a lot of honey that year.
Jim
Jim, There were drone brood in the worker cells as well as on the bottom. It's like she started misfiring and then got worse. As for the other two hives I couldn't ask for no better. If the numbers appear to go down, and I'm sure they will, I'll stick a frame of brood in there from one of the other hives.
Quote from: GSF on April 21, 2014, 06:11:51 AM
Jim, There were drone brood in the worker cells as well as on the bottom. It's like she started misfiring and then got worse. As for the other two hives I couldn't ask for no better. If the numbers appear to go down, and I'm sure they will, I'll stick a frame of brood in there from one of the other hives.
Before you rob from another hive, I would check with the seller about returning it and get a new one.
Jim
Talked with the seller today. They're sending a new queen. No friction from them what so ever.
Quote from: GSF on April 21, 2014, 11:04:47 PM
Talked with the seller today. They're sending a new queen. No friction from them what so ever.
That is the way it should bee. Bees are live stock. There is no way they will all be perfect.
Good luck.
Jim