Hive has no honey and is very aggressive... any ideas?

[Diane]

Hi all,
I'll prefice this post with the fact that my husband and I are new beekeepers.  We have two hives that we purchased this spring.  One hive appears to be doing well and has honey.  Our other hive has no honey at all and the hive is very aggressive.  Just giving them a little bit of smoke seems to make them swarm around us.  Nothing appears to be unusual to us.  We did see larva at the end of August.

We have an experienced beekeeper that is going to stop over to check out the hive when he gets a chance, but in the mean time I'm very worried.  We started feeding them both sugar water about three weeks ago.

Can anyone tell us what we should be looking for or doing?  I don't want to lose the hive.

Thanks so much,

[Jack]

It is getting a bit late to do anything, however you have been feeding and thats a good thing. I would stop the 2-1 sugar water as it is a bit lat and getting too cold, but if your week hive is still light you could put an extra box on top and inside put newspaper with dry sugar on top. Should there be any problem with the queen it is prolly to late to do any thing about it.

[Kathyp]

if they are the weak hive, they may be getting robbed.  that makes hives very aggressive!  if you have not, put an entrance reducer on them.  at this point, you may want to try loading the frames with 2:1 syrup.  take the frames that do not have brood and using a spray bottle on the stream setting, spray the syrup into the comb.  you need to do it at a bit of an angle to match the angle of the cells. knock most of  the bees off first.  you can also leave some syrup on in baggie feeders.  they are not my preference, but if done properly, will not drip as jar feeders tend to with temp changes.  after that, the dry sugar. 

i don't know what you weather is like, but you should be about out of your hives for the winter.  if your mentor finds no queen, you can combine the hives and split in the spring if it comes through.

[Diane]

Thanks for the replies!  Kathyp, appreciate the advice, we'll put the reducers on this weekend and attempt filling the frames with syrup.

[hardwood]

I would go ahead and bear the bees to open the hive and do a cursory check (if your weather is good enough still). I've often found that a hot hive is due to some foreign invaders of some kind. Wasps, spiders and even just too many SHB can really set them off. First guess would be robbing as mentioned, but if the prob still persists I'd check 'em!

Scott

[riverrat]

no honey agressive bees this time of year I would suspect robbing

[Diane]

Thanks again for the feedback, we can use all we can get.  Hardwood, I have to ask you some dumb questions... what does "bear the bees" and "SHB" mean? 

Our temps are currently in the 50's with on and off sunny days.  Today and tomorrow it's supposed to be sunny here.

Other question, with no honey how do the bees survive the winter? 

[hardwood]

"bear the bees"...just put up with their aggressive behavior.
"SHB" =Small Hive Beetle.

Scott

[Diane]

Thanks Scott!