What's wrong with this hive???

annette · April 28, 2011, 12:16:18 AM

Just did an inspection on my strongest hive. Overflowing with bees, lots of sealed worker brood. No eggs whatsoever,

No nectar or honey at all, nothing.... No queen cells, no queen cups. Looked at every single frame.

Healthy looking bees that needed feed.

But when I got down to the bottom super, a different story.

Many frames of half emerging brood that were dead. Lots of smallish larvae that looked neglected and dead

Looked like the bottom super was sick or something. Nothing ropey or slimy.

Could this be chilled brood??

I was going to split this hive due to the overflowing population, but no eggs or queen cells. I think the queen shut down due to no nectar or honey. Is my observation correct here?? I started to feed them right away.

Anyone have any ideas???

Thanks
Annette

JP · April 28, 2011, 01:12:15 AM

Could be chilled brood. Any house cleaning going on?

...JP

Michael Bush · April 28, 2011, 01:36:50 AM

Do you think there are less bees? They could have swarmed and torn down the queen cells already.

AliciaH · April 28, 2011, 12:05:00 PM

Annette, WA has been so weather miserable lately, I haven't been keeping up with CA. Has it been raining a lot? Maybe they haven't been flying? A strong population of adults and bad weather would also explain the lack of stores, they can go through it so fast. In addition to no necter or honey, was there any pollen at all? They need that for the babies, so that might explain all the dead brood.

But you think you are queenless at this point, yes? Are your other hives strong enough to steal a frame of brood from them? Maybe this hive could make a new queen from that. It would at least give them babies to work with and keep them happy for a bit. It also buys you time if they did swarm and break down the cells already, to give a newly mated queen a chance to come home.

I say yes to the feeding. Maybe a pollen patty, too, if you didn't find any.

annette · April 28, 2011, 06:07:36 PM

Quote from: Michael Bush on April 28, 2011, 01:36:50 AM
Do you think there are less bees? They could have swarmed and torn down the queen cells already.

Definitely not less bees, overflowing with bees. I checked on this hive 2 weeks ago and they were making queen cups, so opened up the brood nest and gave them another super. Moved around frames and generally gave them more room.

Perhaps you are correct and they did swarm, but sure do not see any less population.

What do you say about the strange dead brood in the bottom super??

annette · April 28, 2011, 06:09:26 PM

Quote from: JP on April 28, 2011, 01:12:15 AM
Could be chilled brood. Any house cleaning going on?

...JP

All the upper supers look fabulous, healthy looking, vibrant bees. Just that strange bottom super with the dead brood and a whole bunch of dead bees on the screened bottom board. I do see lots of dead bees on the ground in front of the hive, so perhaps they did clean out much of the dead bees and brood.

annette · April 28, 2011, 06:13:09 PM

Quote from: AliciaH on April 28, 2011, 12:05:00 PM
Annette, WA has been so weather miserable lately, I haven't been keeping up with CA. Has it been raining a lot? Maybe they haven't been flying? A strong population of adults and bad weather would also explain the lack of stores, they can go through it so fast. In addition to no necter or honey, was there any pollen at all? They need that for the babies, so that might explain all the dead brood.

But you think you are queenless at this point, yes? Are your other hives strong enough to steal a frame of brood from them? Maybe this hive could make a new queen from that. It would at least give them babies to work with and keep them happy for a bit. It also buys you time if they did swarm and break down the cells already, to give a newly mated queen a chance to come home.

I say yes to the feeding. Maybe a pollen patty, too, if you didn't find any.

Yes we had so much rain and cold weather the past 2 months and they have not been able to fly out much. That is why they have eaten so much of their stores. I hadn't taken any notice of pollen frames so can't answer that question. I don't believe that I am queenless right now, but your suggestion is good to give them a frame of eggs and see what happens.

Hope all this mystery clears up soon. They are truly a very strong very good hive.

Thanks for the help

annette

annette · April 28, 2011, 06:13:53 PM

Thanks everyone for all the help with this hive. Guess the mystery will clear up soon.

I will check them again next week. I am feeding them now.

Brian D. Bray · April 30, 2011, 07:48:18 PM

Quote from: annette on April 28, 2011, 06:07:36 PM
Quote from: Michael Bush on April 28, 2011, 01:36:50 AM
Do you think there are less bees? They could have swarmed and torn down the queen cells already.

Definitely not less bees, overflowing with bees. I checked on this hive 2 weeks ago and they were making queen cups, so opened up the brood nest and gave them another super. Moved around frames and generally gave them more room.

Perhaps you are correct and they did swarm, but sure do not see any less population.
What do you say about the strange dead brood in the bottom super??

I've made a post about this elsewhere but it's easier to explain it again instead of looking for it.

Prior to swarming, even prior to creating any queen cells, the bees will lay brood extensively (in my 8 frame hives I often find 24-36 frames of brood in a 3-4 box hive) through out the brood chamber and even beyond it. 10-14 days later they will have queen cells. The timing of the worker brood hatching is such that the brood within the normal brood area has hatched and been reseeded with eggs. The queen then quits laying. As the workers from the extra sowing begins to hatch the old queen swarms, maybe days before the queen cells are supposed to hatch, taking newly hatched bees as well as foragers and housebees. The extra brood begins hatching along with the queen hatching and the reseeded area is now capped.

Inspection immediately following the swarm will not show a depletion of the population because it really hasn't been depleted, the excess has swarmed. The only true indication within a hive that a swarm has taken place is the absence of eggs, very little larvae, and mostly capped brood with fairly good sized areas of free cells between the remaining areas of capped brood.

As to the wierd brood in the bnottom super it boils down to this: A reporductive swarm was more important to the bees than cleaning up and reoccupying a storage area of the hive. Once the swarming has ceased, the refurbishing of that area will proceed, part of it might be used as a brood chamber but most of it will go to stores.

RayMarler · May 01, 2011, 06:16:54 AM

Hi Annette!
Is the Buckeye in bloom there? It is here, and I'm suspecting it is the cause of similar things I'm seeing here in my hives. They were great two weeks ago, about the time the buckeye was just getting started. I was surprised a couple days ago I look and the brood patterns are bad and less eggs and I had a hard time figuring out what was going on. All I come up with is they must be getting into some Buckeye around here somewhere.

annette · May 02, 2011, 06:06:27 PM

At work right now, but will get back later to these posts

annette · May 29, 2011, 12:01:30 AM

This post is a bit old, but I had to mention that this hive definitely did not swarm out. I found the same queen in there (she was marked) that I placed in there last year. The population never went down. No queen cells were ever made. Lots of brood now and eggs.

Just wanted to mention the outcome of this hive. At the moment, they have absolutely no honey, no open nectar, and I am starting to feed them. This hive has been a mystery for me.

Brian the things you wrote were wonderful and I printed out the post because I truly believe you know what you are talking about. I just wanted to post though the outcome because it has been such a strange hive.