Help and Advice needed....no queen!

Vic. Cabrera · January 03, 2017, 08:30:59 AM

We extracted a hive from a tree yesterday. We had the queen in a queen catcher and she was fine. We vacuumed up all the remaining bees we could and then headed home. We got very little comb and only brood.....no eggs or larvae which we thought was weird.

Anyway, we got home and transferred the bees into the nuc with the queen. As of this afternoon, the queen was dead and the colony is in a weird state flying all over the place. The problem is no one on our island of Saipan has queens for sale. I only have one other hive which is only about a month old. They are pretty strong, with about 10 full drawn combs (top bar). Should I get one comb from the other hive with eggs so that they can develop their own queen? or should I try and allow the remaining bees to join my other hive? I've never reared my own queens yet and am really confused as to what to do next. Any advice would be really great. Thanks.

Psparr · January 03, 2017, 09:01:33 AM

Put a frame of eggs pollen and honey in with your new bees and let them alone. Should be fine.

BeeMaster2 · January 03, 2017, 12:28:53 PM

x2

Rurification · January 03, 2017, 02:34:14 PM

Making your own queen is really easy. You just transfer the frame of eggs and brood like the others said to do and then you wait. Check after a week or so to make sure they've drawn the queen cells out. If you see queen cells, then you're good to go. The bees take care of the rest. It's EASY. All you need is patience.

Once you've done this a couple of times, you'll never ever need to buy a queen again.

GSF · January 05, 2017, 02:37:08 PM

Vic, what the others have said is good advice. Another tip I might add is don't got in there a lot during the first few weeks.

Oldbeavo · January 05, 2017, 02:42:44 PM

How do you improve your bees without buying in queens.
Also you gain 25-30 days by using caged queen vs growing your own.

Psparr · January 05, 2017, 03:57:21 PM

I'll take a mutt in 30 days over a mass produced whatever any day.

Vic. Cabrera · January 07, 2017, 10:35:52 AM

Quote from: GSF on January 05, 2017, 02:37:08 PM
Vic, what the others have said is good advice. Another tip I might add is don't got in there a lot during the first few weeks.

Thanks for the advice. Thanks everyone! Again, the biggest problem is that I'm on a tropical island that's about 14 sq. miles with only one other bee keeper who keeps to himself and won't even set time to speak with me about anything bee related. there is no way of buying or even ordering a queen to be shipped here because of our customs regulation. Because we are free of AFB and EFB, they will not allow for bees to be imported.

I added a comb from my other hive a couple days ago which had brood and eggs and larvae of all stages on it. I also added a feeder. I saw a couple of bees return to the hive with pollen today so I'm hoping they are making that queen.

how many days should I wait before checking in on them to see if they have developed queen cells?

divemaster1963 · January 07, 2017, 11:59:14 AM

Vic would like to see some photos of your setup and the fauna that your bees are working. about how far from the other beekeeper are you. what is up with him? how old is he and how many hive does he have. is he trying to control the islands bee services? If he is older try talking with his friends to see how to approach him. check with the golf courses they would love to have bees to pollinate there flowers. plus you could keep the honey from each course separate and bottle with you logo and there course logo for you to sell to them to resell or give to there guests. win win.

john

BeeMaster2 · January 08, 2017, 07:39:30 AM

Vic.
Check on them one week from when you added the frame. By then you should have capped queens.
Be careful, pull an end frame first and then move the other frames to check the added frame. Do not rotate it, you can damage the queen larvae.
Jim

Vic. Cabrera · January 08, 2017, 09:32:34 AM

Quote from: divemaster1963 on January 07, 2017, 11:59:14 AM
Vic would like to see some photos of your setup and the fauna that your bees are working. about how far from the other beekeeper are you. what is up with him? how old is he and how many hive does he have. is he trying to control the islands bee services? If he is older try talking with his friends to see how to approach him. check with the golf courses they would love to have bees to pollinate there flowers. plus you could keep the honey from each course separate and bottle with you logo and there course logo for you to sell to them to resell or give to there guests. win win

john

Hey John, thanks for the input. If you go on YouTube and look up my name, I have a video there of our first inspection of our top bar hive. We have pacific daisies which grow wild all over the island that bloom all year long which the bees here really enjoy. In addition to that they work on all kinda of fruit trees, banana flowers, and sun flowers which we plant for them. Feeding is not really necessary because of the continuous honey flow.

As for that other guy, I've given up trying. He's blown me off too many times. Honestly, I think the colony we caught in our swarm trap might have been from his apiary which is only a couple miles away...lol. Thanks for the golf course idea too. I spoke to the GM at the nearest course to me and he loved the idea. He will like to meet with me once I have a plan drawn up and show me where they would prefer to have the hives located. Thanks again!