Newbie question - I'm missing something!

[jester7891]

I have a couple of questions - or more likely I need some feedback.  Seems that every time I get going, I always run into problems.  I have one hive that lasted over the winter (my first winter).  The bees seemed to be doing well in the spring but now I cannot find any eggs or larvae etc.  The bees look very happy and busy.  The two deep supers are extremely heavy and laden with honey and nectar.  The bees don't seem to be too interested in the median supers above.  I cannot find a queen but I have never been able to find my queens.  There are clearly no signs of infection or other abnormalities.  The hive in fact looks immaculately clean waiting for eggs to be laid.

I purchased a nuc approximately a month ago.  The bees are doing fabulously well and have basically filled out the second upper deep super already.  I see bees in all stages of development.  I did few things different this time.  I have nine frames in instead of 10.  The bees built comb perpendicular to 2 frames which I have removed.  These bees have also almost completely drawn out the median super.  One frame had a tremendous number of eggs on it so I took it out and put it into the other hive (after carefully removing all of the bees).  I replaced it with a frame with foundation only.  It has already been drawn out and is partially used.  I guess the new hive/nuc is doing well.

A week after placing the frame (from the nuc hive) containing the eggs into the old hive, I still cannot find any larvae, only some capped brood.  I'm really confused and am at a loss as to what has happened.  I was hoping that the bees in the old hive would use the frame of eggs to eventually produce a new queen.  As usual, your comments are greatly appreciated.

                 Thanks,   Jester

[Robo]

The two deep supers are extremely heavy and laden with honey and nectar.  The bees don't seem to be too interested in the median supers above.  I cannot find a queen but I have never been able to find my queens. 

Perhaps they are honey bound and she has no where to lay?   Did you find any queen cells? 

[Kathyp]

any sign that they superseded her and the new queen is not laying yet?

[iddee]

Give the virgin queen a week or two to start laying. They have cleaned the cells in preparation, so the time in nearing. They don't polish cells in a queenless hive.

[Brian D. Bray]

I have a couple of questions - or more likely I need some feedback.  Seems that every time I get going, I always run into problems.  I have one hive that lasted over the winter (my first winter).  The bees seemed to be doing well in the spring but now I cannot find any eggs or larvae etc.  The bees look very happy and busy

They sound queen right, are they russian by chance?  Russians will go into a self impossed brood dearth to control varroa and that is often mistaken for queenlessness.

The two deep supers are extremely heavy and laden with honey and nectar.  The bees don't seem to be too interested in the median supers above.  I cannot find a queen but I have never been able to find my queens.  There are clearly no signs of infection or other abnormalities.  The hive in fact looks immaculately clean waiting for eggs to be laid.

If those 2 deeps are supposed to be your brood chambers then they have backfilled the hive and your queen has no place in which to lay eggs.  Either pull some of those deep honey frames into a 3rd deep super or harvest for personal use and replace the removed frames with empty frames, this will cause the bees to drawn new combs and give the queen a place to lay eggs.  You'll probably find that, if actually honey bound, the queen will start laying eggs before the cells are hardly started.  I've actually see 1 queen lay eggs on undrawn foundation, sure was motivation for the workers to draw comb quickly.

I purchased a nuc approximately a month ago.  The bees are doing fabulously well and have basically filled out the second upper deep super already.  I see bees in all stages of development.  I did few things different this time.  I have nine frames in instead of 10.  The bees built comb perpendicular to 2 frames which I have removed.  These bees have also almost completely drawn out the median super.  One frame had a tremendous number of eggs on it so I took it out and put it into the other hive (after carefully removing all of're the bees).  I replaced it with a frame with foundation only.  It has already been drawn out and is partially used.  I guess the new hive/nuc is doing well.

These bees sound like Italian stock whereas your overwinter bees sound more like Carnies or Russians from their behavior patterns.

a week after placing the frame (from the nuc hive) containing the eggs into the old hive, I still cannot find any larvae, only some capped brood.  I'm really confused and am at a loss as to what has happened.  I was hoping that the bees in the old hive would use the frame of eggs to eventually produce a new queen.  As usual, your comments are greatly appreciated.

                 Thanks,   Jester

I don't think your old hive is queenless it is either in a self imposed brood dearth or honey bound.  Rearrange you frames so give the queen space to lay and make the bees drawn comb.  Bees will sometimes view a hive full of honey as time to swarm so you carryover hive may have done that, swarming induces a period of brood dearth in its own right.

One more thought.  Are you using all wood/wax frames or have you mixed wood and plastic foundation or frames?  Bees having worked wood will often swarm rather than work plastic or they will backfill and still refuse to work the plastic.  Plastic needs to be air out as much as possible before use, an additional layer of wax painted onto the foundation, and other inducements like syrup sprayed on the plastic frames.  Using vanilla in the syrup will help mask to odor of newer plastic.