Weak Hive Making Queen Cells.

Ibmerlin · July 12, 2009, 04:13:36 PM

I am a first year beekeeper. I started noticing that my "borg" hive was starting to lag behind my "alpha" hive about a month ago. The "Alpha is doing great and I have started to add honey supers to it. I noticed that "Borg" seemed to have much less traffic flying in and out and many more drones flying than the other hive. I use 8 frame equipment and added the third box three weeks ago.

Today I opened the hives and the third box had hardly been worked and then found 3 peanuts on the bottom box. I could not find the queen but there was brood in all forms of development. see pic:

So I believe that the queen is still here but is weak and was not fertilized well.

Here are pics of the queens cells.

and

I had just ordered an extra hive from Brushy and if it gets here in time will try to somehow split the queens.

If anyone has any advice or thoughts on what my best coarse of action should be next I would appreciate it.

Thank you in advance
Merlin

JP · July 12, 2009, 05:06:00 PM

I would take a frame from your good hive that has eggs and/or very young larvae, ones that form a "C" but are very small.(they can't be more than 3-4 days old, 3 is best)

If the bees trying to supersede the "borg" hive chose larvae that were too old, the queens won't amount to much. By giving them eggs/very young larvae they can make a new queen for your borg hive.

Good luck!

...JP

iddee · July 12, 2009, 06:22:35 PM

JP, why would you think the cells were from old larva? The cells are capped, meaning they are at least 10 days old, and are in supercedure position. There are very young larva in the first photo. Possibly an egg or two. The cells were almost assuredly made from fresh eggs laid in the queen cups. The hive may be weak enough to need a boost with a frame of young bees while the new queen mates, but not for a new queen from the alpha hive larva.

JP · July 12, 2009, 08:01:53 PM

I don't know what they made those queen cells from Iddee, but just as a precaution against getting a dud, I didn't think it a bad idea to give them something good to work with.

Was just thinking better safe than sorry.

...JP

Ibmerlin · July 12, 2009, 10:06:45 PM

Seeing that there are brood of all ages I believe that the queen is still alive but I feel she was not fertilized well. I was hoping that I could use the queens that are about to hatch if at all possible. I am new and not sure how to go about it or even if it is possible but if I could find the old marked queen and remove her( or can I just let the bees do it after the new queen hatches) and let the new queen have that hive and then remove one of the other queen cells to a new hive that has brood from my other two old hives. This way I might end up with 3 hives. Does this sound do-able or is there a better way to go about it.

Thank you for the help
Merlin

sc-bee · July 12, 2009, 10:25:42 PM

>JP, why would you think the cells were from old larva? The cells are capped, meaning they are at least 10 days old, and are in supercedure position.

If larvae were chosen and older than recommended for quality queens is it not possible for them to be capped before 10 days?

From Beeworks queen video paraphrased "after split is made do an inspection on day four. Destroy any queen cells capped at this time because the larvae they were made from did not receive the proper feeding and will become an inferior queen"

Help me out here folks --- can or can a cell not be capped before ten days?

JP · July 12, 2009, 11:14:53 PM

I've seen queen cells drawn and capped in 2 and a half days.

...JP

iddee · July 12, 2009, 11:25:58 PM

In this case, as they did have day old larva available, do you think they might use 4 or 5 day old larva to make queen cells?

sc-bee · July 13, 2009, 12:53:44 AM

I get the point id ;)

JP · July 13, 2009, 01:28:41 AM

Quote from: iddee on July 12, 2009, 11:25:58 PM
In this case, as they did have day old larva available, do you think they might use 4 or 5 day old larva to make queen cells?

Iddee, I looked at the pictures, the larvae I see are much too old to make queens from. They probably made those queen cells from appropriately aged larvae, but my point was, what if they didn't?

...JP