Bee coverage on capped frame.

[leominsterbeeman]

I moved a  frame of capped brood to my observation hive and took along all adhearing bees on the frame.    

I don't know if this is enough bees.  The bees cover about 1/4 of the capped brood.  Is this enough or will the capped brood not be able to stay warm and develop properly?  

I can't quite tell if any of the capped brood have hatched.  I have not seen any in the process of hatching.  I am watching some particular cells to see if anything happens.

I also gave them a new queen that they are in the process of freeing from the queen cage.   there is also a frame of foundation in this 2 deep frame hive.

There is also a lot of fecal staining going on inside the hive,  Dysentary stains on the glass, on the capped brood, on the foundation frame.  Looks bad.  maybe there are just not enough bees to  keep the hive clean.

[Michael Bush]

>The bees cover about 1/4 of the capped brood. Is this enough or will the capped brood not be able to stay warm and develop properly?

Capped don't require as much heat as open brood, but I'd like to see them totaly covered.

>I can't quite tell if any of the capped brood have hatched.

Obviously they hatched or they wouldn't be capped.  Or do you mean emerged?

>I also gave them a new queen that they are in the process of freeing from the queen cage. there is also a frame of foundation in this 2 deep frame hive.

I'd shake a couple of frames of bees into a nuc with not frames and connect the nuc to the entrance tube until they move into the observation hive.

>There is also a lot of fecal staining going on inside the hive, Dysentary stains on the glass, on the capped brood, on the foundation frame. Looks bad. maybe there are just not enough bees to keep the hive clean.

They have dysentary.  Anything that might have caused that?  The bees eating something besides nectar, honey or sugar syrup?  No matter how few bees there are to support the hive, they should still be able to make it outside to go.

[leominsterbeeman]

Thanks for the update.

I think the move stressed them out, and Oops,  I hadn't completely unblocked  the entrance and they were trying to get out and then a day later they were making the hive a mess.  

I had been feeding them sugar syrup in a  1:1 ratio.  The weather has been damp and they have not been going out to much.

I'm a work now and I will see what I have when I get home today.  Maybe they have released the queen.   I'd like to give them some time before I have to go in and clean everything out again.


Capped brood have not emerged.   Got it. I always thought that when they emerge, they have hatched.    So when do they hatch - when them go from egg to larve or larvae to  pupa?

[Michael Bush]

>I think the move stressed them out, and Oops, I hadn't completely unblocked the entrance and they were trying to get out and then a day later they were making the hive a mess.

That would explain the dysentary.

>I always thought that when they emerge, they have hatched. So when do they hatch - when them go from egg to larve or larvae to pupa?

When they go from eggs to a larvae the eggs hatch.  Eggs hatch, larvae get capped, bees emerge.  :)  But many people seem to call emergence hatching, which gets confusing.

[leominsterbeeman]

I had put the new frame of bees in on Friday and they finally released the queen last night (Wednesday)  I saw her taking a walk.

 Right now she stands out.

The hive that I stole them from were Italian and she is Carnolian, (her abdomen is almost all black).

I also noted, that when she was in the queen cage, she looked real small to me (almost indistingable from her attendents).   I had thought that maybe I had a clunker-queen that wasn't mated well.  And the drones seemed to be very interested in what was going on in the cage.
She seems to have swelled since being released.

[Michael Bush]

>I also noted, that when she was in the queen cage, she looked real small to me (almost indistingable from her attendents). I had thought that maybe I had a clunker-queen that wasn't mated well.

She's probably been banked for a while in a cage and wasn't laying so she slimmed down.

>And the drones seemed to be very interested in what was going on in the cage.

Irelevant.  They are only interested in queens that are flying through a DCA (Drone Congregation Area)  Drones don't mate in the hive.  Ever.  They have to go to the "singles bar" (DCA) to find a queen.

>She seems to have swelled since being released.

They've fattened her back up to lay again.  She should start in a few days.

[leominsterbeeman]

I added some bees to the observation hive on Friday.


The coverage was not enough to sustain the hive.  It was a good thing I added bees because a lot of the capped brood never emerged.  Some ofthe bees that came out were deformed -little stubs for wings, now the workers are pulling out the dead brood from the cells and discarding them.

With the additoin of new bees I would say I doubled the population.  The queen has also started to lay eggs with more regularity.   None of her brood has emerged as of yet.

[Finsky]

I moved a  frame of capped brood to my observation hive and took along all adhearing bees on the frame.    

I don't know if this is enough bees.

You should take a frame where is capped brood but on half of area bees are emerged and  many are coming out. Also when you move a frame to hive you should keep all bees with it. It would be good if fmare has plenty just emerged bees.  Do this in the evening because bees escape at once when they find that they have missed the queen. Also you can lock them in for 2 days that they keep brood warm.  You should put your observation hive in dark place during that time.

If hive is too cool, bees will die in periferia.

[wingmaster]

:D   I have kept observation hive’s for a lot of years. They can be a lot of fun. What I do with mine is when its time to requeen I set it up with two new frames of foundation and I put in about 1/12 to 2 lbs of young bees and the old queen don’t have to cage her just put here in with the bees. Make sure you feed them well and don’t cage them in for more than 24 hours or less at a time. That way I can bank the old queen till I know the new one is laying well if she doesn’t work out I just put the old queen back in the hive. You don’t need the best queen in an observation hive they build up very fast and swarm so anything that will slow them down will give you more time to watch them. Its fun to see them draw the comb and it makes a clean looking hive to show off. The bees in your hive with deformed wings are probably from mites. If you pull a brood frame that’s got a lot of mites you will have a lot of deformed wings and will have some that die in there sells. Its easer to treat them for mites when there is no brood. But if you are like me you might wand to watch a hive with the mites. I have used infested frames in the past to see what happens in the hive and to try different treatments on them. You can see if something works or not. If you keep them in your house like me they will be able to keep warm even with a small number of bees. I have a thermometer in mine that I attach with some wax at the top of the foundation on the top frame. They will build the comb around it and you can see haw thaw keep it worm or cool. And when you close them in and take them some place to show them them you can watch it and make sure they don’t get over heated or to cold in the car I have vents that I can close or open win they start having trouble. I like to use Caucasian bees in mine Carniolans will build up real fast and swarm. when Caucasian bees get loose in the house they are so mellow they will not sting unless you really work at pissing them off. And a Caucasians don’t get agitated as much when you are taking them around to show them to people.