Hygienic behavior or should I worry?

[psbeekeeper]

So last night I took a peek around the front of my hive after feeding and bees, and this is what I found.... .  Does this show a sign of hygienic behavior or is their something worse going on?  Thoughts?

http://imageshack.us/f/153/img2011091500123.jpg/

http://imageshack.us/f/403/img2011091500125.jpg/

[caticind]

Two things may be going on here:

1) Most likely - Hygenic behavior - which is good, but make sure you know what your mite load is.

2) Preparing to kick the drones out - and so deciding not to spend more space or food rearing them.

If you don't know how many mites you have, find out.  And take a quick peek in the brood nest to see how much drone brood there is.  They may just be clearing out the last of it.

[Hethen57]

I think it is just regular bee-havior.  They self regulate the drone population by aborting them when they are overloaded.  At this time of year, in a Northern latititude, there shouldn't be drones hatching.  But like Catidind indicated, don't get too complacent that it means they will successfully battle the varroa any better than any other hive.  All if my hives that died out last winter did the same thing last spring and summer.

[psbeekeeper]

Two things may be going on here:

1) Most likely - Hygenic behavior - which is good, but make sure you know what your mite load is.

2) Preparing to kick the drones out - and so deciding not to spend more space or food rearing them.

If you don't know how many mites you have, find out.  And take a quick peek in the brood nest to see how much drone brood there is.  They may just be clearing out the last of it.

Not sure what my mite load is.. I might be able to check on Sunday, but if I can't is it still a concern?  I doubt if their is a little or any drone brood at all at this time of the season, but I'll take a gander  :)...

[Kathyp]

have you had a cold snap that might have killed some brood that was in burr comb, etc.?

[psbeekeeper]

have you had a cold snap that might have killed some brood that was in burr comb, etc.?

It was in the 40's last night...

[caticind]

Two things may be going on here:

1) Most likely - Hygenic behavior - which is good, but make sure you know what your mite load is.

2) Preparing to kick the drones out - and so deciding not to spend more space or food rearing them.

If you don't know how many mites you have, find out.  And take a quick peek in the brood nest to see how much drone brood there is.  They may just be clearing out the last of it.

Not sure what my mite load is.. I might be able to check on Sunday, but if I can't is it still a concern?  I doubt if their is a little or any drone brood at all at this time of the season, but I'll take a gander  :)...

Kathyp has another good suggestion - cleaning out of chilled brood.  You must have had some drone brood, because all of those dead pupae you photographed seem to be drones.

Mite loads are definitely a concern at this time of year.  The number won't tell you anything about why the bees are chucking out drone pupae, but it will tell you which of your hives will probably be dead by spring.

[psbeekeeper]

Two things may be going on here:

1) Most likely - Hygenic behavior - which is good, but make sure you know what your mite load is.

2) Preparing to kick the drones out - and so deciding not to spend more space or food rearing them.

If you don't know how many mites you have, find out.  And take a quick peek in the brood nest to see how much drone brood there is.  They may just be clearing out the last of it.

Not sure what my mite load is.. I might be able to check on Sunday, but if I can't is it still a concern?  I doubt if their is a little or any drone brood at all at this time of the season, but I'll take a gander  :)...

Kathyp has another good suggestion - cleaning out of chilled brood.  You must have had some drone brood, because all of those dead pupae you photographed seem to be drones.

Mite loads are definitely a concern at this time of year.  The number won't tell you anything about why the bees are chucking out drone pupae, but it will tell you which of your hives will probably be dead by spring.

So the hive that is chucking out the dead pupae before winter will be the survivors or the dead ones in the spring?

[CapnChkn]

I'm sure that's chilled brood.  I saw the same here.  We had months of hot dry weather, finally the tropical storm came in and gave us a drink.  Behind it was a cold front that dropped the temperature 40℉ (22℃).  I had a clot of bees on the landing board that never made it in, though there was plenty of room inside.  They just stayed out there in the rain, and the cold, and would now be candidates for the "Darwin awards" if they could have reproduced.

They had never seen that kind of cold being summer bees.  They had to cluster to keep the temperature up, and that brood was probably out on the edge of it.  I've seen them throw out the drones, but I don't see drones in the photos.  There were a few of the worker brood in front of one of my hives.  I guess they get too cold to haul them off, it was also raining, but they can't help pull them out of the nest.

I would suppose you would have a living hive in the spring, if they didn't remove the corpses from being potential cultures of disease, they would have a lot less chance.  If you have a hive that isn't removing the chilled brood, I would suppose they would be the dead one.   

[caticind]

Two things may be going on here:

1) Most likely - Hygenic behavior - which is good, but make sure you know what your mite load is.

2) Preparing to kick the drones out - and so deciding not to spend more space or food rearing them.

If you don't know how many mites you have, find out.  And take a quick peek in the brood nest to see how much drone brood there is.  They may just be clearing out the last of it.

Not sure what my mite load is.. I might be able to check on Sunday, but if I can't is it still a concern?  I doubt if their is a little or any drone brood at all at this time of the season, but I'll take a gander  :)...

Kathyp has another good suggestion - cleaning out of chilled brood.  You must have had some drone brood, because all of those dead pupae you photographed seem to be drones.

Mite loads are definitely a concern at this time of year.  The number won't tell you anything about why the bees are chucking out drone pupae, but it will tell you which of your hives will probably be dead by spring.

So the hive that is chucking out the dead pupae before winter will be the survivors or the dead ones in the spring?

Could be either.  Hygenic behavior is a good thing to see, but what really matters is how low they can keep the mite count.  So one hive may throw out no drone brood because they have few mites.  Another may throw out many because they are hygenic, but still have very high mites and die over winter.  Another may throw out many because they are hygenic, and successfully reduce the population of mites and live.  Another may not pull out drone pupae, have lots of mites, and crash and die.

Throwing out drone pupae means either that they are just done rearing drones, that some just happened to be chilled, or that those pupae were infested with varroa.  You cannot know what role varroa plays without taking more steps yourself to find out what your mite count is.