need advtce--something new to me

pembroke · April 21, 2012, 12:16:47 PM

I've been in this for about 8 years. I'm seeing dead bees on landing board every morning. Some more than other mornings. I've been in hive see NO brood except small amount of drone ready to hatch out, no queen because of large amount of bees and she's not marked and I didn't want to go through every frame. I don't see anything that would lead me to think foul brood or chalk brood. Any suggestions on why dead bees will be appreciated. Thanks. Pembroke

yockey5 · April 21, 2012, 12:23:16 PM

"no queen because of large amount of bees and she's not marked and I didn't want to go through every frame."

After you have found her, or the lack of her you may get your answer, but this is a must do as I see it. Eggs, no eggs, larvae, no larvae, capped brood, no capped brood?
Betting you may have a laying worker, but just a guess. More info is needed.

Jim134 · April 21, 2012, 12:24:58 PM

Quote from: pembroke on April 21, 2012, 12:16:47 PM
I've been in this for about 8 years. I'm seeing dead bees on landing board every morning. Some more than other mornings. I've been in hive see NO brood except small amount of drone ready to hatch out, no queen because of large amount of bees and she's not marked and I didn't want to go through every frame. I don't see anything that would lead me to think foul brood or chalk brood. Any suggestions on why dead bees will be appreciated. Thanks. Pembroke

Has at been cold chill brood or just old bees and you see NO eggs. Swarm out because of overcrowding??. You get a virgin queen.

BEE HAPPY Jim 134 :)

Kathyp · April 21, 2012, 12:30:54 PM

QuoteNO brood except small amount of drone ready to hatch out, no queen because of large amount of bees and she's not marked and I didn't want to go through every frame.

i'd guess laying workers also, or a queen that needs to be replaced. no way to get around going through the entire hive. otherwise we are all guessing.

as for dead bees, sounds like house cleaning. how many dead bees. there's a difference between seeing a few and seeing 100's.
if they have no brood to raise the find other things to do.

pembroke · April 21, 2012, 10:02:21 PM

it looks like I will have to go through the whole hive and take a closer look. As for how many dead bees on the landing board the board sometimes has looked black, (maybe a hunderd or more, sometimes less). This is each day. No pollen going into hive, which tels me no laying going on now. Other suggestions???

Kathyp · April 21, 2012, 10:53:29 PM

do you have other hives?

pembroke · April 22, 2012, 08:18:36 AM

Yes. Have other hives. May end up moving a frame of eggs and trying to start over in this hive. Pembroke

Kathyp · April 22, 2012, 12:26:01 PM

i wouldn't waste the eggs on a laying worker hive. others will disagree.

what i would do is take that hive and put it on top of another with window screen in between. make an upper entrance for the one on top. or...put a queen right hive on top with the screen between. hopefully this will suppress the urge for the workers to lay. just make sure you have openings for both hives.
when you have no more eggs or drone brood in the queenless hive, then give them a frame of eggs. it will take some time but in this way you don't waste eggs on a hive that won't make a queen anyway, and you don't risk your queened hive by trying to combine them.

my preference is to take the laying worker hive a ways away from the other hives and shake it out. the bees will return to the yard and not finding their own hive, will join others. messing with a laying worker hive is time consuming and a waste of resources unless you want to buy a queen and cage her in there until the laying workers are suppressed. in that case, go to Michael Bush's site. he has some really good info on how to do this.