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Chronological Thread  
  • From: Randall Austin <ra41717 AT gmail.com>
  • To: kirsten.bothwell AT gmail.com, Walter Starks <walterstarks AT icloud.com>
  • Cc: ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org, thrhodes AT hotmail.com
  • Subject: Re: [ocba] Missing queen
  • Date: Thu, 10 Mar 2016 09:56:04 -0500

Kirsten,

The article "I Need to Buy a Queen! Or Do I?" <here> addresses some of your questions.

Randall

On 3/10/2016 9:44 AM, kirsten.bothwell AT gmail.com wrote:
043A3B50-893B-41CC-BD3D-9075D720E823 AT gmail.com" type="cite">
We have a similar situation with one of our hives. On Sun Feb 21 we opened the hive and found several supersedure cells and a scattering of capped brood. 

The next Sunday, we went in and found no queen cells, no capped brood and lots of hot bees. 

This past Sunday, we didn't see any signs of eggs or larvae although we only looked in the top deep. 

Given the off/on weather and probable shortage of drones, I'm wondering how long we should wait before acting on this situation. I'm also wondering if it's too late to place a frame of brood and eggs from another hive. How long do we have before the dread laying workers show up?

Thanks in advance!

Kirsten

On Mar 9, 2016, at 5:39 PM, Walter Starks <walterstarks AT icloud.com> wrote:

You won't be able to introduce a new queen. The bees have already accepted the laying worker as their new queen. IMO the easiest way to solve this problem is to combine the hive with the laying worker with your queen right hive. You can always split them later in the season once new queens are available or they can make their own. The laying workers will die off in a few weeks.

______

Walter




You never can tell with bees. ~ Winnie-the-Pooh

On Mar 8, 2016, at 2:30 PM, thrhodes AT hotmail.com wrote:

I checked my three hives at the end of February when we had a couple warm days.  As expected, one hive was completely dead as evidenced by the carnage from robbing out front. One hive looked really good and strong with a good brood pattern and sufficient resources. I flipped the brood box to the bottom and then looked at the third hive.  When I opened up the hive and started looking, I immediately knew something was wrong.  I have what to me looks like a classic laying worker situation.  The "brood" is spotty, all drone in length, no apparent queen cells, no brood pattern characteristic of the good hive, and no queen that I could see.  I took what frames of honey were left in the dead hive and put it in this one.  Perhaps throwing good resources at a lost cause, but then I wasn't sure since I'd never had this happen before.

Just to be sure, I gave it some time and rechecked today.  No change for the better and if anything that laying worker has really kicked it up.  Resources are down, but there are still a good amount of worker bees and some resources left.  

At this point, what's the best option?  In an active laying worker situation, would introducing a queen work if I can get one or are they just likely to kill it off.  I'm leaning toward just taking a frame or two of brood from my other hive and seeing if they will draw out some queen cells from it and hopefully get queen-right.  I could also briefly newspaper combine the two hives into one as well and split later, but if there is any chance I can save it separately, that would be ideal. Thoughts?

Thanks,
Haywood
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