Do I have enough brood?

[Blackbird]

I was wondering how much brood I should be seeing right now. Would the queen be slowing down her laying?
I inspected on friday and saw, out of three frames that I pulled, only about a half a frame of capped and uncapped larva. Is this normal for this time of year?
This is a new package from April and my first year beekeeping. I wish I had a second hive to campare to.
Initially there was a lot of laying when first installed.
The bees are very active and have lots of honey stored.

[Anonymous]

Are the 3 frames that you looked at from the center of the hive body or the edges? Is this from a one or two hive body colony? Is this the top or bottom hive body? If you have two hive bodies, did you look in the other one? Did you see the queen? You didn't mention seeing any eggs, were any visible?

[Finman]

only about a half a frame of capped and uncapped larva. Is this normal for this time of year?

This is a new package from April and my first year beekeeping.


Initially there was a lot of laying when first installed.
The bees are very active and have lots of honey stored.

If you got the hive in April, hive should have  now 5-6 boxes. Two boxes brood and  2 boxes honey and 1-2 empty boxes for new honey.

Honey must be extracted as soon as 1-2 boxes are capped. If you have hive too full of honey bees will loose their inspiration to gather new.

New beekeepers often are not aware to enlarge the hive, and hive will swarm.  It ispossible that you hive has swarmed or twice and the new queen has started just laying eggs.  - Why, because new beekeepers do not have experience to estimate the growth speed of colony.

When hive is full of honey brood area widden very slowly.

When honey flow is good, bees can swarm as soon as egg space is full of new honey. You can only have egg in the queen cap and old queen has gone. So you must wait  4 weeks after that new queen start to lay eggs.

When hive had bee a long time without brood, new nursing bees are few. New queen starts to widden brood area after that when colony gets enough newborn bees.

In Finland almost all natural flowers are nów gone. In one unit in outer place I hade  10 frames brood and in another place they had only 3 frames. The last one is in the middle of cuktivated fields and they must fly over 1 km to reach flowers.

You have summer there, I guess.

I suppose, that you have now new queen.

If you have capped honey, take it away. Arrange empty space for new honey and eggs.

I think that many has troubles when they start to store winter honey to bees in the middle of summer.  If you like that, take capped honey away, give empty comps and before winter give them one box full of honey =25 kg in Langstroth.

[Blackbird]

I have one large brood chamber and three medium with honey and a fourth they are working on. I have always made sure there was extra space for then to move to and when I add a super I put it under a full one. Also usually intermix the foundation with drawn out frames every other.
It sounds like I need to pull some honey though.
I did see uncapped larva in some cells. Of the frames I pulled one was from the middle, that one had some capped and uncapped brood. the uncapped I saw were kind of curled in the cell so I assume not fresh laid. The other two frames were from closer to the outside. I guess it would be smarter to check the middle frames ?
Should I do a more agressive search for the queen?
I never saw signs of swarming like bearding and such, the hive is in my back yard so I see the outside every day. Could they really have swarmed?
Am I in denial? I don't want to believe they swarmed.

[Finman]

I have one large brood chamber and three medium with honey and a fourth they are working on. .

That seems good! But you should have 2 brood chamber. Or  one full if you use queen exluder.

I have always made sure there was extra space .....I add a super I put it under a full one.

This is really essential during honey season, good!

I did see uncapped larva in some cells. Of the frames I pulled one was from the middle, that one had some capped and uncapped brood. the uncapped I saw were kind of curled in the cell so I assume not fresh laid.

One possibility is that your queen is somehow getting weak. Thats happen.

The other two frames were from closer to the outside. I guess it would be smarter to check the middle frames ?

Brood can be also scattered , one part in brood box but some islands in honey boxes.

HOW MUCH you have bees. If your boxes are full of bees, swarms is not gone. So queen has some problem.

Should I do a more agressive search for the queen?

Don't be agressive. It is not wise to turn upside down  hive because you want to see queen. Some queens hidden themselves on purpose.  Queen usually is seen on farmes which save most bees. You must find eggs. Queen is near eggs. You may have brood somewhere.

[/quote]

Swarn can escape and you see nothing. Is is not matter of believing. :roll:

[Blackbird]

On last inspection I found my queen. The same marked one from my package. So that is good, they haven't swarmed. Also there was more brood when I looked this time. I think the queen is just slowing down her laying in prep for winter. Any way I'm glad they hadn't swarmed.