What was that sound/ a broodless colony. NEED HELP!

[Apis629]

I was checking on a small Russian colony of mine that I made from a split last month and they were oddly aggressive.  I opened the hive, which they were less than thrilled about and did my usuall inspection but, today I NEEDED gloves.  Anyways, I picked up a frame to examine it and the bees buzzed as usuall but, I heard a loud, high pitched sound that sounded like ,"Beeeeeeeeeeeeeee".  This was repeated a few times and I'm not sure wheather that was a queen piping or what.  Probably my biggest concern was that the colony is practically broodless.  I checked on them last Sunday and they had all stages of brood.  Now, the only brood is capped.  I searched the entire hive and couldn't find any eggs or the queen.  The population, however, has greatly increased even since I last opened them a week ago, so, I know they didn't swarm.  There weren't any queen cells either; supersedure or swarm.  THe center two frames were entirely full of capped brood, some emerging but, all the other frames had a few capped and very little honey or nectar.  There was a fair bit of pollen.  I'm wondering why some bee in the colony made that sound and what I can do to help them start rearing more brood?  I have started feeding them 2:1 sugar syrup (sugar:water).  I am in a panic.

[Finsky]

and what I can do to help them start rearing more brood?  I have started feeding them 2:1 sugar syrup (sugar:water).  I am in a panic.

When you cheched 7 days ago you shoud have some larvas yet if queen was there a week ago. But when you have no larva, queen have left 3 days ealier and took a  small group of bees with it OR they have raised a ne queen which have emerged 10 days ago and killed old queen.

If hey have no queen, they surely had raised queen cells.

MORE BROOD?

You need to give syrup that bees have some kind of food store . Do not give too much because it takes room from hive.

You do not tell, how many frames you have in hive.

You get more brood when you have one box full of bees. It is able to raise normally brood. If it is not full take a frame of emerging brood from bigger hive. One full brood frame gives 3 frames bees.

If you are greed, you may give larva frames to bigger hive to raise  and then you give emerging brood or empty frame to lay eggs.

If your queen have emerged 10 days ago it begins to lay egg very soon . It depends how you have mating  weathers.

[gsferg]

Probably my biggest concern was that the colony is practically broodless.  I checked on them last Sunday and they had all stages of brood.  Now, the only brood is capped.  I searched the entire hive and couldn't find any eggs or the queen.  The population, however, has greatly increased even since I last opened them a week ago, so, I know they didn't swarm.

Nathan, I don't know for beekeeping in Florida, but in much of the rest of the country about now, most hives are broodless. I haven't seen eggs in my hives for weeks. Also, when a queen stops laying she can slim down a lot and be harder to locate, especially if they're not marked. You didn't say if she was marked or not. I suspect also that when they've stopped laying, they tend to be more skittish- hiding in the corners of frames, not marching around the frames inspecting cells and preoccupied with laying like they usually are. I mean, if they're not laying eggs, what do queens do?

I think you're right, it's unlikely they swarmed this late and if they did I'd expect to find swarm cells. What do your other hives look like? Are they russian also? Do they have eggs and open brood?

I don't know what that noise was you heard, if it's even relevant. As for being a bit hotter than usual, that could be due to a number of things. Without open brood to care for, your bees might be inclined to fly more. Dunno. I've always found queenless hives to be unhappy, a bit more unsettled maybe, but not necessarily more aggressive. On the contrary, they're usually more lethargic- not the usual level of activity i.e., a lot of bees with nothing to do. The hives also tend to make an unhappy discontented "roaring" noise. Doesn't sound like that's what you heard though.

I can't say if your hive is queenless or not, but right off, the absence of eggs this time of year isn't to be unexpected. You might want to wait for a nice sunny day and check again, carefully, without smoke. She'll be on a frame with a lot of bees.

George-

[Apis629]

Sorry I wasn't to specific about the hive, It's a 10 frame langstroth and the outermost frame on each side is just foundation, one in from that has been drawn on one side, and all the rest are mostly fully drawn.  WHen I did the split I gave them 3 frames of completely drawn comb from my Italian colony.  Oh, and, I'm talking about deep frames.  Unfortunately, I accidentaly ordered an unmarked/unclipped queen so, no, she's not marked.  I'm going to check on my Italian colony to determine if the broodless state is due to the fact that Winter is comming.

[manowar422]

Here's a sound file of a queen piping

http://hemingwaysouthcarolina.com/sounds/queenpiping.wav

Is this what you heard?

[Finsky]

 I'm going to check on my Italian colony to determine if the broodless state is due to the fact that Winter is comming.

Florida weather now : http://weathercenter.com/

79 F = 26 C,  can't help what is happening somewhere else.

We are just wrinting much about hives which have had expectionally much brood this autumn.  Cant help with "most" data, if 30% have brood when they enter to winterball.

Your another hive has eggs and larvas, it means nothing to another hive.

Of course it is usefull to learn what happens in hives before winter, if you have winter at all n Florida :roll:

You can check the queen: GIve to the hive  frame with eggs and young larvas. If it has no queen, after 3 days you see emercency cells.  If nothing happens, you have queen in the hive. It is good test.

[Apis629]

That sound of a queen piping is almost exacly what I heard but, there weren't any short calls only long ones lasting probably 2-3 seconds.

[newbee101]

I would guess you have a Queen then.

[Apis629]

A queen that hasn't started laying yet...queens only pipe before they start laying, right?

[Finsky]

That sound of a queen piping is almost exacly what I heard but, there weren't any short calls only long ones lasting probably 2-3 seconds.

Good to know.  In computer voice I suppose that queen was running along frames. Another style is that it walk slowly on combs and press it's thorax against combs and give longer sounds.

Seems to be that you have a queen. After one week you should have eggs there. But you should have more sugar stores in your hive. I do not know, what imeans "Florida winter". Does your bees get honey year around or pollen?

Chech egg laying after one week. Depends on weather when it have mating flight.

[Apis629]

Pollen is almost a year round thing but, nectar flows seem to decelerate and eventually stop from December to January or early February.

[Apis629]

UPDATE...

I just checked on the hive today and, there were eggs...tons of 'em!  There were even a few young larvae just bearly bigger than the eggs.  And yes, I'm sure it's a queen.  There were only one per cell.  I guess I'll just have to find out how these new bees are tempermentaly when they start to emerge in about 3 weeeks.

[Horns Pure Honey]

Sounds like a slow queen to me my friend. There is also some advice that could be given about new bee behavoir, at different times of the queens life she uses different drone sperm which in part gives you different timpered bees. You would think that the sperm of all drones would combine inside of her but in fact it layers itself giving you the different moods once again, just a little info. I have gone through this myself and it seamed to work out in the end so just hang in there, good luck! :D

[Finsky]

Very good!

So colony makes brood as much as nurser bees can nurse them. Do not wait any more. After 3 weeks new nurserer emerge again and hive is able to expand again. But do not give too much sugar. It just fills combs and restricts the brood area. If you have almost full food frames on boath sides that is enough.

Do not force them to make brood by giving ne room on the top. If it is necessary, give new room under the brood. So they are able to maintain brood temperature better. When it is honeyflow season, it is diffrent case.

[downunder]

at different times of the queens life she uses different drone sperm which in part gives you different timpered bees. You would think that the sperm of all drones would combine inside of her but in fact it layers itself giving you the different moods :D

I would love to see a reference on this?

Queens simply do not layer sperm, it is a common beekeeping misconception. I personally witness this on a weekly basis in my work with a bee genetics lab. A queen mates with approximately 10-16 drones. Queens cannot choose what sperm they use to fertilize an egg. At all times, all of the drone fathers progeny are represented in a colony and generally in equal proportions. The interactions between subfamilies within a colony is amazing. Particularly in the area of worker policing.

Drone sperm does clump and sometimes you can get a higher proportion of some subfamilies but not enough to describe the temper shifts you mention.

[Finsky]

Queens simply do not layer sperm, it is a common beekeeping misconception. I personally witness this on a weekly basis in my work with a bee genetics lab. A queen mates with approximately 10-16 drones.

We have talked about this and some one knew that after latest knowledge sperm of different drones are in packages. Is that so or are the sperm mixed in queen's container?

[Horns Pure Honey]

That was some info I got from the Illinois state lab, if they are wrong then so be it, no big deal to me, thanks for the correction if in fact I am wrong :)

[downunder]

As I said, if there is a reference for this I would love to read it. Sperm is mixed in the spermatheca.

We emerge progeny of colonies in incubators every week, these bees are then genotyped and you get full representation of all subfamilies when testing 200 bees.

We inseminate queens with 5 unrelated drones and get relatively the same distribution of subfamilies every time.

If a queen layered sperm why would they multiple mate? It's widely known that hives with a greater mix of subfamilies are better at task specialisation as they have a wide variety of genetic variability.

We have genotyped thousands of colonies and you get all subfamilies represented.

[Finsky]

If a queen layered sperm why would they multiple mate? It's widely known that hives with a greater mix of subfamilies are better at task specialisation as they have a wide variety of genetic variability.
.

Thanks downunder! I appreciate your comments.

[Horns Pure Honey]

Thanks downunder, can't learn from your mistakes without answeres, thanks again, bye :D

[Diver]

downunder said

Queens simply do not layer sperm, it is a common beekeeping misconception.
Queens cannot choose what sperm they use to fertilize an egg
Sperm is mixed in the spermatheca.
Drone sperm does clump and sometimes you can get a higher proportion of some subfamilies
We inseminate queens with 5 unrelated drones and get relatively the same distribution of subfamilies every time.

My query is:
From the above it would appear that the sperm is mixed quite well in the spermatheca to get relatively the same distribution of subfamilies every time.  Is this mixing done by the queen, or or the multiple mating over a short period of time. Does the occasional clumping result from a malfunction in the queen or mating over a longer period allowing the sperm to congeal somewhat between each drone mating. Neither of these, but something else?
To know this would help dispel any misconceptions and help in raising better queens possibly.

[Michael Bush]

All the evidence I've seen or heard (studies, my experience etc.) would say it's a little of both.  There are times that you see population shifts in a hive where it used to be all black and now there's a mixture of yellow.  Same queen but later in the year.  It does not "layer" per se.  It's not like you get all of one subfamily followed by a different subfamily.  But it's also not a uniform mix.  As mentioned above, the sperm "clumps" (if that's what you want to call it) and there are periodic changes in the mixture of subfamilies from time to time.

This "misconception" is based on real life observations when there are changes over time in color, demenor etc.

[Horns Pure Honey]

Very nicely put Michael :D

[downunder]

All the evidence I've seen or heard (studies, my experience etc.) would say it's a little of both.  There are times that you see population shifts in a hive where it used to be all black and now there's a mixture of yellow.  Same queen but later in the year.  It does not "layer" per se.  It's not like you get all of one subfamily followed by a different subfamily.  But it's also not a uniform mix.  As mentioned above, the sperm "clumps" (if that's what you want to call it) and there are periodic changes in the mixture of subfamilies from time to time.

This "misconception" is based on real life observations when there are changes over time in color, demenor etc.

I'm not arguing that you get these population shifts, however after genotyping 200 bees at random at any time of the year from a colony you get all subfamilies represented. This indicates that this shift is not so significant.

We have been doing this genetic work for 10 years now. Temper shifts in colonies can simply be related to season itself, food availability, pest presence etc.

I'm not sure wether all this genetics stuff actually helps or just confuses the issue more.

I still have not seen one bit of published information to support that the proportion of progeny in say 60,000 bees is greatly uneven.

I think if it does happen it's more to do with a lower number of drone fathers during mating and one of these clumping significantly.

Unfortunately the scientific world talks replicates. You must be able to replicate this at any time of year with any colony. This is where the "exceptions to the rule theory" breaks down

[Jerrymac]

Drones don't have fathers... Correct??? So if a lot of drones from one queen mates with another queen, that could lessen the number of different traits in a hive.

Suppose a queen was mated with 10 drones that were all produced by the same queen.

[Horns Pure Honey]

You are correct, drones do not have fathers, only grandfathers.

[Michael Bush]

>Temper shifts in colonies can simply be related to season itself, food availability, pest presence etc.

Temper.  Yes.  Color.  No.

[downunder]

Ok my mistake, what I ment to say is male companions.

If drones from one hive all mate with one queen then you get a uniform progeny. This is what happens when you are maintaining lines by A.I. or mating them in an isolated area.

If it happens I hope it's drones from a colony with a good temper :D

In Australia we do not have Varroa, so we still have an extremely high feral population 70 - 110 feral colonies per square kilometre of bushland, so this mating with the same drones is generally unlikely.

[downunder]

>Temper shifts in colonies can simply be related to season itself, food availability, pest presence etc.

Temper.  Yes.  Color.  No.

I am hearing exactly what you say, but this has not been published. It has been said to me by a few beekeepers over the years. I'm not saying it doesn't happen either.

In most cases their queens are not marked or wings clipped and they cannot guarentee 100% that it was the original queen.

I've worked 300 colonies for the last 15 years and can't say I've seen this happen. It doesn't mean it doesn't, but it would be a hard one to research and publish without many replicates.

What you see visually and what you see with genetics can be deceiving from both directions. As I said, we have genotyped 1000,s of colonies with 200 bee samples and all subfamilies are always represented.

It is 100% verified by removing the queens spermatheca and genotyping the sperm within it.

There is still a lot we don't know about things like sperm competition and mate choice (wether they can naturally avoid in-breeding or not) however it's not yet published but we a working on it.

We have just completed a large experiment individually watching more than 300 queens going on mating flights, how many flights, duration, mating sign,s etc. We have then genotyped the brood to look at the amount of sub-families present, over several seasons and in multiple countries.

We are also looking at mate choice in remote location by providing queens with related drones, unrelated drones, and mixed populations to investigate the issue of mate choice.

Hopefully we will have some useful answers shortly.

[Finsky]

We have just completed a large experiment individually watching more than 300 queens going on mating flights, how many flights, duration, mating sign,s etc. We have then genotyped the brood to look at the amount of sub-families present, over several seasons and in multiple countries.

Do you have in internet your reports?

I just found interesting piece http://www.rirdc.gov.au/reports/HBE/03-037.pdf
Interesting is survival of queens after mating nuc.

But one question. Here is the text: "During the first 5 or 6 days of adult life, worker bees consume large amounts of pollen to obtain the protein and amino acids required to complete their growth and development. If young adult worker bees do not consume needed proteins, their hypopharyngeal glands (brood food glands) will not develop completely, and their royal jelly will not support normal growth and development of worker larvae or egg production in the adult queen." http://maarec.cas.psu.edu/bkCD/HBBiology/nutrition_supplements.htm

I wonder when emerged queen is in cage and nurser bees cannot feed it, is it any harm if emerged queen goes not get during first days it's froteins "to finish it's development"?.

Have you handled this issue?

[Finsky]

In Australia we do not have Varroa, so we still have an extremely high feral population 70 - 110 feral colonies per square kilometre of bushland, so this mating with the same drones is generally unlikely.

  Every 100 meter's interval there is one colony?

Amazing! That is true!
http://www.deh.gov.au/biodiversity/invasive/publications/bees/
.
.

[downunder]

I should say that is the case in my area, Australia is a big place a lot of it doesn't even have trees so it is varied. Nevertheless the populations are very high. At present we are investigating the so called "background noise" from these feral contributing Small Hive Beetle to managed colonies placed in the area.

[Michael Bush]

>In most cases their queens are not marked or wings clipped and they cannot guarentee 100% that it was the original queen.

All my queens are are marked (EXCEPT the ones I find that are not the original queen).  I try to breed the black ones so I'm very aware of the color of each hive.

[downunder]

[quote="Finsky
Do you have in internet your reports?[/b]

These queen experiments are not published yet. They will appear in scientific journals such as "Apidologie" when completed. I must say I am not the cheif researcher in these particular experiments.


I just found interesting piece http://www.rirdc.gov.au/reports/HBE/03-037.pdf
Interesting is survival of queens after mating nuc.


It's funny you should mention his research, I was speaking to the author at work today. Most queen breeders now catch mated queens in 3 week cycles as apposed to the old 2 week cycle as they have better acceptance rates. It also showed that there was no significant difference in the cage type used to introduce the queens


I wonder when emerged queen is in cage and nurser bees cannot feed it, is it any harm if emerged queen goes not get during first days it's froteins "to finish it's development"?.

Have you handled this issue?[/quote]


I haven't handled this issue however it would be reasonable to assume that it would be detrimental to her development. I don't know anybody here that use emergence cages, most prefer to have her with the bees.

[downunder]

All my queens are are marked (EXCEPT the ones I find that are not the original queen).  I try to breed the black ones so I'm very aware of the color of each hive.[/quote]

Do you control what drones they mate with?

I'm not trying to stir up a hornets nest (so to speak) :D , but as scientists we are taught to go by refereed publications. If we disagree with a theory we need to prove otherwise and have it accepted by impartial referees.

I've recently talked about this issue with 3 world experts on AI on this issue. They say if the temperature is cold the sperm is more prone to coiling and clumping. They agreed that there would be shifts favouring one subfamily over another, however they did not think it would be very significant.

We dissect spermatheca's stain them with pippidium iodide for flourescence microscopy to look at sperm viability. The live sperm stain one colour and dead sperm another (Yes the spermatheca contains dead sperm). This clumping of sperm is visible. What is interesting however is that a lot of the sperm that is clumped is dead.

Yet another mystery for us to work on.

[Michael Bush]

>Do you control what drones they mate with?

Other than my drones, no.  But the ferals are where they came from and that's what else I see besides mine.

>I'm not trying to stir up a hornets nest (so to speak)  , but as scientists we are taught to go by refereed publications. If we disagree with a theory we need to prove otherwise and have it accepted by impartial referees.

I've seen what I've observed originally denied by science and eventually proven by science far too many times to believe "science" over my own observations.

>They agreed that there would be shifts favouring one subfamily over another, however they did not think it would be very significant.

Excatly.  There are shifts.

[Finsky]

Quuen and nosema

Hi downunder

I just have around 15 hives but every spring nosema spoils 1-2 queen so they cannot lay eggs any more. With workers I found that when I give emerged bees from healthy hive, nosema spoiled hive starts to develope normally.

That is odd to me that queen and workers have so different tolerance against nosema.

Before that notion I casted away queen of shrinked hive but during couple of years I found that it is not necessary. Problem is how to give new bees at spring. At night temperature may be  -5C and by day +5C. Most of brood catch cold. Terrarium heaters and electrict heating resolved that problem.