laying worker for sure!

[newguy]

im picking up a nuc on fri to deal with a laying worker hive, can anyone  offer any tips? i was planning on removing the hive from its location and putting the nuc there, then brushing all the bees in the hive off onto the ground 10 to 15 feet from the hive, as advised. then eventually exchanging the hive body for the nuc.
i think that was the advise i got. i may have got it wrong as it was a lot of info to process for a newguy. im concerned about fighting when the bees from the ground try to go back to the nuc where their hive was, will this be a problem? please advize

[Finsky]

That brushing is old trick and it is not needed.

Give a normal worker larva frame to bees. They start raise emergency queen cells.  It normalizes hive life when they know that they have soon real queen. Worker laying stops. Then join the hive to another.

Worker layers may be tens or hundreds in the hive.

I had Sheffield University's documents but they are any more behind the links.

[newguy]

finsky  
  i realize i can put in a frame of worker larva but i wanted  to get the hive normalized quickly so as not to lose a month of production. i thought this was a good solution. i was told it is difficult to requeen in a laying worker hive but that using a nuc was a pretty effective method. if i let them raise their own queen it will be the end of july before that hive has any new workers, this hive has already been queenless for a month. this was a 3lb package and lost its queen in the first couple of days after i hived it.

[Finsky]

finsky  
  i realize i can put in a frame of worker larva but i wanted  to get the hive normalized quickly so as not to lose a month of production.

It takes only 2 days. Shaking bees in lawn helps not. They still have egg laying workers. I made shaking last time 40 years ago.

I have laying workers every year in my mating nucs. When I give them worker larvae bees calm down and stop egg laying.

And if you have bigger hives, give from them a frame of emerging brood to small hive and it will grow double faster.

[Michael Bush]

The quick method is shake them out and give the frames to another hive.  It's a done deal.  Shaking them out will not get rid of the laying workers but the other hives won't tolerate them.

In my experience one frame of brood usually doesn't snap them out of it but two or three a week apart always seems to work.  These are the only practical methods I've used.  I have requeened a laying worker hive, but it cost me a month and two queens.

[Finsky]

I have requeened a laying worker hive, but it cost me a month and two queens.

The time of summer affects on how bees accept new queen. In the middle of summer there are seldom difficulties.  Early autumn, before I feed winterfood is the most difficult. Even hives has no workers layers it want to kill all strange queens. I have lost often 2-3 queen and then my extra queens are finish. So I leave hive withut queen over winter. In spring  all goes again well.

I have requeened worker egg laying colonies a lot and I have lost queens. Mostly they are 2 frame mating colonies. However when bees have emergency cells and after cells are capped, hive take new queen. When cells are open, bees often attach on new queen.

It needs only one worker which offers to queen poison and then queen is doomed in her home colony too.

I have not noticed that worker eggs bring extra difficulies. Queen setting has many other difficulties.

 4 weeks ago I killed one queen and offered another.  Hive did not like her. After 7 days I offered her again and again bees attached. But then I try to give queen from another hive and it was accepted at once. This I have noticed many times.

I offer queen first under shelter of mesh. If worker try to bite mesh with their jaws it is sign that they want to kill strange queen .

[newguy]

micheal
so if i shake out the bees and give the frames to another hive what comes of those bees that i shook out? will they not try to return to their former location? im picking up a nuc tomorrow(fri) what do you think my action should be.  i was planning on putting the nuc where the laying worker hive was. will this be a mistake because of the returning(shook) bees?

[TwT]

micheal
so if i shake out the bees and give the frames to another hive what comes of those bees that i shook out? will they not try to return to their former location? im picking up a nuc tomorrow(fri) what do you think my action should be.  i was planning on putting the nuc where the laying worker hive was. will this be a mistake because of the returning(shook) bees?

newguy, if you take the hive about 100 feet away and shack out all the bee's then return the hive to it location, the laying worker doesnt know how to get back to the hive thats why you can't shake them out close to the hive, the older forager bee's will return to the hive but the young bee's with the laying worker will not,,,, that's the understanding I have on it..... I have only done this one time and it was a nuc, I shook all the bee's out about 100 feet away and when I put the nuc back in place I got a frame of eggs, brood from another hive and made sure the queen wasn't on that frame and I put it in the hive with the nurse bee's still on it... it worked, that hive still has its queen it raised and going strong.....

[Scott Derrick]

Ted and Micheal,

I have the same problem that I also will be addressing tomorrow. I will be picking up a queen at about 10am. Ted are you saying that all you put into the new hive was a frame of brood / eggs and then shook the frames from the old hive out 100 feet away? You didn't put new queen into the new hive?

So did the frame of brood and eggs need to have a queen cell on it or did they create on knowing there was no existing queen or queen cells in the hive?

What did you do with the frames from the old hive?

I actually have some capped and uncapped honey on the super that is above the brood chamber. I wonder if I can still use that with the new hive?

Scott

[TwT]

Ted and Micheal,

I have the same problem that I also will be addressing tomorrow. I will be picking up a queen at about 10am. Ted are you saying that all you put into the new hive was a frame of brood / eggs and then shook the frames from the old hive out 100 feet away? You didn't put new queen into the new hive?

It was a nuc, I shook out all the bee's 100 foot away, most of the frames in the nuc had honey and pollen, after I replaced the nuc with no bee's, I took a frames of eggs and young brood from another with the nurse bee's still on that frame (didn't shake the bee's off the frame I took from the other hive) and put this frame in the nuc and let then raise a queen themselves

So did the frame of brood and eggs need to have a queen cell on it or did they create on knowing there was no existing queen or queen cells in the hive?

no cells, just eggs and larva,,, the made their own queen..

What did you do with the frames from the old hive?

I only removed the frame with the most eggs from the laying worker, alot of these cell had about 7 eggs in them , seems this laying worker just stayed on this frame, I must have caught it just when it was starting up good..

I actually have some capped and uncapped honey on the super that is above the brood chamber. I wonder if I can still use that with the new hive?

Scott  

sure, just make sure you shake every bee off the frames and out of the hive body, cant leave one, it could be the laying worker....

[Scott Derrick]

Ted,

What Micheal was saying I am hoping is true. If you do shake the bees and some of the laying workers return to the hive (or in his case other hives) I am hoping that the (nurse bees/ frame from other hive) would take care of them by getting rid of them if by some chance some of them returned. I heard what you said about the layers not being able to find their way back.

Heck I'm wondering if I need the new queen now. Wonder if I put a new frame of bees / eggs / brood into a nuc with the new queen and then after a couple of days shook the laying worker bees out then put the new hive in the old hives place if they would have any problems?

Scott

PS...Ted you got a msn messenger account. If so how bout PM it to me.    :)

[Brian D. Bray]

Usually, but not always, it's too late to requeen once a laying worker begins laying.  A laying worker can be a hard problem to over come.  Early in just putting a frame of brood with eggs in will most likely cure the problem.  Once a laying worker is established for more than a few weeks the only really workable solution is the egg/brood and shake method.

[Scott Derrick]

Brian,

I hope I made myself clear. What I am talking about doing is taking a frame of brood with bees on it and adding a queen to it inside of a new hive/nuc. Then after the queen is released...taking the bees from the laying worker hive and shaking them out at the suggested distance from the new hive which I will have placed in the same position as the laying worker hive.

Whatch think?

Scott

[Brian D. Bray]

It should work but I think I would have set the nuc on top of the other hive for a day or two to build it up with drift from the other hive.  Then moved the lower hive, shaken it out, and the rebuilt the nuc into a standard size hive box with a super containing some of the frames from the original hive with some undrawn frames to aid in redirecting the hive.  The queen would be in the lower box.

[Scott Derrick]

Ahhh.....I see what you are saying. The only problem is that the laying worker hive is a 10 frame with a 9 frame deep super on top. I guess I could put the nuc with the new queen on top of the hive with the laying worker right? I found something on Micheal Bush's website that I thought was interesting. It is as about beekeeping myth. It is about laying workers. I had an experienced beekeeper come over and look at this hive. He couldn't find the queen either and also couldn't fine eggs. We did however find multiple eggs in sells.


From MB's website.

If there is no brood there is no queen.

There are many reasons you might find a hive with no brood even though there is a queen. First, in my climate at least, from October to April there may or may not be brood because they stop in October and then raise little batches of brood with broodless periods in between. Second, some frugal bees will shut down brood rearing in a dearth. Third, a hive that has lost a queen and raised an emergency queen often is broodless because by the time the new queen has emerged, hardened, mated and started to lay 25 or more days have passed and ALL the brood has emerged. Many a beginner (or even a veteran) has found a hive in this state, ordered a queen, introduced her and had her killed, ordered another queen, introduced her and had her killed and finally noticed there were eggs. Unmarked virgin queens are very hard to find. A frame of eggs and brood would have been a better solution. That way IF the hive is queenless they can raise one, and if they aren’t it won’t hurt anything and you’ll know the answer to the question.

[Brian D. Bray]

You've gotten the idea.  Put another hive body, with 10 frames, between the 2 that are there.  You'll find that 2 deeps makes a larger hive which in turn makes more honey.  NEVER use a 9 frame configuration in a brood chamber.  The only justification for using using 9 frames instead of 10 is that it makes it easier to uncap when extracting, any comments otherwise is just a smoke screen.  When you're done you'll have a 3 box hive.

[Scott Derrick]

Brian,

It's not actually a brood chamber....we typically only use one brood chamber here in the Southeast. I am using a "deep super" because my mentor has taught me to do this. He uses all deep supers and does this because he says it makes it easier to uncap. We do make sure the frame are spaced evenly so that they are drawn properly.

Queston...

You've gotten the idea. Put another hive body, with 10 frames, between the 2 that are there.

It might be late and I might be a bit confused again. Why would I put the new hive between the two super that are already there? That would defeat the purpose of shaking the bees out and hopefully getting rid of the laying workers. Dooooh...I'm going to bed.   :roll:

[Michael Bush]

>so if i shake out the bees and give the frames to another hive what comes of those bees that i shook out? will they not try to return to their former location?

Of course.  But if there is no hive in their former location they will move into the other hives.

> im picking up a nuc tomorrow(fri) what do you think my action should be. i was planning on putting the nuc where the laying worker hive was. will this be a mistake because of the returning(shook) bees?

I wouldn't put a nuc there.  They would be overwelmed by all the laying worker bees.  I'd put the nuc somewhere else.

I either remove all the equipment and shake them out and give it to the other hives, or I put a frame of brood in every week until they rear a queen.  Everything else is too much uncertainty and too much work.

[TwT]

Brian,

It's not actually a brood chamber....we typically only use one brood chamber here in the Southeast. I am using a "deep super" because my mentor has taught me to do this. He uses all deep supers and does this because he says it makes it easier to uncap. We do make sure the frame are spaced evenly so that they are drawn properly.

Scott, a single deep is not enough for a brood chamber, you can use it but unless you work your hives every other day every hive you have will swarm a few times during the year and with swarming hives your honey count will not be as good as it should be, I use 2 deeps on some hives and a deep and medium on others, then put my supers above them, when I started I heard this also (to use just 1 deep for brood) but I some found out this was not close to being enough, I wintered every hive last year with a medium super above the brood chambers and they did fine... but everybody has their own way of doing things and the 1 deep didn't seem to work for me from my observation's, just wasnt enough room....

[Scott Derrick]

Ted,

I think you are right. I will also be doing the same thing this year. Thanks for the info.

Scott