Beemaster's International Beekeeping Forum

BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. => Topic started by: Zoot on June 06, 2006, 11:49:54 pm

Title: Abundance of drone brood
Post by: Zoot on June 06, 2006, 11:49:54 pm

I am in the process of dealing with a replacement queen who has apparently turned out to be, for whatever reasons, primarily a drone layer. Once I resolve that issue in the next day or so (kill queen, combine colony or possibly requeen again) I am curious as to the eventual use of the frames where the larger amounts of drone brood are located; is it feasable to simply let the drones hatch and re-use those frames in honey supers?  Are they suitable for all-around re-use?

I'm also concerned that if I make the attempt to save that colony (requeen) and allow all the drone brood to hatch that the eventual presence of hordes of drones will severely deplete the marginal food stores in that hive lessening the colony's chances for winter survival.

Title: Abundance of drone brood
Post by: Brian D. Bray on June 08, 2006, 12:52:10 am

You can always use the drone brood frames for control of varroa mites.  If they are placed in a honey super  the bees will fill with honey, they don't care what size cell is used for stores.
As I read this forum I am noticing a high frequency of faulty queens, either with packages or singlarly.  If you got all your stock from the same queen supplier I would lay odds he is over medicating and would look for a new source of queens.