Author Topic: Advice needed about queen (Read 3974 times)

Lesli · « **on:** August 21, 2004, 09:42:40 pm »

Hi All,
Exactly 30 days ago, I got a new queen, and installed her in a nuc with 4 frames and a feeder. The bees accepted her fine, and she started laying eggs.

Two weeks ago, I checked the hive and saw that workers were uncapping brood and tossing them. I thought it was odd, but since this has been a chilly summer, I thought perhaps they just needed more house bees, and some brood and had been chilled. So I shook a couple of frames from a strong hive.

Today, two weeks later, I open the hive and find that nearly all the capped brood has been opened and discarded by the bees, there are no eggs, and no larvae. There are uncapped cells with dead larvae that are fully formed, but for whatever reason, didn't live.

The queen was still in place, and still had a retinue, but the hive itself is extremely sluggish. Some bees were simply head down in cells and not moving. I had noticed few foragers coming and going, but put it down to the hive being so young.

I killed the queen and I'm going to combine the remaining bees with another hive. I pulled a frame to take to a beekeepers club meeting tomorrow (good timing!) so they can confirm for me that there is no disease present before I combine.

Has anyone seen anything like this? The queen obviously layed eggs for a while, then just stopped, and her brood died at or before maturity.

golfpsycho · « **Reply #1 on:** August 21, 2004, 11:09:07 pm »

Are they starving? Frequently, head down in a cell... listless.. indicates starvation. I would put some syrup on them right now, then see what happens. When there are few stores, and a dearth is full swing, the nurse bees mug the foragers and there isn't anything to store. If thats not it, I wouldn't know what to tell you.

Lesli · « **Reply #2 on:** August 22, 2004, 09:36:18 am »

Nope, not starving. There a feeder in there, and they're taking syrup. But they'e put in no stores to speak of, though they pulled a fair amount of wax--for a while, at least. Bizarre!

leominsterbeeman · « **Reply #3 on:** August 23, 2004, 11:55:18 am »

Leslie -

is there a lot of drones? if so, she could be a drone-laying queen and the workers you see are just trying to keep up.

Robo · « **Reply #4 on:** August 23, 2004, 12:29:10 pm »

It's hard to try and diagnose without seeing it.

Anyway, you did the right thing by disposing of her. Good idea getting some "expert advice" before merging back in with another hive.

Let us know what they conclude.