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Author Topic: multiple eggs  (Read 3324 times)

Offline newguy

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multiple eggs
« on: September 02, 2005, 07:33:12 pm »
i found some cells with several eggs in them(a few even had like six), some of these cells were very shallow, like 1/3 the norm, on the bottom edges of the foundation. should i be thinking laying worker, or will a queen do this as well.  this hive was queenless for about three weeks before i requeened. i assumed the queen was accepted(many new eggs a week after requeening) but i never actually found her. how long will it be before these cells would start to look like a drone cell if thats what they were? the earliest eggs are probably 8-9 days old

Offline bassman1977

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multiple eggs
« Reply #1 on: September 02, 2005, 07:40:36 pm »
That sounds like a laying worker to me.  Queens will only lay one egg per cell.  I don't know of any method of finding the laying worker.  By about day 11, drone larve will be capped.  By this point you should definately be able to tell if it's a drone cell or not.

My suggestion to you would be to hunt down that queen.  If there is no queen, then that would lead me to believe that is the reason for the laying worker.
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Offline newguy

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multiple eggs
« Reply #2 on: September 02, 2005, 08:04:11 pm »
micheal, please chime in. thanks

Offline bassman1977

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« Reply #3 on: September 02, 2005, 09:00:21 pm »
I found some more information for you (Beekeeping for Dummies Page 161-162).  Getting rid of laying workers.  Have the following items:

Empty hive w/o frames
Outer cover
Wheelbarrow or other means of moving a hive

1.  Order queen

2.  Once queen arrives put entire hive minus bottom board in a wheel barrow and move 100 yards from original location

3.  Shake every single bee into the spare hive with no frames

4.  Put each empty frame into the spare hive that is standing by.

5.  Once the bees from all the frames are removed, return the frames to the original hive bodies

6.  Roll the hive and empty frames back to original location and place hive on bottom board.

It also confirms that the queen will never lay more than one egg in a cell.
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Offline thegolfpsycho

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multiple eggs
« Reply #4 on: September 03, 2005, 03:03:51 am »
If a queen has been caged or banked for an extended period, she may lay multiple eggs in a cell as she gets going again.  It usually passes quickly however.

Offline romduck

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multiple eggs
« Reply #5 on: September 03, 2005, 03:55:20 pm »
I just discovered that I too have a laying worker running one of my hives.  :evil:

My understanding of the procedure that you mentioned is that the laying worker has never left the hive and thus, will not be able to find her way back once you have moved her >100 yds away. Meanwhile the field bees will fly back to the hive and care for the new queen who will hopefully start laying.

I plan on ordering a new queen and trying the same procedure HOWEVER, I also have a VERY strong hive next door to the queenless one. Might I be able to help the new queen out once she is established (presumable in a couple of weeks) by moving over a couple of frames of capped brood from the strong hive? I would assume that this would give the weaker drone-packed hive a boost when it needs it most.

Any thoughts :?:
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Offline bassman1977

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« Reply #6 on: September 03, 2005, 04:16:21 pm »
Sure, that shouldn't be a problem.  And if I may make another suggestion...since it's so close to the end of laying for the queen, it might help your hive if you try to get rid of as many of those drone as possible, yourself.  I wouldn't worry about getting every single one of them, but enough to make a dent in the drone population.  That will allow your bees to concentrate on other things such as gathering stores and maintaing the colony.  All the drones are going to do is eat up stores.  Your queen won't mate with those drones so it's not going to hurt anything, and as you may already know, drones don't have stingers so they won't hurt you either.  I saw my bees evicting drones today.  One last thing...I understand they are excellent fishing bait!  :D
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Offline romduck

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« Reply #7 on: September 03, 2005, 06:13:59 pm »
Cool.

I cut out a number of the capped drone cells today, but I honesty just got tired of it.

I'll probably proceed to do that when I open the hive back up again.

Thanks.
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Online Michael Bush

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multiple eggs
« Reply #8 on: September 03, 2005, 11:45:41 pm »
Doubles I don't worry about too much.  Sometimes a queen will do that if she runs out of room or she's a rookie or she's just starting back up after a spell of not laying.  Six is  layng workers for sure.

The simplest solution for laying workers is, move all the equipment and shake out all the bees and put the frames on other hives.  Simple, sure thing.

Requeening a laying worker hive can be done, but requires some open brood from another hive.  If you put a frame or two of open brood in the laying worker hive every week for a couple of weeks and THEN try to requeen them you can USUALLY get it to work.  Or put a nuc over a double screen for a couple of weeks and then do a combine. The pheromones from the open brood are what supressed the laying workers.  It's NOT the QMP (Queen Madibular Pheromone) that is the solution, it's the open brood pheromone that is.

Trying to requeen a laying worker hive is always a gamble.  I did a split on my observation hive because it was too crowed and let them raise their own queen.  The two queens that emerged eventually fought it out and the winner was a queen with a crumpled wing.  She never managed to mate and return, so it went laying worker.  I put two frames from a nuc into the hive and shook out the rest and the laying workers came back and killed the queen from the nuc.  I'll probably just shake it out, wait until all the laying workers drift off somewhere else and put a nuc in it.  What I did USUALLY works.  But when dealing with laying workers the only sure thing is to shake them out and do a split from a strong hive to replace them.
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