Re: 1st year questions

On Fri, 21 Nov 2003 11:24:32 -0500, Eric Deaver
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

>The first batch of swarms were definitely confirmed with 6-8 empty
>cups and missing marked queens in all three hives.  The laying worker
>was diagnosed by the random pattern of just drone cells - no worker
>brood.  We actually saw the virgin queen on this hive but she never
>took for some reason - I'm assuming lost on mating flight.
>
>The second swarm (of the two remaining hives - in October) was
>confirmed again by missing marked queens (we remarked all the queens
>after the first swarm) and the presence of empty queen cups in the
>hive that successfully requeened.  None in the one that did not
>requeen.  I suppose something elso could have killed the queen (I did
>find a bunch of dead bees in front of this hive around this time) but
>I still ended up with the same brood pattern (only drone cells and
>random pattern) to indicate a laying worker and no queen.

Just because a hive has only drone brood doesn't mean a hive has
laying worker.  Especially if the drone brood is capped.     This
condition can happen when the queen stops laying (superceedure, swarm,
poor weather, or simply low on resources).  Since drones take longer
to hatch than workers there will be a period when you only have sealed
drone brood.    The true laying worker colonies I've seen have had
good amounts of drone brood in all stages of development.

It's often surprised me how irregular the timing can be when dealing
with queens.  I've had purchased queens take 2 weeks before they start
laying again.  I've inspected hives and marked them to get a new queen
when they came in later that week convinced they were hopelessly
queenless,   (no brood of any sort, no queen cells, etc.).  Yet when I
went to requeen them the queen (old queen, not a new one or a virgin)
was laying as usual.  (I suspect the 3 week dirth and period of
intense robbing had a great deal do to with that).

I have had (as well as others in my area) a great deal of problems
with queens this year.  Likely it's due to the stress of our past
winter, and the generally poor conditions for honey (too much rain).

It does have me a bit concerned.  The hives typically look better
going into winter.  They don't have nearly as many young bees because
of the derth we had in September.  I've never seen my Italians shut
down brood rearing so much except for winter.  It's also the first
year I've had to feed going into winter.

-Tim