Search results

Yes, there was some brood in the super, including drones near the bottom, but not exclusively.

First inspection today for 10 days as it’s been too cold to look any earlier. And what I feared has happened: my best colony which produced a massive harvest last year has swarmed. Here’s how it happened: this was brood-and-a-half (super on top). So at the first inspection, I inserted a QX...

Aaannd, back on topic: marigolds and nitriles work for me.

That might be true, I guess, although there were definitely bees active in January and early February. A clue (to myself which I didn't take enough notice of) was my inspection note of 5 February: Note though that there was plenty of fondant on 25 January, so it implies there were enough bees...

But it would be unusual for one hive to die completely while the other two seem fine.

Completely understand your point.

Thanks for the advice. I think I know what I got wrong so it won't be repeated. However, as a coda to the story, I left varroa boards on for five days under my two remaining colonies. The colony closest (one metre away) to the failed colony showed a drop of eight mites, the other three metres...

PS: would it be safe to re-use the frames?

Thank you for the help and advice. Looks like my IPM (MAQS in August+OA vape in December) wasn't good enough. :cry:

Finally got to the apiary today, removed the hive, cleaned everything up and took some photos. One of them shows bees emerging from brood cells. The others, not much (to me anyway), and are typical of the brood frames. See what you make of them.

No, it was a carpet, evenly spread across the entire floor.

Sorry, I will need to make another trip to the apiary to remove and clear out the hive, and I'll take photos of the frames then. Later today or tomorrow, probably.

You're more than welcome to come and take a look...

Could be, I suppose, but after all this time, hard to tell. For what it's worth, the colony in this hive in this physical configuration, made it through the previous winter without a problem.

Happy to accept that I've made a mistake somewhere along the line. I thought I was on top of varroa levels so starvation is the next most likely problem. It just doesn't look like any of the starved colonies that I've seen - though I'm still fairly new to this!

As far as varroa treatment is concerned, they got MAQS strips in August after harvest, and OA vaping in December, v low drop after that.

No, I don't think so. Not only did they have plenty of stores and fondant, which a month ago they were consuming, there are no heads in cells - in fact almost no bees on the frames at all.

Yes, the wax probably fell as I took frames out - there was a lot of burr comb. No idea what the red stuff is - it looked like some sort of exuded stuff.

Thanks - I'll pop back there later in the week to retrieve the kit and photograph the brood frames. Not sure what to do with thousands of dead bees, mind you....

It was pretty horrible. Failed queen, perhaps, but why so many dead bees?