Advice please folks!

[Magourou]

Have two hives situated two metres apart. One is a new colony bought in June and doing very well; Active and with lots of healthy looking brood. Still needs to fill three of the nine frames.
The other hive was inherited early this year with little known history.It has been active but on recent inspections shown only drone brood being laid with no worker brood at all. Lots of drones evident at the hive entrance.
Am I too late to do anything or do I have any options?
I assume I have a drone laying queen which I think means the hive is dying anyway. Being a newcomer to beekeeping I need some advice. Do I re-queen?......I can't seem to find a source to buy a new queen. Do I use some brood frames from my other hive to encourage them to make a new queen?.....I'm worried that if I do that it may weaken the new hive as it's probably not established sufficently to support me robbing frames.
Advice would be appreciated please from you knowledgeable people!

 

[Steve Dyer]

Salut!

It's difficult to diagnose from a distance, and it depends how many (and how old) workers you have got left. You could cut out just a few cells from the first hive with fresh eggs and place them in a hole in the brood comb and hope they make an emergency queen. Whether this will happen, and whether afterwards they will build up depends on the climate and the length of French summer you have left, not to mention whether you are in the oppressed South, or the oppressed North.

Oh - and you need to find the queen and kill her - another French tradition.

Enfin it's worth a go, because if you don't they are doomed...

Bonne chance!

Steve

 

[Midland Beek]

Advice would be appreciated please from you knowledgeable people!

I do not know whether it is actually advice you want. If it is, you have to find the drone laying queen, kill her, and then unite the two stocks. Thats if it is not laying workers you have.

If you want someone to explain how you do that lot, then there is a case for you reading a good bee book, because there is quite a lot to it.

 

[huntsman666]

First off, if the drone pattern is scattered, then you probably have laying workers. If the pattern is tight then chances are you have a drone laying queen (sterile.)

If a queen and you can find her then kill her.

Regardless of whatever action you take, I suggest you give a frame of eggs a week for three weeks.

I had a similar situation this year and it worked a treat.

No guarantee but what do you have to lose?

 

[Steve Dyer]

Well, you have three not entirely compatible bits of advice so far!

I think we all agree you kill the queen if there is one.

If you unite the stocks you may add strength to your one colony, albeit adding a lot of drones, - only you can decide if uniting the two is a good route. This method leaves you with one good colony.

I suggested a few eggs to give them the means to make a new queen, but this takes time and if the bees are old the colony may fail.
Huntsman is suggesting frames of eggs, which gives the same opportunity, but also boosts the nurse bee population making the hive more viable. However you have only nine frames in your main hive, so again it's a judgement call - weakening your good hive to strengthen the other.

This second route may leave you with two colonies, or one not quite so good as it would have been colony.

Your choice!

Steve

 

[Mike a]

It is important you are 100% sure about your queen before you take any further action. Did you find any queen cells recently in the centre of the frame/s a few weeks ago? Normally this is the first sign the old girl is starting to fail.

I would take one frame of newly laid eggs from a good hive to test to see if they are willing to try and raise a new queen once the old queen has been removed. If you start to see queen cells after 3-4 days I would opt to remove them and slow introduce a new mated queen and not raise one as we are half way through July.

Last option combine them as suggested already.

 

[Magourou]

Merci mille fois Steve....good advice and weather permitting I'll have a look tomorrow with a knowledgeable mentor for a second opinion and then make decisions. Thanks again.
Robin

 

[Magourou]

It is important you are 100% sure about your queen before you take any further action. Did you find any queen cells recently in the centre of the frame/s a few weeks ago? Normally this is the first sign the old girl is starting to fail.

I would take one frame of newly laid eggs from a good hive to test to see if they are willing to try and raise a new queen once the old queen has been removed. If you start to see queen cells after 3-4 days I would opt to remove them and slow introduce a new mated queen and not raise one as we are half way through July.

Last option combine them as suggested already.

Thanks Mike for the advice...yes, I did find four queen cells a few weeks ago and destroyed them. Supercedance(which it probably was) or swarming; difficult for a beginner to decide on! Not knowing the history of the hive the queen must have been getting past it. Thanks. Robin

 

[Magourou]

I do not know whether it is actually advice you want. If it is, you have to find the drone laying queen, kill her, and then unite the two stocks. Thats if it is not laying workers you have.

If you want someone to explain how you do that lot, then there is a case for you reading a good bee book, because there is quite a lot to it.

Thanks Midland Beek for the advice. Will go back to my reading!

 

[Magourou]

First off, if the drone pattern is scattered, then you probably have laying workers. If the pattern is tight then chances are you have a drone laying queen (sterile.)

If a queen and you can find her then kill her.

Regardless of whatever action you take, I suggest you give a frame of eggs a week for three weeks.

I had a similar situation this year and it worked a treat.

No guarantee but what do you have to lose?

Thanks Huntsman666....Yes, the drone laying pattern was tight in some frames and scattered in others but will check tomorrow.