Advice sought please - Colony with DLQ or DLW?

[zeeb]

Hi All,
I have been following the forum since last season when i purchased a Nuc from a fellow member of our BKA.
I have suspected that one of my two colonies is Drone laying due to the high number of flying drones.
This colony was hived from a swarm from the original purchased Nuc, the swarm was hived in May 2010 and progressed well throughout the season.

Today i have inspected.
The colony contains around 50% adult drones with only drone brood evident.
There is BIAS (Brood In All Stages) but all capped brood is drone, placed over 2-3 frames.
The colony has been vigourously collecting pollen until the last couple of days. now very little entrance activity, but there are 3 frames of stores.
On one frame of brood there was found to be three supercedure cells 2 open and one sealed, newly laid egg could also be seen and appeared to be laid 'centrally' within the cells.

I have a second colony (the original colony from the Nuc) which from outward appearances appears to be doing well, this is headed by a Queen that is starting her third season.

is there a chance that the colony could be left alone to allow a queen to be reared and fertilised at this point in the season?
is there any advantage in uniting the colonies, especially if the queen right colony is vigourous and healthy?

Advice, please, is sought on the imminent management of the DLQ/W colony.
many thanks for your time

 

[Mike a]

I'd recheck the cells in a few days to see if they have been capped, but the chances are if you only have drone brood in all stages now they wont be viable so you might want to try a test frame of eggs to see if they try to raise more queen cells.

 

[Baggyone]

I'd say theres a drone layer in here so this is what I would do as any queen cells are possibly going to be dud.

Move the hive to somewhere new and put a nuc in its place. Allow bees to "come home". Put in a frame of eggs from another hive and see how it goes. If you have a 3 year old queen in the other hive then its time to think about queen rearing/nuc building. I'd consider this year as a no honey year and go for rearing.

baggy

 

[Midland Beek]

I'd say colony one is screwed. I would expect those queen cells to come to nothing seen as the eggs they contain are unfertilized. They might actually be more 'emergency variety' as opposed to supersedure, but the bees know they are in dire straits and are desperately trying to raise a new queen. They might seal those queen cells, and the larva in each one might well die.

Luckily you, in that you have a second colony. However, the problem you got is determining whether DLQ or laying workers in colony one, and I would be inclined to think DLQ given the stage we are at in this seaon. If you find the queen that answers the question, and do not hesitate to kill her if you do. Then you could unite or give a frame of eggs from your other colony to let them try raising a new queen. Bit early for a queen mating.

A DLQ is often a scrub queen and looks a whole lot like a worker.

And whatever has been laying those eggs has buggered some of your comb up because I believe that once the bees have enlarged the cells after finding drone larvae in them they are unable to re-engineer them back to worker size. At least I think so. Don't want a good queen to come along at some point in the future and only lay unfertilized eggs in them after feeling for size.

Good suggestion in this thread for moving dud colony to new site. Your 'good' colony might accept the returning workers. Depends if both of your colonies are side by side.

 

[zeeb]

Many thanks for the replies and advice,

I too cant see that a queen can be raised now, as the eggs laid will be un fertilised.
Glad i attended a queen rearing lecture a couple of weeks ago! a no honey year, not another

The brood comb does look buggered, i did wonder if it could be re-used as it now so large and uneven, and as you say MB a good queen may 'feel' the cells and lay drones.
The hives are side by side and during the inspection of the DLQ colony i didnt see the queen, dwarfed by all the drones!
cheers