Dead colony: would you reuse the super full of stores?

[Amari]

Visited apiary yesterday to assess need for fondant. One of my seven colonies dead - masses of dead bees on the OMF starting to go mouldy. Brood box: scanty scattered dead sealed worker brood, no dead drone brood, cells otherwise empty. No queen cells. Four frames of stores. No Q excluder.
Super: ten frames packed with capped stores.
New 2023 queen inserted June. Two supers of honey taken off.
Apivar late August, removed end October - seemed to be plenty of bees but no frames removed. OA vape end November, hive not opened. Syrup feed early Sept.
Cause of death?: the bees were fit enough to store and cap the syrup and seemed OK end Oct. Would CBPVirus strike this late in the year?
Question: would you reuse the super with the capped stores? (I decided to ditch the brood frames as they were dark brown). I don't know the infectivity of CBPV - it seems to strike randomly and many hives recover (personal experience 2022)

 

[ericbeaumont]

New 2023 queen inserted June

end October - seemed to be plenty of bees but no frames removed. OA vape end November, hive not opened

scanty scattered dead sealed worker brood

Scattered dead sealed brood suggests varroa, but queen failure likely later in summer.
What evidence have you to support CBPV?

 

[Amari]

Scattered dead sealed brood suggests varroa, but queen failure likely later in summer.
What evidence have you to support CBPV?

The caps of the very sparse sealed brood had no perforations and the Apivar should have at least reduced varroa. Why I suspect CBPV: large thick pile of dead bees on the OMF. Surely queen failure would cause steady dwindling of bee numbers as the bees reached end of life and not result in mass death?

 

[hemo]

One would likely suspect varroa issues and or a queen issue as well.

CBPV tends to be a spring issue.

 

[hemo]

Mass death can also be caused by isolation starvation, this is a likely scanario following the recent cold snap and they clustered away from the stores.

 

[fian]

I would say that due to the Apivar treatment the workers caused a replacement of the queen to another with poor fertilization that was unable to maintain a stable population for winter.
I would take advantage of the super as food/reinforcement for the rest. Everything in the nest to melt and get some wax.

 

[Curly green finger's]

The caps of the very sparse sealed brood had no perforations and the Apivar should have at least reduced varroa. Why I suspect CBPV: large thick pile of dead bees on the OMF. Surely queen failure would cause steady dwindling of bee numbers as the bees reached end of life and not result in mass death?

Do you have any photos ?
I’ve seen cbpv in the autumn but only the odd bee.

 

[ericbeaumont]

due to the Apivar treatment the workers caused a replacement of the queen

Apivar is tolerated well by bees and I've not heard of it causing supersedure, but supersedure for other reasons is quite likely.

 

[ericbeaumont]

large thick pile of dead bees on the OMF ... Surely queen failure would cause steady dwindling of bee numbers as the bees reached end of life and not result in mass death?

We know only that they ended up in a pile, not the speed of arrival. If flying was not possible or survivors were much-reduced, the collective will to drag them out would be absent.

 

[fian]

This year I acquired some buckfast queens. I did the queen introduction and everything went well for a few weeks. Then everything went wrong, they decided to raise a queen (hybrid since the mother was buckfast but the drones were Iberian). When I check in spring I should find two, the rest were replaced and in some I had to add new breeding. It is likely that it began to twist as a result of the treatment because I did not want to perform it until the queen was sufficiently settled.
Note: Three weeks was not enough

Apivar is tolerated well by bees and I've not heard of it causing supersedure, but supersedure for other reasons is quite likely.

 

[Amari]

Do you have any photos ?
I’ve seen cbpv in the autumn but only the odd bee.

Sadly no photos. I usually forget to take my iPhone with me. Daft, I know

 

[Amari]

We know only that they ended up in a pile, not the speed of arrival. If flying was not possible or survivors were much-reduced, the collective will to drag them out would be absent.

I would expect evidence of a few Q cells -I examined every brood frame.

 

[Amari]

Thanks for your replies so far.....

 

[Antipodes]

I would expect evidence of a few Q cells -I examined every brood frame.

It's strange, but sometimes I see no evidence of queen cells even if they must have been made. Sometimes they seem to keep them there for ages, and other times they seem to remove all trace.

 

[Curly green finger's]

Sadly no photos. I usually forget to take my iPhone with me. Daft, I know

it’s always the way Amari isn’t it, they sound like they have been dead for a while some weeks even.
If it was isolation wouldn’t there still be bees head down in the cells?
Yes there would be bees on the floor but I would expect to see some bees in the cells, was the June queen marked have you been through the carpet of bees to see if you can find the queen ?

 

[ericbeaumont]

was the June queen marked have you been through the carpet of bees to see if you can find the queen ?

Good point.

 

[Amari]

it’s always the way Amari isn’t it, they sound like they have been dead for a while some weeks even.
If it was isolation wouldn’t there still be bees head down in the cells?
Yes there would be bees on the floor but I would expect to see some bees in the cells, was the June queen marked have you been through the carpet of bees to see if you can find the queen ?

Yes, probably dead a few weeks. No 'head down' bees. I looked at the carpet of bees but couldn't see the marked Q.

 

[ericbeaumont]

It is likely that it began to twist as a result of the treatment because I did not want to perform it until the queen was sufficiently settled.

By twist, do you mean begin to fail through varroa, or supersedure? Delayed treatment may cause the problem, but I don't see how it would induce supersedure.

 

[Curly green finger's]

Yes, probably dead a few weeks. No 'head down' bees. I looked at the carpet of bees but couldn't see the marked Q.

We can rule out isolation then, it’s hard to find a marked dead queen I know I don’t think it was varroa either from your first post august treatment of apivar when varroa is at its highest a November vape hmm was there brood cappings on the inspection board following treatment mite drop etc?

 

[ericbeaumont]

scattered dead sealed worker brood,

Remove pupae or larvae with tweezers and let us know what you find.