Does lots of drones mean agressive hive

[SteveJ]

Ok question.

I have a hive where somehow I managed to get the old mated queen in the brood box and a DLQ in the supers. Anyway got rid of the DLQ but left lots and lots of drone brood and then eventuallly lots and lots of drones.
So last Saturday went into the hive. Smoked as normal at the entrance then cracked open the crown board and even before I'd applied some smoke two workers poped out and stung me on the spare tyre just below the diaphragm. Gave them some more smoke waited a couple of minutes and went in again. Lots of noisy drones flying around, bees very agitated and got a further sting through the canvas of my gloves right into my wrist joint. So called it a day got them all closed up. Went back to the house and Thirty or so bees then followed me back up the garden. Had to stand there in my suit catching and dispatching each one that landed on me. When I got back in I counted thirty to forty stings in them.

This is normally a nice pleasant colony which is one of the reasons I have them in the garden. Then the rest of the weekend if I went near that part of the garden I ended up with a bee buzzing round me.

Does having lots of drones mean an agressive hive?

Any body have any thoughts? They've stopped following now and I'm going to attempt another inspection this weekend.

SteveJ

 

[enrico]

Hard to say from one inspection. Hives can have bad days for no apparent reason that we humans understand but other things can trigger it, weather, bad queen, just to name a couple.....give it another try, if it happens again consider requeening from known stock. It is unlikely to be merely drones.
You do not want a hive like that. If you can't tame it it needs to go! But give it every chance first....good luck
E

 

[aberreef]

Last year my top bar hive had huge numbers of drones and was a model apiary citizen It's suprising how many drones they'll make when you leave them to their own devices

 

[BeeNice]

You will need to see whether your queen is still around, hives like this are sometimes queenless. You should off got rid of drone cells in the super as they can't get through the QE and they would just eat stores that the colony need. Get well suited or 2 suited, hold you breath and just go into the BB, don't over smoke them, have cool mild smoke. Use a cloth to cover half the BB frame so you can stop some of the bees coming out. Have a plan of action. Look for eggs, you don't need to look for the queen, are there QC's? If no QC's or eggs you may need to requeen and then the bees will be calmer.
Steven

 

[Poly Hive]

The answer to the question is no.

Three stings and a back off? I assume to avoid neighbour troubles?

Temperment changes all the time with different subsets of progeny. Not to mention weather.

PH

 

[justme]

The way I understand it, drones keep the colony happy, until a dearth or no longer needed.

 

[Poly Hive]

Drones are the insurance policy for a colony. Useless and expensive until needed then priceless.

PH

 

[John R]

I've also encoutered a change in the nature of a couple of my hives, inspected them last saturday, went back an hour later and had a look at them from a meter away, bang---- stung on the nose by a guard worker that just came straight from the entrance at me. no blooxy fun let me tell you. Over the last few weeks they have been getting worse. I definately put it down to the weather with mine, they can't get out regularly it's been that wet and cool.

 

[Luminos]

Does having lots of drones mean an agressive hive?

At least they can only buzz at you!

 

[Queens59]

Drones don't sting - they can't...so they don't affect the temperament of the hive. More likely by taking a queen from teh super your bees are angry. Check you still have one in BB, you could be Q-.

 

[Tom Bick]

If you still have the queen excluder on the hive then you will have drones trapped above and this can make the bees grumpy.

You will need to get them out and a simple way will be to slide a super slightly to one side so creating a hole and they will get out.

In my experience plenty of drones makes a colony more calm and not grumpy but trapped drones not good.

 

[jackbee]

I've been told the ladies like a few hunky men around - keeps them calmer, and warmer

and so do the bees

 

[SteveJ]

Three stings and back off? Definitely when you have a slight alergy problem. Couldn't have my desensitization jab that week. Consultant classed it as a self administered dose.

SteveJ

 

[Poly Hive]

Might have mentioned that earlier as it was not a normal thing to do?

Have they calmed down at all?

PH

 

[SteveJ]

Went back in last weekend and they where as nice as pie.