Drones in February

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co durham
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Went round the bees yesterday noted one or two dead drones on the alignment board of a couple of stocks. Normally I would assume that there would be a problem of Queen less but I think that because I fed well in the autumn they have retained a few drones over the winter.
 
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Went round the bees yesterday noted one or two dead drones on the alignment board of a couple of stocks. Normally I would assume that there would be a problem of Queen less but I think that because I fed well in the autumn they have retained a few drones over the winter.

Do they live that long? , suspect a few queen missfires as she starts relaying after her mid winter break
 
Do they live that long? , suspect a few queen missfires as she starts relaying after her mid winter break

Never thought of that, the ones that I saw were quite small, so that fits with what you said. Do you think that, they weren't permitted to live and ejected?
 
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Hi all,
I had drones flying in one hive in December, but that stopped at the first cold snap we had. I have not seen any dead ones yet. Can't wait for a nice warm day to see if they are still there. Colony very busy foraging for pollen.
 
I too noticed one of my hives had some drones flying in and out last week. This is my first year beekeeping so wasn't too sure what it meant. Should I worry? Is it likely the queen has failed? It had plenty of worker activity.....
 
A laying worker, in a colony with a laying queen?[/QUOTE]
Not unknown when hive has supers on but unusual in winter.
 
A laying worker, in a colony with a laying queen?


See page 9 of "The Wisdom of the Hive"

"Although worker honey bees cannot mate, they do possess ovaries and can produce viable eggs; hence they do have the potential to have male offspring (in bees and other Hymenoptera, fertilized eggs produce females while unfertilized eggs produce males). It is now clear, however, that this potential is exceedingly rarely realized as long as a colony contains a queen (in queenless colonies, workers eventually lay large numbers of male eggs; see the review in Page and Erickson 1988). One supporting piece of evidence comes from studies of worker ovary development in queenright colonies, which have consistently revealed extremely low levels of development. All studies to date report far fewer than 1 % of workers have ovaries developed sufficiently to lay eggs (reviewed in Ratnieks 1993; see also Visscher 1995a). For example, Ratnieks dissected 10,634 worker bees from 21 colonies and found that only 7 had moderately developed egg (half the size of a completed egg) and that just one had a fully developed egg in her body."

If you do the math, in a normal booming queenright hive of 100,000 bees that's 70 laying workers. In a laying worker hive it's much higher.
 
I too noticed one of my hives had some drones flying in and out last week. This is my first year beekeeping so wasn't too sure what it meant. Should I worry? Is it likely the queen has failed? It had plenty of worker activity.....

Hi,
It is unusual for them to be Q+ and to keep a large complement of drones during winter, but we have to wait and see. My colony has a supercedure queen from late Aug. She laid three frames of worker brood initially and continued laying, but they kept building supercedure cells last one I saw was beginning of October, but have not looked since for obvious reasons. Colony is very active bringing in lots of pollen, so I am hoping for the best. However, I do have spare queens should I need one! First day at +13C I shall have a look, but it may be a long wait!
 
Went round the bees yesterday noted one or two dead drones on the alignment board of a couple of stocks. Normally I would assume that there would be a problem of Queen less but I think that because I fed well in the autumn they have retained a few drones over the winter.

Potential dlq?
 
If you know anyone near you that can do II and you do have a DLQ you could get them to inseminate the queen with the seamen from her own drones.
As long as they are mature
 
If you know anyone near you that can do II and you do have a DLQ you could get them to inseminate the queen with the seamen from her own drones.
As long as they are mature

Too late if she's already a layer - or otherwise we'd have queens going out on 'top up' mating flights every year or so?

My great uncle Dewi used to recycle semen
- he had a Raleigh dealership outside the dock gates in Swansea
 
Too late if she's already a layer -


The procedure is called selfing, a virgin queen is induced to lay eggs, these of course will only produce drones, when these drones are old enough, the queen is inseminated with the semen collected from the drones she has produced.
 
The percentage of spermatozoa entering the spermatheca is lower for an old queen than for young queens, and many queens inseminated when four months old would lay a high proportion of unfertilized eggs, but the colony would go on.
 
Stunted smaller drones doesn't sound good

First decent day get a quick look, might just be a high percentage of drones in with normal worker brood.

Get rid of queen and unite it if there is worker brood too, if not bin the lot.
 
Yes, nothing can be done until an inspection is carried out.

I have inspected colonies in spring that have new queens in from a late supercedure, which have turned drone layer due to not mating, so a lot of drones are produced, at the same time the old queen is still present and laying fertile eggs, normal brood, also had it the other way round, old queen failed and only producing drones, while the young supercedure queen is perfectly ok.

Also had very old queens laying just a few fertile eggs, and lots of the workers laying and producing drones, not enough brood and queen pheromone to inhibit them from laying, and although they already have a queen they are often not easy to introduce a new queen too, after removal of the old queen.
 
I was under the impression a queen mating with her own drones would not work, as the drones are a genetic copy of herself. Would this not just mean she is in a sense, mating with herself?

Also, would this mean any queens raised from this one, would be an exact clone of the original?
 
... Normally I would assume that there would be a problem of Queen less but I think that because I fed well in the autumn they have retained a few drones over the winter.

I don't think it works like that - in any recent British winters, however well-provisioned with stores they might be.

The two worryingly likely prospects are DLQ and laying workers.
The hope would be that she wasn't 100% drone layer, just firing a few blanks, and that the colony had some hope of an independent existence until a new Q could be raised and mated. Although, ex-ing Q and uniting with a better colony (as Pete D suggests) is probably the more hard-headed response.
But if its laying workers, the only real question is whether there is any comb (or stores) worth saving. The theoretical possibility of 'turning off' laying workers by exposing them to brood pheromones from another colony (below a mesh board) doesn't have a high probability of success, and is a right faff. Laying workers, realistically, means the end of the line for that colony.


But, as advised above by Hivemaker, an inspection is called for.
I'd do it sooner rather than later - no point waiting for the 'perfect day'.
I suspect that the decision then is whether to unite or shake out.
 

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