Droney, healthy or failing?

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bjosephd

Drone Bee
Joined
Oct 12, 2014
Messages
1,129
Reaction score
1
Location
North Somerset
Hive Type
Langstroth
Number of Hives
3
Afternoon all…

Lovely sunny day here in Somerset, bees seem busy and happy.

Double brood Langstroth for over wintering.

Noticed today that there are plenty of drones flying from this hive!

Seems a funny time of year.

Earlier in the year I (foolishly) 'vetoed' their attempts to superced until I realised what they were doing and hoped they would get back onto superseding. After that I never noticed any more attempts.

The hive seems very healthy but I don't want to go digging through really to see if I can find brood.

I pulled one frame from the top centre today (I know probably shouldn't have) to see if it would be very broody, unfortunately most of the top box is thick and heavy with stores - the only patch I saw were what looked like drone sized cells all charged with eggs.

They are also piling in the pollen big time.

Is this just avery healthy hive and with their additional feeding and no honey taken off they just think that life is awesome?

Have I drone laying queen and this hive could potentially crumble through winter?

Did they superced, but they are hedging their bets and they are carrying a new queen and and and allowing the old potential drone layer to live on?

Should I dig through this what seems to be a pretty big and healthy hive or just cross my fingers and risk losing the lot?

Introducing a potentially new ordered in mated queen would be a pain in the arse as I'd clearly have to dig through and confirm first that there are only drones being laid (20 frames in autumn) and potentially have to dispatch her before risking putting in a new queen who they might kill.

Ideally I'd shut them up now for winter and leave them well alone.

Thoughts?

Anyone else got loads drones about?

(hope I din't squish a queen with my brief look today)

They seem very happy and chilled.

Many many thanks

Please don't beat me up

Mr Ben
 
Have you other hives to compare?
Are there worker bees doing orientation flights from this hive?

I suppose you won't know unless you look in
Then take it from there
If you have a failed queen can you source a mated queen?
If you have laying workers have you other hives you can "combine" them with?
 
Some hives still have drones - some have them all through winter.
What would you achieve by finding out one way or another?
That's the trouble with this long spell of comparatively good weather, usually by this time there's not much movement and we just sit in front of the telly.
Now there's an overwhelming urge to fiddle and interfere :D
 
Ha, yes Mr Jenkins B, that's kind of the answer I was hoping for... especially as it would mean trying to heft a ten ton Langstroth brood box full of stores that for the rest of the season is significantly lighter being full of brood!

Thanks Erica too... I'm pretty certain it's not laying workers, and combining would be a colossal PITA. I'm not sure to be honest at this time of year how easy it is to source a queen. Think I might go with Jenkins' idea of crossing my fingers and trusting the bees.

I just hope it isn't a dead out/drone out by spring!

B




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Hi Mr. Ben,
If you have a lot of drones flying from the hive you have either got a drone laying queen or a virgin or a newly mated queen. When did you last inspect?
 
Beeno... a month or so? Maybe? Not good at keeping notes yet.


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Yes I would leave them especially as there's no remedy if something is wrong. I found a drone flying around the kitchen yesterday and have seen the odd one at the hives. Let us know what you find in the spring. Feedback is good
 
Most of my hives still have the odd drone kicking around, there comes a time when fiddling around has the potential of doing more harm than good, you just have to ignore the doom mongers, leave them to it and hope you have a viable colony come spring.
 
Yep. Ok. Thanks all. All my bits crossed! I'll be seeing my bees next week. Off back to the other side of the country to work now. Goodbye countryside :(


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:judge:
Beeno... a month or so? Maybe? Not good at keeping notes yet.


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Fingers crossed then. Do keep notes though only way to keep track of what they are up to!
 
Drones

I still have the odd drone flying. I did see my first drone larvae outside the hive on the slabs, soon carried off by a wasp. (I missed it)
 
Very mild and warm today ... took opportunity to put a merged colony into one brood box ready for the harsh bitter cold winter we need..... noted large amount of sealed brood, adequate stores of pollen and honey.... plus drones still hatching!!!

sub tropical microclimate here in the
greatgreygreenslimeytamarrivervalleyallsetaboutwithnewleybuiltsecondhomesthateventheknitesbridgemillionairbrigadecannotafford!

Yeghes da
 
Last edited:
Hi Mr. Ben,
If you have a lot of drones flying from the hive you have either got a drone laying queen or a virgin or a newly mated queen. When did you last inspect?

Really!!! Not all hives chuck their drones out en mass beginning of October.

I have five hives at the moment and have just done a second vaping with oxalic acid. Every single one of them has drones flying at the moment. It's 14 degrees here in Lancashire today and lots of pollen going in too.
Every one of my hives cannot have a drone laying queen, a virgin or a newly mated queen. Considering the law of averages.
 
Really!!! Not all hives chuck their drones out en mass beginning of October.

I have five hives at the moment and have just done a second vaping with oxalic acid. Every single one of them has drones flying at the moment. It's 14 degrees here in Lancashire today and lots of pollen going in too.
Every one of my hives cannot have a drone laying queen, a virgin or a newly mated queen. Considering the law of averages.

Don't worry - it's the usual tripe she spouts from a pamphlet she found somewhere - at least it gives the beginners something to ignore.
 
One or two drones flying from my strongest colonies. Very strong colonies with plenty of stores sometimes allow a few drones to overwinter. However, the presence of drone pupae on the alighting board during the winter months usually in my experience has resulted in a drone layer.
 
Interesting stuff... So I've been away from my bees for a couple of weeks as I'm away working. All were stacked full of stores after taking down tons of sugar/syrup so have paused on feeding as it's slowed. Reports from family observing are that hives are indeed stacking in tons of pollen and seem busy and happy. Will there still be nectar around at ALL? Or only pollen? ie, will they be churning through there recently fed stores and I'm gonna have to get back on a mega feed again when I get back in 10 days or so? I was hoping to build up some celotex bee cosies, mouse guard them and leave them beeeee... maybe no such luck... I'm totally bored of syrup.


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