Empty hive but huge amounts of stores

[Ambodach]

Unfortunatly I had huge commitments in the autumn and I suspect that maybe I was a little careless in fitting the mouse block to this particular hive.

The problem I now have is that the hive is empty with really no apparant reason apart from a very small area of one frame looking as if a mouse might have chewed it. There was very little rubbish on the floor, and no immediate evidence of dead bees.

But huge amounts of sealed stores. The super is packed and all the brood combs are too. My thinking is that with the very warm November we had, that the 'exit' must have occurred in late October/early November as my other two hives are very much lighter and have been on fondant for a month.

My problem is how to handle the two stores packed lifts as leaving them is just asking for trouble from robbing or wax moths. My logic is to remove the fondant from the other two hives and just stick the super on top of the hive that has a double brood already - and ditto for the brood chamber onto the smaller hive, and then sort it all out in the spring. It's going to cold near Edinburgh from Wednesday onwards this week so I don't want to go any deeper into the occupied hives than I have to.

The two existing hives have been flying well.

Any other options ?

 

[pargyle]

There are questions you need to think about as to why you have an empty hive ... is there no residual brood (it will be dead of course) left in the hive ? If so, you are probably looking at queen failure - there's a few reporting queen failure - I had one that dwindled very early in winter and presumably absconded and begged their way into another colony. There were stores left but not massive amounts in my case.

If the brood frames and the super were rammed with stores - was this the result of really good foraging or did you start feeding them early ? If the queen had nowhere left to lay where would your winter bees come from ? Indeed, as you suggested, they could have swarmed late in the season, several times, but you would see the remains of the queen cells - did you see any ?

Either way, it's more about curiosity and a learning experience as what has happened has happened.

Block the entrance up - ASAP. If there are no signs of wax moth damage at present and the frames are full of capped stores it's unlikely that you will get an infestation at the moment. You could treat the whole stack with a sulphur burner which would ensure any potential infestation is nipped in the bud and won't harm the stores in there.

Feeding at this time of the year is very much a balancing act, you don't want your bees to starve but if you feed them when they don't need it they will just end up with frames full of stores that you will have to remove in order to provide space for the queen to lay. IF your other colonies were well stocked going into winter and you have been feeding fondant for a month I would be wary of giving them a full super on top.

If anything, I would wait until you get a reasonably warm day and have a very quick look. If there are brood frames that are empty of stores and they are looking light you could substitute a couple of the empty ones with the brood frames of stores from your empty hive. Frames of stores can be very useful - if you have freezer space you can freeze them. You can use them to start off Nucs to expand or replace the colony you have lost ...the super frames ? if they are capable of being extracted - I'd extract them - if they are full of set honey ... not so easy to deal with I'm afraid.

 

[Ambodach]

Hi Pargyle - with the current weather forecasts, I decided to act today as hives 1 and 2 were flying and collecting pollen from a large bed of crocuses, whereas the local forecasts are such that the next 10 days are going to be cold. The storm in other parts of the UK had little impact near Edinburgh.

So I shifted the brood box to No 1 hive as that was potentially the weakest of the 3 last autumn and yielded no extracted honey, and then the super to the strong No 2 hive.

You quite rightly raise the question of why this happened. There was no queen cells in any of the brood frames, nor any evidence of brood, which of course suggests no, or failing, queen and the workers just filling the cells with stores. There was a very small area that might have been eaten by a mouse, but the brood box was too heavy to lift and I had to remove half the frames to transfer it. My feeding was no earlier than normal - mid September, and I don't specifically remember that hive being particularly greedy.

So I think I will just have to go with the queen getting lost - perhaps to the mouse - and perhaps slightly fortunately early enough for all the bees to beg accommadation next door.

 

[Ian123]

Obviously a guess but in my experience deadouts like that are often caused by a high varroa load… what was your Autumn treatment.

 

[pargyle]

Obviously a guess but in my experience deadouts like that are often caused by a high varroa load… what was your Autumn treatment.

There is a propensity, these days, to lay the blame on Varroa for anything and everything that results in bees deteriorating, dying out or (in this case) disappearing altogether. If the frames were stuffed with stores and the OP was not excessively feeding them, there must have been a healthy foraging population. Varroa ridden bees (you all keep telling me ... as a non-treater) do not make lots of honey.

In my humble opinion it rather points to a queen failure late in the season ... No brood in the hive left behind (I'd expect to see some capped cells with holes in them if it was varoosis). No dead bees left in the hive (I'd expect to see some as the workforce reduced and there were less bees to clear out the dead) rather suggests to me that whatever was left absconded and found their way into another colony. No empty queen cells - so they did not swarm to extinction.

But .... I'm not a proper beekeeper so I'll leave the varroa theory hanging there - but I'm not convinced.

 

[Into the lions den]

Without pictures of the central part of where the nest used to be we are relying on the description, and with no prejudgement of the expertise of the poster, is very often relayed innaccurately and the real story often jumps out to the experienced eye once pictures are available.

Pargyle is certainly right in one respect. Beekeepers are very quick to blame varroa for everything, and forget that all the old colony killers have not gone away, in fact may even be worse with the supplementary stress of varroa even if that in itself is not at a high level...its still a stress. External bogeymen being responsible for colony losses has been a story as long as I remember.

This case has a number of possibilities. More evidence required.

But............
Queenlessness, probably going back to mid summer, is high on the list, but this usually impairs rate of syrup taking.
Varroa also a strong possibility, but there would normally be a few little relict cells with unhatched or partially chewed out brood present. Varroa faeces/frass in the base of the cell close to the upper vertex of the hexagonal cell base. (looks like a tiny wooly aphid).
Pesticide/chemical kill. The favoured 'bete noir' of many. Its not a thing we meet on any kind of significant frequency.
.

 

[Ian123]

There is a propensity, these days, to lay the blame on Varroa for anything and everything that results in bees deteriorating, dying out or (in this case) disappearing altogether. If the frames were stuffed with stores and the OP was not excessively feeding them, there must have been a healthy foraging population. Varroa ridden bees (you all keep telling me ... as a non-treater) do not make lots of honey.

In my humble opinion it rather points to a queen failure late in the season ... No brood in the hive left behind (I'd expect to see some capped cells with holes in them if it was varoosis). No dead bees left in the hive (I'd expect to see some as the workforce reduced and there were less bees to clear out the dead) rather suggests to me that whatever was left absconded and found their way into another colony. No empty queen cells - so they did not swarm to extinction.

But .... I'm not a proper beekeeper so I'll leave the varroa theory hanging there - but I'm not convinced.

Yes varroa is the easy option to blame, as Murray suggested some photos could help. I did also say it’s a guess rather like we all guess or assume with the information provided by the OP. One thing that we can say with 100% certainty is Varroa would have been present You can’t really say that about any other disease or parasite options?
The OP did also suggest they had been ill prepared for Winter with huge Autumn commitments, so asking if they treated or perhaps timings would be a legitimate question?Weve not had an answer to that yet.
As to the amount of stores indicating a large healthy colony you could be correct in regard to earlier in the Summer or early Autumn. But it’s often larger prosperous hives that are liable to collapse. If you offered me a developing nuc/colony or a lager hive that’s just produced a good crop with multiple boxes and said you can only treat 1 colony, I’d actually pick the bigger hive to treat every time! As bee numbers drop in Autumn the larger colony will likely have far more mites to pressure available brood that’s probably very similar end of season to the amount found in a decent nuc with possibly far fewer mites!
As to being repeatedly told Varroa ridden bees make no honey, I’d accept that as fact! Have I ever suggested your bees are Varroa riddled, if so please show me?
So as above we are all guessing with the information provided, sometimes we’ll even get it right

 

[Erichalfbee]

So as above we are all guessing with the information provided, sometimes we’ll even get it right

@Ambodach
can you help with some pictures ?

 

[pargyle]

Yes varroa is the easy option to blame, as Murray suggested some photos could help. I did also say it’s a guess rather like we all guess or assume with the information provided by the OP. One thing that we can say with 100% certainty is Varroa would have been present You can’t really say that about any other disease or parasite options?
The OP did also suggest they had been ill prepared for Winter with huge Autumn commitments, so asking if they treated or perhaps timings would be a legitimate question?Weve not had an answer to that yet.
As to the amount of stores indicating a large healthy colony you could be correct in regard to earlier in the Summer or early Autumn. But it’s often larger prosperous hives that are liable to collapse. If you offered me a developing nuc/colony or a lager hive that’s just produced a good crop with multiple boxes and said you can only treat 1 colony, I’d actually pick the bigger hive to treat every time! As bee numbers drop in Autumn the larger colony will likely have far more mites to pressure available brood that’s probably very similar end of season to the amount found in a decent nuc with possibly far fewer mites!
As to being repeatedly told Varroa ridden bees make no honey, I’d accept that as fact! Have I ever suggested your bees are Varroa riddled, if so please show me?
So as above we are all guessing with the information provided, sometimes we’ll even get it right

I agree ... the OP has been around since 2011 and even then told us he had been keeping bees 'for many years' so I rather assumed we had an accurate description of what he saw. But you are right ... we are all guessing and without even a timetable of what pre-winter preps were taken and what the state of the colony was at that stage we are very much in the dark. But ... I like a bit of conjecture now and then, it brings out the best in this forum and I hope makes us all think about our beekeeping. Particularly those of us with only a few colonies and less experience in hive years than some of the forum stalwarts.

The colony I lost in early winter had a very low varroa count but I know the queen was not the best I've ever seen and they just disappeared leaving the hive in exactly the same state as the OP described, with stores in the hive - albeit not an excessive amount. I'm pretty certain that they dwindled as a result of queen failure (and my bad )- I'd noted she was not a great queen and if I was a proper beekeeper I'd have taken her to the gatepost and combined the colony ... sometimes I put too much faith in queens recovering ,.... and they rarely do !! I suspect the remains of the colony begged their way into my other hives.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Queenlessness, probably going back to mid summer, is high on the list, but this usually impairs rate of syrup taking.

That’s interesting. My dead out this year had only a few bees dead on the frames and food on the tops of frames which had been robbed out.

 

[Antipodes]

Queenlessness, probably going back to mid summer, is high on the list,

Even if queenlessness was in mid-summer, would you still expect to see some evidence of queen cell/s now?

 

[Antipodes]

I'm pretty certain that they dwindled as a result of queen failure (and my bad )

Was there any evidence of queen cells having been made?

 

[pargyle]

Was there any evidence of queen cells having been made?

No ... no queen cells at all. Nothing to indicate they had swarmed ... the queen was laying in the autumn but it was not the levels of brood I would have liked to see. Like I said, I had concerns at that stage and really should have done something about it.

My theory, such as it is, is that the queen was laying just enough to stop them superceding late summer, she either stopped or slowed laying in the early autumn - with too few bees left and possibly too late for them to try and create a new queen - indeed, by the time they realised there was a problem there may have been no larvae that was viable .. if the queen still had strong pheremones it would supress laying workers. I can't really guess at what happened next - it's possible by then that there were relatively few bees left - and what were decided they would be better off elsewhere. Perhaps during the Ivy flow they had sufficient buying power to beg their way into adjacent colonies - I have 7 within close proximity.

But ... who knows ? They are bees, they sometimes get it right and sometimes they get it wrong ! As humans, we share a lot of things in common with the honey bees .... and we could do with sharing some of their other traits.

 

[Ian123]

.. and we could do with sharing some of their other traits.

My partner has developed a sting in the tail as she’s got older…….does that count?

 

[Sutty]

There seems no other time bees (except drones) will beg their way into a nearby colony unless their hive has been removed and they are searching for "home", so I'm not convinced this happens.
Isn't it more likely that something induced the colony to abscond complete with the queen? Not something that we offer hear of happening in the UK, but it's common in some parts of the world.

https://theapiarist.org/absconding/...l conditions are one,as ants (or beekeepers).

 

[pargyle]

There seems no other time bees (except drones) will beg their way into a nearby colony unless their hive has been removed and they are searching for "home", so I'm not convinced this happens.
Isn't it more likely that something induced the colony to abscond complete with the queen? Not something that we offer hear of happening in the UK, but it's common in some parts of the world.

https://theapiarist.org/absconding/...l conditions are one,as ants (or beekeepers).

Who knows ? But his definition of absconding ...

Absconding is very different. During this process the entire colony – the queen and all the flying bees – leave the nest site (hive). They usually leave behind almost nothing. There may be very limited amounts of capped brood/larvae or eggs remaining, but the stores are usually gone. Absconding therefore does not involve colony reproduction. There are no queen cells produced. You start with one colony and end with one.

Does not apply in any of the cases mentioned ....

 

[Sutty]

There's a limit to how much stores they can take, so with a well supplied hive there would be loads left.
 May be brood...not necessarily.
No queen cells.

 

[Antipodes]

No ... no queen cells at all. Nothing to indicate they had swarmed ... the queen was laying in the autumn but it was not the levels of brood I would have liked to see. Like I said, I had concerns at that stage and really should have done something about it.

My theory, such as it is, is that the queen was laying just enough to stop them superceding late summer, she either stopped or slowed laying in the early autumn - with too few bees left and possibly too late for them to try and create a new queen - indeed, by the time they realised there was a problem there may have been no larvae that was viable .. if the queen still had strong pheremones it would supress laying workers. I can't really guess at what happened next - it's possible by then that there were relatively few bees left - and what were decided they would be better off elsewhere. Perhaps during the Ivy flow they had sufficient buying power to beg their way into adjacent colonies - I have 7 within close proximity.

But ... who knows ? They are bees, they sometimes get it right and sometimes they get it wrong ! As humans, we share a lot of things in common with the honey bees .... and we could do with sharing some of their other traits.

In your case, could you have missed seeing a supersedure queen cell? They can be very difficult to spot in my experience, particularly if it has been some time since the queen had emerged. A whole bunch of empty swarm cells, not so easy to miss.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

There's a limit to how much stores they can take, so with a well supplied hive there would be loads left.
 May be brood...not necessarily.
No queen cells.

so is this from experience? you have witnessed colonies absconding?

 

[Sutty]

so is this from experience? you have witnessed colonies absconding?

No, except recently hived swarms, but a colony of bees might weigh say 8kg (thinking of a very large swarm size), there's no way they could carry 30kg of honey away.