Failing queen

Neil · May 15, 2009

Hi All,
I have a failing queen there is only about four frames of brood and there not full I was wondering what to do. They haven’t superseded the queen so should I regrettably terminate the queen if there are day old eggs and let the bees produce a new queen would this work?

Poly Hive · May 15, 2009

If you have drones about then yes.

Is it worth the hassle? I would bump her off and unite to a strong stock then take a nuc off it later when you have a queen or two to spare.

PH

Neil · May 15, 2009

Thanks for the advice I only hive the one hive working at the moment is this still a good idea?

gavin · May 16, 2009

Hi Neil

What makes you think the queen is the problem? Other possibilities exist, from disease to poor local forage. Bumping off the queen will delay the build-up further and will not necessarily solve anything (but it might!).

A failing queen might have patchy brood (and other things give this too) or you may find scattered drone cells where they shouldn't be.

Can you call on an experienced beekeeper to have a look?

best wishes

Gavin

PS Or post a pic of a brood frame.

jon · May 16, 2009

If you kill the queen the best you will get will be an emergency queen with similar genetics to the one you just removed.

Is the box packed with bees yet with very little brood? if you have only a few frames of bees you will only have a few frames of brood as you need sufficient bees to keep brood warm.
The problem could be lack of bees rather than a poor queen.
If there is a lot of free space in the brood box consider removing a few frames and replacing them with dummy boards. This will help the bees keep brood warm by reducing space.

Hebeegeebee · May 16, 2009

Neil, if you have only one colony (and 4 hives?) you might consider putting the queen on a frame of brood plus stores in a nuc and allow the colony to produce a queen? However this may depend on answers to jon's quenstions above.