first inspection what a mess

[darren64]

did my first inspections today,in the first hive,there wasn't a lot of brood and it was patchy,there were eggs,but there were a few sealed poor quality queen cells and open queen cell that looked a better one,I did eventually find the new queen but not the old,there were plenty of bees and 8 frames of honey in the super,so it doesn't seem likely they have swarmed,is it possible that the new queen has not been in the hive long and will start laying,should I wait and see?.In my second hive I made the mistake of leaving the eke on because they filled it with cone and stores while I did my varroa treatment in autumn,the eke is now completely full of comb hanging from the crown board,some with honey and a lot with sealed brood,have I done the right thing by putting a queen excluder between the eke and the brood box to give the sealed brood chance to hatch,but stopping the queen laying any more in the eke,I have also put a super full of empty drawn comb above the eke,will this work or have I done it all wrong?

 

[wightbees]

Do you know if the queen is under the QE?

 

[darren64]

Do you k ?now if the queen is under the QE

yes she is,we found her in the brood box

 

[wightbees]

Sounds about right to me, but then i'm no expert . Someone will soon let you know.

 

[darren64]

Sounds about right to me, but then i'm no expert . Someone will soon let you know.

Its not the second hive that I'm concerned about really,it has a lot of brood in all stages,its the first one with the new queen.

 

[drstitson]

old queen past it so superceeded? just let new one mate and get laying.

 

[richardbees]

darren

re hive 1 presumably you know it's a new queen you saw because the old one was marked? If there's eggs you mimust have missed the old one by days!
The colony seems viable so leave it alone for a couple of weeks and put a contact feeder on with 1pt water / 1lb sugar syrup mix

rich

 

[darren64]

yes the queen was marked red so I was gonna have to change anyway,fingers crossed the new queen be mated,cheers

 

[MuswellMetro]

yes the queen was marked red so I was gonna have to change anyway,fingers crossed the new queen be mated,cheers

very early for your area, sugest you may need to re queen or use a frame of eggs form the 2nd hive

may even be worth combining and splitting later

 

[darren64]

very early for your area, sugest you may need to re queen or use a frame of eggs form the 2nd hive

may even be worth combining and splitting later

The weather as been really quite warm,and there are drones in my hives,so other hives in the area will contain drones,will it be ok to wait a couple of weeks to see what happens?

 

[richardbees]

Darren, it looks like you're in with a chance - so I suggest you leave Hive 1 alone until a sunny day around April 16th!
richard

 

[darren64]

Darren, it looks like you're in with a chance - so I suggest you leave Hive 1 alone until a sunny day around April 16th!
richard

ok cheers

 

[darren64]

Darren, it looks like you're in with a chance - so I suggest you leave Hive 1 alone until a sunny day around April 16th!
richard

checked yesterday and still no brood,was gonna put a frame of brood in from the other hive,but if a worker only lives for 35 days in summer,will there be enough time for them to produce another queen cell in time for the queen to mate and produce foraging bees before the existing foragers die?

 

[richardbees]

Yes,

I would think so, especially as we're having such good weather (even up'tnorth) in the middle of the Spring nectar flow.

richard

 

[darren64]

Yes,

I would think so, especially as we're having such good weather (even up'tnorth) in the middle of the Spring nectar flow.

richard

,should I remove the queen a few days before I put the frame in or a the same time?

 

[richardbees]

We're still waiting for the new queen in Hive 1 to start laying....did you see her yesterday?

EDIT

to add it can take a couple of weeks depending on weather etc.

 

[darren64]

We're still waiting for the new queen in Hive 1 to start laying....did you see her yesterday?

EDIT

to add it can take a couple of weeks depending on weather etc.

yep she is still there,I marked her.so she could still start laying,she doesn't look poor quality,nice large queen.

 

[richardbees]

darren

EXCELLENT!

just leave her alone - you may have missed seeing her first eggs

(worker bees in a queenless hive live for much longer)

richard

 

[darren64]

darren

EXCELLENT!

just leave her alone - you may have missed seeing her first eggs

(worker bees in a queenless hive live for much longer)

richard

cheers

 

[darren64]

cheers

checked today,the queen is still there but I could not see any eggs,but there is still some sealed drone cells,there were 2 sealed queen cells on the face of the frames,they looked ok nice and long not smooth,so are they trying to supercede the queen again?will the new queens be any good?