Maverick bees?

[Headnavigator]

After multi-checking my weakest hive (no queen, emergency queen cell, still no queen, patience, long wait and eventually a frame of brood from another hive, I resigned myself to the fact that it really was queenless and bought a new queen. She was swiftly accepted, and after a couple of weeks I checked to see that all was well. Yes and no! She is there, very visible (I marked her before introducing her) and laying. BIAS but only on the one frame that I had put into the hive - all others clean and empty except for major pollen arch and a few stores. I'm feeding 1:1 as a precaution anyway.
Anyone got any idea of why she is only laying on that one (introduced) frame?

 

[DarynWebb]

maybe she just needs a bit more time?

 

[snoop]

Is there enough bees in there for her to expand the brood nest?

 

[Headnavigator]

You may have a point there Snoop, the only young bees are the ones that would have come from the introduced frame; there are - not plenty - but quite a lot of others but bearing in mind the hive's history they're not going to be youngsters. The new queen may be smart enough to recognise the shortage of nurse bees, perhaps?

 

[user 6228]

To improve build up you need to allow the colony to change the number of bees per unit of brood. That means increasing the level of insulation. That reduces the number of bees doing climate management of the brood.
The biggest advantage of insulation is build up ... thats from ITLD experience and it comes from the research done, and I've seen it myself.
Even if you have a poly hive you can do more on the insulation front.

 

[Headnavigator]

Even in these temperatures? OK, I have a five inch thick eke of top quality insulation I use in Winter, on it goes. Thank you!