Queen found above excluder

[ches chesney]

Hello,

I (a neo-beekeeper) have just returned from assisting a fellow newbee to inspect a hive he bought recently from an elderly beekeeper who has had to retire due to ill health.

The colony inhabits two brood boxes and two supers which are well stocked with brood and stores throughout.
In the supers, we saw lots of capped honey, capped brood and larvae. There appeared to be relatively little pollen and almost no drone cells. There was also what appeared to be some chalk brood.

The queen excluder is between the brood boxes and the supers.
It was clear the queen was active in the supers. We photographed the frames as we inspected them and were later able to identify the queen there, as expected.

In the brood boxes, there was capped honey and quite a lot of capped brood cells, some pollen, but no sign of recent laying.

We left the hive as we had found it, i.e. with the queen excluder in place. However it occurred to us shortly after the inspection that we should probably have removed the QE altogether.

We be very interested in hearing from some more experienced beekeepers what should now be done about the situation...

Thank you.

Ches

 

[richardbees]

Congratulations on spotting the queen in that heap!

I'd suggest as a first step, to go back and find the Q again and put her in one of the two brood boxes on the bottom, then the QE and the supers on top. In 3 weeks all the brood in the supers will have hatched=== and we can re-assess

edit to add someone recently probably let the Q into the supers by mistake

 

[ches chesney]

Sorry, the capped brood was not in the brood boxes - my mistake!

Thanks.

 

[richardbees]

Ches, makes no difference but ...does the QE look in good condition?

assuming it does, I still suggest you find and put the Q in the brood boxes below the QE with the 2 supers on top. If it looks the slightest bit distorted, buy another asap!

I'm also an old fart and can easily understand how the hive would be in that state!

Richard

 

[ches chesney]

Many thanks for your advice, richardbees.

Personally, I didn't like the QE, although it didn't look too bad apart from quite a lot of propolis. It's a thin metal one and I prefer those with a wooden frame around them to give a bit of bee space.

What would you think about the idea of identifying the super with the queen in it and moving that down, onto one of the brood boxes - to make a brood-and-a-half, and putting the QE on that? That would give the choice, possibly, to remove one of the remaining boxes and leave the other as a super.

Ches

 

[richardbees]

Ches
Yes, that's a good plan - but if you want to go ahead with 'brood and a half' I suggest you put the super underneath the bb as it'll make it easier for inspections next Spring.
Those flat metal QEs tend to be foolproof
richard

 

[MuswellMetro]

well been there, done queen in super, got the T shirt

Agree with above, metal QE normally queen safe, but she could have been off lay and a small queen, though i expect is was a beekeeper mistake

1) queen on crown board when QE and super added

2) top brood box put on super when inspecting or top brood box on roof ,then knocked in when re assembling

3) QE on skew for a few minutes

4) QE with queen under placed on top of super while inspection of brood

me ,well it was no, 2 and the roof

 

[ches chesney]

Thanks again, Richard!
I accept your wisdom regarding putting the super below the bb, but I'd appreciate further explanation of how, specifically, it'll facilitate the inspections.

Ches

 

[ches chesney]

Thanks, MuswellMetro, it's good to know the risks to avoid!

Ches

 

[richardbees]

ches,

Apart from a preliminary 'wellbeing' check, the Spring inspections are chiefly for swarm prevention. A consensus is that they'll "usually" make swarm Q cells towards/along the bottom of frames in the bb if the super is underneath - so you only have to lift the bb frames out.
whereas if you put the super on top, you have to go all through those frames, put it aside then go through all the bb frames looking for swarm QCs.

Obviously not foolproof but was certainly the case the few times I went 'brood+half'
but personally no longer do it and accept an earlier tendency to swarm....
Other beekeepers swear by it!
richard

 

[Erichalfbee]

ches,

A consensus is that they'll "usually" make swarm Q cells towards/along the bottom of frames in the bb if the super is underneath - so you only have to lift the bb frames out.
whereas if you put the super on top, you have to go all through those frames, put it aside then go through all the bb frames looking for swarm QCs.

Conversely if you have the shallow on top all you have to do is tilt and look and leave the brood box alone.

 

[ches chesney]

Richard,

Really good to know!

Thank you.
Ches

 

[ches chesney]

Conversely if you have the shallow on top all you have to do is tilt and look and leave the brood box alone.

Hi ericA,
What do you tilt? Do you mean just the half brood box or both?
At the moment, at least, it's quite a big stack to move at all!

Ches

 

[Headnavigator]

Similarly - was lucky enough to have a prime swarm move into an empty hive but they all, including the queen, went through the QE (normal framed rod type) into the super and she started laying there. This gave me the chance to remove the QE and replace the old frames in the brood box with minimal loss, and now have brood and a half with the BB on top of the super, with brood throughout. Presumably my best plan then is to leave them like that? Much prefer to over-winter in single BB but not sure they're going to let me!

 

[ches chesney]

[...] Much prefer to over-winter in single BB but not sure they're going to let me!

Hi Headnavigator,

What is the advantage of over-wintering in a single BB?

Thanks.

Ches

 

[Erichalfbee]

Hi ericA,
What do you tilt? Do you mean just the half brood box or both?
At the moment, at least, it's quite a big stack to move at all!

Ches

Ches, you just lift up the top shallow and tilt it away from you and look at the bottom bars.
Swarm cells tend to be there.
If you're not sure you just have the top box to look through. If something seems amiss then you would have to look through the bottom box too.
If you're routinely looking in the bottom box anyway take off the top one (put safely down as the queen may be there) and look through bottom one first.

 

[ches chesney]

Thanks, ericA, for the clear explanation.

Ches

 

[Headnavigator]

Hi Headnavigator,

What is the advantage of over-wintering in a single BB?

Thanks.

Ches

Only that there is less empty space for the colony to heat, so they consume less in the way of stores to remain warm.

 

[ches chesney]

Only that there is less empty space for the colony to heat, so they consume less in the way of stores to remain warm.

Good thinking!

Thanks,
Ches

 

[crateman]

I have a few points to add to this thread, the first and most important being that you should DEFINITELY not put the queen in the brood box with the QE between her and the supers with brood. We have done this twice in successive years (some people learn slowly), and both occasions we have lost the queen. The first time they swarmed, the second time the bees balled the queen and killed her (we actually saw this happen on inspection).

The reason is that, with the queen unable to walk on the comb and spread her pheromones, the bees build queen cells from the brood/eggs in the same way as if the queen was duff, then she leaves or they get rid. The queen MUST have access to the brood, or you'll lose her.

If the BB is put over the supers, the queen will most likely do what she would in the wild (don't they always?) and lay near the top of the comb, i.e. move up into the brood box. When she has done this and the brood nest has eventually moved up, it's safe to swap the supers back over a QE.

However with winter on the way, it wouldn't be a bad idea to keep on a brood and half and swap them back around in the spring. We've done this for 4 years now, and haven't lost a colony through the winter yet - the extra stores available in a brood and a half far outway any potential problems with heating. We keep ours on mesh floors anyway, so they get pretty drafty, but still no winter losses. In fact, given that the bees tend to overwinter high up in the hive you could argue that, with mesh floors, a BB and a half puts the cluster further from the floor/outside world than with a BB alone. The reason we put the BB over the super and not the other way around, is to keep the queen from laying in it and make it easy in the spring.

When spring comes, we take the 1st opportunity to switch the super to the top over a QE, before the nest has grown to occupy it, and continue running the colonies on single BBs until autumn.