State of queen and influence on honey production.

alfazer · Aug 7, 2014

Let's say it's July and we have a colony with no laying queen. We can't find her and a test frame of young brood does not produce a queen cell. About a month later, eggs start appearing again. Maybe it's the queen taking a break? Maybe it's a supersedure and now the new queen is mated and laying?

My query is, all other things being equal, does a gap in laying make any difference to the foraging and general honey production of the colony. (Aside from the fact that the colony will have become smaller during this time?)

Davelin · Aug 8, 2014

It depends when your break in laying occurs. Your July foragers would be from eggs laid in mid to late May, so it's then that it's crucial for your queen to be in full lay. Going off lay in July May help foraging with less brood to feed.

If they had superseded you would hope that you had noticed queen cells.

Apple · Aug 8, 2014

We have had q- colonies with double brood + 1/2 that produce 160 lbs + of honey.
Kept queenless for breeding purposes, with more frames of selected and time framed brood added at regular intervals to keep numbers up, it it the quantity and quality ( mine are Amms) of the honey bee that produces honey for you to sell.
Simple husbandry, I can not understand this fetish for finding queens, I have good colonies, in which I have never seen the queen.

Must go time for my medication!

James

YorkshireBees · Aug 8, 2014

It's not the Queen that determines the honey crop but the abundance of bee to forage at the RIGHT time.

Ofc having less or no brood to feed may slightly increase the amount of Honey stored in a hive but the importance of my first statement, I believe, is the key.

Finman · Aug 8, 2014

If the hive has no larvae 2 weeks, it is able to forage much more yield per day, but some hives loose their motivation to forage, if you make them queenless.
I have nursed my hives that way 30 years. But actually a good yield comes from good pastures.

Nowadays I do not use that trick any more. Queenless hive does not gather pollen and pollen store is important to the winter brood. It was difficult to make large colonies over winter.