[HELP] Two Queenless Hives

I AS'd two hives six and seven weeks ago respectively. Neither of the ones that had the QC's in seem to have a laying queen, and after six weeks I'm getting a bit concerned. I've tried a test frame in both hive they just cleaned out the eggs and didn't build any QC's which would indicate the presence of a Q. But haveing searched through the boxes I haven't found either queens. What options do I have now?

Do I try another test frame or should I unite them with a Q right colony.

SteveJ

Have you checked in your supers? Many a scrub queen can pass through an excluder.

Not sure about your dates because even an unmated queen eventually starts to lay eggs.

You could risk a unite if you are unable to find the queens.

Yep checked supers as well and no sign.

SteveJ

I'm in kinda the same position having A/Sd 25th. April and still no laying queen in either hive.

Still plenty of active bees yet when I last looked a week ago, no eggs. Plenty of nicely polished cells in readyness though.

The weather here in May was awful with low temperatures. Yesterday and today were scorchers, over 20C which is necessary for mating. So if I have a virgin queen in each hive, they either have now done the business or they have gone stale.

I don't think stale for I believe nature expends their period as a virgin if the weather is adverse.

So fingers crossed, this is what I hope.

I won't open the hives but if they mated, then give say three days before laying, three days for eggs to hatch. Larvae then give off a pheromone stimulating the field bees to start bringing in pollen again. This is what I'll look out for as I won't disturb them. So in about a week it's do or die.

Give yours another bit of time and good luck. I think many of us are in a similar position this year.

Don't give up hope! We had a colony like that last year. Saw emerged queen cells 30th of May, and after adding sereral frames of eggs which were not used for queen cells, we finally had a laying queen 2nd of August - which I make 10 weeks.

They did start to clear the area of stores where the brood nest should be - just no laying! That colony is the second strongest this year!

Jc

I did an AS at the end of April and have just seen queens and eggs today. I had convinced myself that both colonies hadn't even managed to bring the QC to maturity.
I'd stick in another test frame if you can spare it and give it another week now that the weather is improving.

A option is to split the hive 1 half would have a Q of some type the other would be
desperate and i would of thought be glad of some eggs.

Disclaimer
I am not saying this is right,but my own ideas on what to do.

SteveJ said:

I AS'd two hives six and seven weeks ago respectively.

SteveJ

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You are not on your own - exactly the same here in Lancashire - only three hives. I am going to wait a few days to see if the virgins (if any) have mated.

Below it the advice that we were sent from our master beekkeeper in the club. It was timely for me because some of the problems others are seeing, I am facing. I did an AS in early May and they swarmed anyway which I caught. My colonies therefore went from 1 to 3 in the space of a week. The old queen is doing a great job but the AS and the remainder of the original colony are broodless. The AS has a lot of bees, they are bringing pollen in and the cells are polished so I thing the queen probably got mated in the last few days with the nice weather coming back. The hive where the queen swarmed from I am less optomistic, but will wait a week or so before any interfernece from me.

The advice given was as follws:-

I am getting a lot of calls from members who say their hives are queenless.
Remember April when everything in the garden was rosy, the bees thriving and preparing to swarm. We did the right thing (or not) and did artificial swarms or the bees swarmed.
Then we had May and the wind blew and it was cold and rained. Our virgin queens emerged from the queen cells and waited and waited for sunny warm weather to go out and get mated. We are now in a situation where many of these virgin queens are 3 or 4 weeks old and showing no signs of laying.
To be a good mated queen she needs to get mated within about 3 weeks.
We now have the situation where many of the queens may not get properly mated.
If you have an unmated (or mated) queen the bees will be preparing for her to start laying. They will shine the cells in the middle of the comb where the brood nest should be and they may also be bringing in pollen.
If this is the case the best thing to do is nothing, give the queen a couple of weeks to start laying.
To test whether your colony is queenless, put a frame with eggs or very young larvae in the brood chamber. If it is queenless you will find emergency queen cells within a few days.

DON'T introduce another queen or merge it with another colony, unless you have found the virgin queen and removed her. She will kill off your good queen.
If the queen is not mated she will eventually become a drone layer.
If the colony is queenless you will eventually get laying workers. Read Ted Hooper for the difference between drone layers and laying workers or ask at the next meeting on Sunday Afternoon.
Hopefully, with warmer weather forecast, we will be able to get into queen rearing mode and things will get back to normal!!!!

Flatters said:

Hopefully, with warmer weather forecast, we will be able to get into queen rearing mode and things will get back to normal!!!!

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Have you seen the weather forecast for the next week, in the NW not above 14c for the whole week

even if they do mate, then there are going to be lots of supersedure queens in Autumn

Thanks MM...let's hope we're south of north with 37 VQs out in apideas at two mating apiaries. As for the colonies here, similar to elsewhere, waiting game times a few...

MuswellMetro said:

Have you seen the weather forecast for the next week, in the NW not above 14c for the whole week

even if they do mate, then there are going to be lots of supersedure queens in Autumn

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why?

<To be a good mated queen she needs to get mated within about 3 weeks.
We now have the situation where many of the queens may not get properly mated.>

Generally I agree with such advice, but IMO and IMO only, nature is not stupid.

When there is adverse weather conditions, I believe they get extra days grace.

If not, then honeybees would never have survived 'till now.

Great post though.

Some of ours that we ASd in mid April are only just coming into lay. Literally only polished cells 2 weeks ago, now they are awash with eggs. So all is not lost.

I'd echo the cautions about doing anything radical. One of our colonies lost its queen over the winter, raised QCs when given a test frame (at the second inspection of the year), then nothing happened. Odd drone cells suggested laying workers (no worker brood at all), so they were tipped out and merged with a nuc. All went well in the original hive (flying bees + nuc merged well), but there was a persistent clump of bees (small swarm size) in the old brood box at the tip out site. We covered them with a crown board, and hoped the flyers would go home. They stayed. Eventually Mrs rae went through them and found a queen (nice big one), so they have now been put in a nuc. We'll see if they are viable, but bees do the strangest things when it comes to queens.

Rae said: Some of ours that we ASd in mid April are only just coming into lay

Keep fingers crossed yet awhile - they may be drone layers.

Darren64 said: why?

Because that wil be a better option for the bees than having a drone layer at the onset of winter.

Oh the waiting, waiting, waiting. I'm also faced with hives set up ready for laying but no eggs. May's poor weather has caused this delay and under normal conditions I'd say my VQs are getting a little old to mate. However, I am pinning my hopes on the bees having some mechanism for letting the VQs sit around unmated for a little longer when confined by weather..............it kind of makes evolutionary sense. Quick look tomorrow then another week chewing my nails. Pretty disasterous feel to this spring................but hell I'm learning loads.

Keep fingers crossed yet awhile - they may be drone layers.

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One of the 5 has turned out to be a drone layer, but the others seem OK. Very good (and big) pattern over lots of frames. Confirmation to come at the next inspection when they will be capped...or domed!

Hi, I'm in the same position. I'm new to the beekeeping lark, this is my first year, I had 1 hive that was full to bursting so I did an AS at the end of April, but since I've not had any eggs, not sure what happened to the old queen (probably clumsy inexperianced handeling) I split the frames with queen cells between the 2 hives (at least 3 in each hive). Both hives have nice shiny brood cells, but no eggs or brood, from reading the above I guess I should just wait.

One thing I have noticed in the last week the bees seem to have became a bit grumpy and seem slightly more aggressive than before. Any ideas why this would be?

GBC ... possibly end of the OSR in your area, or similar source of nectar. We're into the June gap in some places. There are threads on colonies needing feeding. When the flow stops they can get a bit tetchy.

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fatshark

Thanks Fatshark, I'll get out and give them a feed. I've got so much to learn.