Queen stopped laying

Hi everyone, this is my first time posting. My husband and I are in our second year of beekeeping.

We have discovered that in one of our hives, the queen has stopped laying. The bees overall look very healthy, there are plenty of them and they have ample stores. The queen is from late 2009 and we were planning to replace her in the spring. But, now it appears we may be too late as over the last few weeks we have seen no new brood, even though she has room to lay. Even the warm weather has not encouraged her to lay.

So, I'm not sure what we can do, as there aren't any drones about for mating a new queen. Will they survive the winter until we can get a new queen mated? Or should we try to unite with another hive?

Thanks.

Queens do stop laying at this time of the year - one of mine (August 2011 emergent) stopped laying a few weeks ago - she may just be shutting up shop for the winter. Don't panic, just feed them if they haven't plenty of stores and keep an eye on the colony until spring

Thank you for your quick response.

I did think that it was possible, especially as they have glued everything up with propolis. But I thought the queen only stops laying for a month or two in the winter?

Welcome to the forum. Long time a member but your first post today.

as over the last few weeks we have seen no new brood

You need to be a bit more informative about this.

What is a few?

When did the last capped brood emerge?

What varroa treatment have you been applying? When did it start and when did it finish?

Likely no bother but not a lot to go on.

Re: uniting with another colony; do you have that option? How strong are these colonies? There should be no problem with uniting colonies at the present time.

Location, type of hive, etc might make it easier to guess your situation.

If queenless they may survive the winter but not too likely to be in good shape for adding a new queen, so obviously best if over-wintered queenright.

Far better to start with another queen and bees from existing Q+ colonies in the spring.

Not a lot of help really, but not a lot to go on.

RAB

Sorry, should have given you more:

On 31.7 we noticed they were kicking out their drones, but at this point brood was all as it should be. Our first Apiguard treatment was put on 13.8 and the second on 27.8. On 10.9, we first noticed that there were no eggs or uncapped brood, but there was capped brood at this point. We initially thought it may be down to the Apiguard treatment. However, at our next check on 17.9 there was no brood what so ever.

Re: uniting with another colony; do you have that option?

Yes, we have several strong colonies to unite with.

Location, type of hive, etc might make it easier to guess your situation.

The hive is in a field facing south-east and it's a 14x12 national. The bees are Buckfast and have up to this point been very prolific.

If it was earlier in the year, we would have immediately taken measures to replace the queen. But as it's autumn, we're not sure of what is the best thing to do.

digitalangel78 said:

we're not sure of what is the best thing to do.

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Put a test comb in, before you do anything else.

digitalangel78 said:

]Location,

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I think RAB means where in the country are you, not just that it is in a field.

From you dates you are doing a lot of inspections, at a time of year now when they are not really required.

And as you say it is Autumn, so if you have squashed her through excessive inspection, not much you can do.

Oops, sorry, we're in Oxfordshire.

We had intended the 10.9 to be our last one, and have only checked afterwards to see if there were eggs.

The queen is definitely there, we have seen her on our checks, just no eggs.

So stopped laying around, or soon after, the 28th August. That is a long time to be broodless with a queen there. Are you sure there are no eggs or signs of her re-starting laying?

Not too important with just the one colony not laying, and several others going well.

I think if she were mine I would be distributing the bees to other hives, providing they are not nosemic, or otherwise unhealthy.

How you might do that is open to your local set-up. Move the hive and allow the workers to redistribute themselves to adjacent colonies and then unite the remainder (after queen removal) to reinforce your weakest colony - or whatever you choose.

Leaving them for a few more days is not going to be the end of the world either. We just don't know how long this autumal summery weather is going to last. If it were to continue to the end of the month, she may restart and lay up enough for the winter.

Chucking out drones back in late July would indicate to me a possible shortage of stores at that time and/or definitely not planning on superceding. I would not be giving her very long to sort herself out. No great loss, better to concentrate on your other colonies going into winter. No time for lame ducks at this time of the season. An early split next year with a bought-in laying queen is a far better way to go than messing around with a failing colony, IMO.

RAB

digitalangel78 said:

The queen is definitely there, we have seen her on our checks, just no eggs.

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Don't worry then,she will resume laying when they are ready,plenty of colonys around like this. Some have just resumed laying again as the pollen from the ivy has started to come in.

Ok. Thank you all for your suggestions. I think we may unite with the one weaker hive we have to give them a boost in numbers. The non-laying queen was due to be replaced anyway. We may then consider a split in the spring.