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Offline Beeboy

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My splits
« on: April 22, 2014, 09:16:56 am »
I started spring with 5 hives that I had over wintered. I split my worst hive, & lost the mother colony, but the split I made now has a laying queen. (I let the splits make their own queens this time)

I have made two more splits from stronger hives & I checked one of them last friday. They are making queen cells, but I also found some eggs & very young larva. It had been 6 days since I split so there should not be any eggs at this point. It does not look like a laying worker. I will check it again tomorrow or Thursday. It got down to 28 at my place on monday night, & it was colder in some areas. These 3 splits are at a new place about 10 miles away, so it may have got a little colder there. Is it possible that I put to much brood in it for the amount of bees that I had & the eggs &  few larva got to cold & died? Its only in one small area of one frame.

Normally won't it take longer than just 6 days for a laying worker to develop?

This came from a really strong hive, so I'm wondering if I might have the rare case of 2 queens & got the second queen in the split without knowing it? There is so much brood in the parent colony it is unbelievable. She had a deep & a shallow of wall to wall brood in various stages, & that after I used 3 frames of brood from this hive to make my first split about 1-1/2 weeks earlier. She was this way last year to. I got her set up in late May, in foundation only & I harvested 6-1/2 gallons of honey from them & they had plenty left over for the winter.

I will check my 3rd split when I go back to check the others on Wednesday/Thursday.

Any thoughts on the eggs & larva in the second split? Or anything else for that matter. I think I'll try my hand at grafting next time, so I don't have to wait for the splits to make queens.
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Offline brooksbeefarm

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Re: My splits
« Reply #1 on: April 22, 2014, 10:12:46 am »
Anything is possible, but normally it takes 5 to 6 weeks for a laying worker to start. A \re you sure you didn't get the queen from the mother hive in the nuc?? Jack
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Offline Beeboy

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Re: My splits
« Reply #2 on: April 22, 2014, 10:28:34 am »
Yes, I am sure. I was dividing things up, & there she was on a frame. I put that whole frame into the bottom box, put a queen excluder on & put the top box back on until morning. (she was the most gorgeous queen I have ever seen.

I'm expecting my next inspection to tell me a lot.
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Offline LazyBkpr

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Re: My splits
« Reply #3 on: April 22, 2014, 10:30:47 am »
As I understand it, it takes a loss of pheromone from brood to cause laying workers to develop. In general it will be 21 days from the last eggs laid to new bees and no more brood/pheromone. THEN the laying workers begin to develop..   A laying worker can at most lay two eggs per day, so when you see two, three or more eggs in cells it is generally because there are laying "workers" rather than a laying worker.   I have my doubts about it being a laying worker, and would suspect there was another queen in there.  Because there were originally two or because a virgin queen located the queenless hive etc, its hard to tell.  I have more often than "rare" found two queens when running brood through a shaker box. On one occasion I found two, and my mentor pointed out a third running along the edge of the box and excluder.
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Offline Beeboy

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Re: My splits
« Reply #4 on: April 22, 2014, 10:40:01 am »
I didn't know that about the laying workers. These gals never cease to amaze me. So you don't think the eggs could have froze & died?

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Offline Lburou

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Re: My splits
« Reply #5 on: April 22, 2014, 12:00:21 pm »
Thanks for that pearl Lazy  :)
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Offline Beeboy

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Re: My splits
« Reply #6 on: April 22, 2014, 01:25:42 pm »
Yes, thank you lazy.
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Offline LazyBkpr

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Re: My splits
« Reply #7 on: April 22, 2014, 09:17:31 pm »
Quote from: threadkilla on April 22, 2014, 10:40:01 am
I didn't know that about the laying workers. These gals never cease to amaze me. So you don't think the eggs could have froze & died?

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   I would like to think if the eggs had been chilled the workers would have removed them post haste.
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Offline Beeboy

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Re: My splits
« Reply #8 on: April 24, 2014, 08:18:28 am »
I got into then yesterday and there a few more eggs. There are half dozen Queen cells, but there are also eggs. The eggs I saw last week are capped & they look like worker brood but I don't know how long it takes for the bubble to appear on drone brood. It's a small area of eggs, probably about the size of my Palm, maybe a little smaller.

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Offline pistolpete

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Re: My splits
« Reply #9 on: April 24, 2014, 11:03:33 pm »
One possibility (other than two queens in the donor hive)  is that a newly mated queen returning from her mating flight went into the wrong hive.   Normally when that happens they get killed, but your queenless split would have welcomed her.
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Offline Beeboy

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Re: My splits
« Reply #10 on: April 25, 2014, 11:44:57 am »
Quote from: pistolpete on April 24, 2014, 11:03:33 pm
One possibility (other than two queens in the donor hive)  is that a newly mated queen returning from her mating flight went into the wrong hive.   Normally when that happens they get killed, but your queenless split would have welcomed her.
It's really strange. I only have one other hive there that has had time to make a queen, & the queen is there & doing good. I don't know, but I'm getting nervous about this one.
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Offline Beeboy

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Re: My splits
« Reply #11 on: April 25, 2014, 12:40:40 pm »
The hive is making queen cells, so my question is will the laying workers kill the queens when they are hatched? Should I just go ahead & give these queens time to hatch & see what happens? Should I go ahead & shake them out on the ground far from the hive, & try to get rid of any workers, just in case.

One more question. How long does it take for the drone brood take to develop that bubble on the end that looks like the end of a .22 bullet?
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Offline Beeboy

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Re: My splits
« Reply #12 on: April 28, 2014, 10:40:39 am »
Well, I guess I'll check the brood today & if it is all drone brood I will assume it is a laying worker & shake them all out far from there, & hope for the best.
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Offline DonMcJr

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Re: My splits
« Reply #13 on: April 29, 2014, 09:37:03 am »
Might be a 2nd Queen that just isn't up to par and they are trying to supercede her?
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Offline Beeboy

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Re: My splits
« Reply #14 on: April 29, 2014, 09:44:54 am »
Maybe. I thought the same thing. I went yesterday & got through the third frame, & it started raining. I put it all back together, I'll have to look another day.

What I did see yesterday was brood that look like worker brood, not drone brood. I only saw one egg though. The queen cells (that I saw) are not opened yet, but they should be anytime. So shaking them out at some distance away might not be a good idea right now. I think I'll leave them alone at this point, & wait to see if a queen will emerge & do her thing.

Now that it's so close to the queens hatching, I am afraid to shake them out to get rid of a laying worker. I'm afraid that a queen might come back from mating & not be able to find her home. Anyway, that's the latest. It seems my other splits are doing great, & that's the good news!
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Offline riverbee

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Re: My splits
« Reply #15 on: April 29, 2014, 09:53:10 am »
"How long does it take for the drone brood take to develop that bubble on the end that looks like the end of a .22 bullet? "

they are capped on the 10th day.

i think you made a good decision to wait on shaking them out, not sure that you have a laying worker. 
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Offline Beeboy

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Re: My splits
« Reply #16 on: May 01, 2014, 06:55:00 pm »
Crazy stuff going on! I looked in my best hive today and found 3 Queens. I have two deeps and a shallow box in this hive, with a queen excluder between the two deeps. The shallow had a queen in it that was hobbling around like she was old and decrepit. Pulled the top box off to find another Queen with her head down in the Queen excluder and she was doing her best to get through that thing. She also looks like a virgin Queen. The other bees were balling her big time. I don't even know what they are doing when they are doing that. I caught her a put her in a bottle. Then I opened the bottom box and found the Queen in that box! She is laying up a storm by the way. I have been in this hive several times this year and have never seen any Queen cells in it. There were no eggs in the top boxes at all, so I know these two Queens on top aren't laying, but where in the heck did they come from and what is going on with this hive? They have plenty of room & shouldn't be swarming. Shrug...

Also this is the hive that I took a split from that had a few eggs in it. That would be four Queens in this one hive... & I thought I knew something about bees. HA!

One more thing. There were way to many drones in the top box. I'm mean like frames of nothing but drones. Thousands of them just hanging out.

I got a pic of the first Queen. I'll try to figure out how to post it later.

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Offline Beeboy

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Re: My splits
« Reply #17 on: May 01, 2014, 07:04:04 pm »



Did it work?
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Offline DonMcJr

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Re: My splits
« Reply #18 on: May 03, 2014, 02:41:22 am »
Yes wheres the queen though?
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Offline DonMcJr

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Re: My splits
« Reply #19 on: May 03, 2014, 02:42:48 am »
Never mind I found her. ..  8)
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