Losing hive....at what point do I give up.

[joeybrowne]

Hey all,
I looked into one (one of two) of my hives today and noticed only approx. 2k bees at most.  The queen is not laying eggs and I noticed quite a few dead bees on the comb.
My other hive is really strong.  I could possibly take a couple frames of brood from the strong hive and put it in the weak hive and hopefully get a queen.  Is this even a possibility or is this hive lost.  I should have noticed soon but the population was dropping so gradually that it kinda crept up on me.
I know I have to do something soon or the hive will definitely be lost.
Any suggestions would be appreciated.
Thanks

[Wandering Man]

I have done that with a nuc that had about the same number of bees.

I didn't shake in enough bees, however, and the small hive beetles slimed a couple of frames.

So, I cleaned it up, and added more frames and bees. It took a while, but we've got the nuc into a 10 frame deep and the bees are working on a medium super now.

If the queen is not laying, I'd replace her.

Keep in mind, I can't stand to throw out an old pair of tennis shoes, so my advice my be slanted.

[CBT]

The dead bees on the comb. Are there heads in the cells, are there dead bees all inside the hive.?

[joeybrowne]

Yeah, some have their heads inside the comb and some don't.  Does that not mean they're starving?  I have sugar syrup there for them...

[Perry]

If the queen isn't laying Joey (be certain), pinch her and shift a couple frames of brood over, making sure you have eggs on there. They will raise a new queen. Finding queens right now is tough, the imports are all in and local queens won't be available for a while yet.
I am just starting to see swarm cells now.

[Barbarian]

Are the bees taking the sugar syrup ? The syrup may need to be in close contact with the cluster. A contact feeder right above the cluster would be my choice.

With some dwindling colonies, they do not pick up no matter what you do. A lot of effort which might be better spent with other colonies.

[Bakersdozen]

Another option is to combine with your strong hive.  That way you have one big colony.  If all goes well, you can do a split when local queens become available.