wrt the comment/debate about waiting for a queen to be raised:
An attempt at summarizing what Ed is saying that at this point of the season any hive intended to make the winter, it must be a fully functioning hive - RIGHT NOW. Complete with laying queen, minimum 4 frames full of brood of all stages, plenty of stores, and a box nearly overflowing with bees. If it does not meet ALL of that criteria, it is a hive that is already dead but the bees in there just do not know it yet. Or perhaps they do and it is the beekeeper who is missing the signs.
This is probably where I was confused. I had thought bees were supposed to be shutting down on raising brood in the fall. I have about 13 hives and two had 6+ frames of brood. Some have small patches of capped brood, with just a few eggs laid around the edges. Most are one box of 8 medium frames. Which told me they were doing what they were supposed to and that the two hives were not shutting down and would use their resources up through winter. That's why I was trying to move brood around to slow them down. I was concerned the season is over is why I've been feeding for some time now. Most have quite a bit of sugar water, but I was concerned that maybe too much and they were swarming. So anyway, that's what I was thinking in asking all these questions, but maybe I'm wrong. From what you're saying, I only had 2 good hives and now I accidentally killed the queen of one.
By the way, how does one keep from killing the queen? Or like you say, it just happens. I try to carefully pull the frames out, but sometimes they stick or come up crooked and if the queen was on the side bars, she'd be dead like others. Usually the I see the queen stays in the middle.
If you are dead set intent on trying to get a queen(s) out of this. Then suggest to still rip apart and tear down the hive for resources, but take one frame with a few QC's and setup a 2 frame nuc. Let that nuc go for producing a queen, while not stressing a whole hive of bees over it. Get the rest of the bees and resources into new welcoming homes (combine).
I like to learn things as long as it doesn't harm the rest of my hives. I was thinking this would be excellent for an observation hive if I had one. Maybe along the lines I was asking previously, I could make a small nuc for the queen cells, get the queen laying, then replace the dud queen? She's still laying, just doesn't look right to me. Then they'd still have eggs going and get a good (?) queen later. And I could give some brood to them now.
Hope that helps, in some way, with a push in the right direction with this.
Yes, I've learned "hoping" in the past did not turn out well. I need to do something, but have read stories of how weak colonies that survived become booming colonies the next year, so that delays me, but I did move some brood over to the one hive and it seems like it's going much better now. So I need to do more with the others.
