Combining LW Hive with Queenright Hive

[CoolBees]

Just to clarify, there is only capped worker brood, no open worker brood.  There were a handful of larvae, but they were either VERY young, or very old.  I was seeing capped drones here and there amongst spotty capped worker brood, so my assumption is the larvae are all drones.  I did see some cells with only 1 egg in the bottom, but I also saw cells with many eggs, like 8-10 per cell.   

Bee careful not to shake out a new queen. Young queens will often lay multiple eggs per cell (which the workers clean up), in the first few days. Shaking them out, kills her. ... ask me how I know ...

LW's lay on the walls of the cells mostly. New/young queens lay multiple eggs on the bottom of the cells. So - location of the eggs in the cell tells you what's really going on. (Lesson learned the hard way  )

[The15thMember]

If you have some larvae and few eggs and capped ... An entirely possible (and highly probable) situation is the hive raised a queen and the LWs promptly killed her right shortly after she laid a few eggs.  Happens often, nearly every time.

Only way to know for sure is to take the hive out a ways.  Put and empty box on the ground with 3 empty frames in it.  Put on a queen excluder.  Put another empty box on the QE, no frames.  Next shake them all into the open box. They will crawl through the QE.  If there is a queen. You will find her.  If there is no queen, finish up shaking everything out and take all the equipment away.

Based on the fact that I was waiting for this hive to make a queen, I think your theory is very probable, HP.  I know they made one because I found hatched queen cells, and I'm also pretty sure she laid at least a little bit because the population in the hive is the same and maybe even a little increased since last time I checked.  I'll look for a queen the way you described tomorrow to make sure she's not in there somewhere.  If I find her (unlikely, I imagine), how should I proceed?  Also, why the 3 empty frames in the bottom box? 

Bee careful not to shake out a new queen. Young queens will often lay multiple eggs per cell (which the workers clean up), in the first few days. Shaking them out, kills her. ... ask me how I know ...

LW's lay on the walls of the cells mostly. New/young queens lay multiple eggs on the bottom of the cells. So - location of the eggs in the cell tells you what's really going on. (Lesson learned the hard way  )

I've seen new queens lay multiple eggs in a cell and this doesn't look like that to me.  I'm not sure whether there were many eggs on the sides, as I forgot to specifically look for that, but many of the eggs looked kind of small and underdeveloped, and as I said, some cells were full of eggs, it wasn't just an extra one or two.   

[iddee]

"""An entirely possible (and highly probable) situation is the hive raised a queen and the LWs promptly killed her right shortly after she laid a few eggs.  Happens often, nearly every time."""

HP, I don't disagree with you often, but I have to this time. If the hive raised a queen, where did the LWs come from. They don't develop in numbers as long as there is viable brood in the hive. If it were an introduced queen into a LW hive, I could see them killing her, but if the hive raised her, the LWs were not present.

[TheHoneyPump]

Iddee. The scenario I was thinking of is all brood is mature, capped and emerging, no larvae anywhere.  LW develops.  A frame of partial brood is later added. They raise a queen cell from the adder. The virgin is ignored and mates. When she starts laying she is killed.  The missing link in the assumption only 15th can verify if a brood frame was given along the way.

15th.  If you find the queen crawling on the excluder, temporarily cage her for safety.  Then put a box back at the hive location with 1 or 2 empty frames, no bees.  Release the queen.  Now go back to the area you have the shaker stuff.  Shake everyone out there.  Take the bee-free frames back and put in the box with the queen. Finish and close up the hive. Alot of the bees will beat you back there. There will be quite a few bees flying.  So suit up first so you do not get any in your hair. Wait 1 week then go back to see if things are looking normal.
The three frames below is to draw the bees down through the excluder, rather them wanting to climb out the shaker box. 

[The15thMember]

15th.  If you find the queen crawling on the excluder, temporarily cage her for safety.  Then put a box back at the hive location with 1 or 2 empty frames, no bees.  Release the queen.  Now go back to the area you have the shaker stuff.  Shake everyone out there.  Take the bee-free frames back and put in the box with the queen. Finish and close up the hive. Alot of the bees will beat you back there. There will be quite a few bees flying.  So suit up first so you do not get any in your hair. Wait 1 week then go back to see if things are looking normal.
The three frames below is to draw the bees down through the excluder, rather them wanting to climb out the shaker box. 

Thanks HP, will do.

Iddee. The scenario I was thinking of is all brood is mature, capped and emerging, no larvae anywhere.  LW develops.  A frame of partial brood is later added. They raise a queen cell from the adder. The virgin is ignored and mates. When she starts laying she is killed.  The missing link in the assumption only 15th can verify if a brood frame was given along the way. 

The LW hive is a swarm I caught on 5/2.  Based on how they were acting (straggler bees moved from the swarm tree to the lid of my swarm bucket and then into the hive when I dumped them in) I assume they had a queen at the time.  I put a frame of open brood in the box when I hived them to help them stick.  On 5/10 I checked on them for the first time, and they had 2 queen cups and 1 elongated but not capped queen cell, all with larvae in them, on that frame I'd given them.  I don't believe there was any other brood in the hive then.  Yesterday I went in to check for a new queen, and found the LWs.  Does that confirm or deny your suspicions?       

[TheHoneyPump]

Confirms the scenario hypothesized. Thanks.
Let us know how it goes and plays out.  Am hopeful you find a queen on the QE.  Not to be at all surprised if you don't.

[Oldbeavo]

Trying to follow this, are we saying that the evidence for LW is multiple eggs in cells? Is there drone brood yet?
As brood was added this would have finished hatching 5/26, not long for LW to get going!
I am going to back "a queen somewhere" getting her act together laying multiples.

[iddee]

HP, with the new info, I now agree with you. I also agree with Oldbeavo. I think another week will show a nice laying pattern from the new queen.

Member, I would leave the hive as is for another week, then make a decision based on what it looks like then.

[The15thMember]

So I followed HP's instructions this morning and shook all the bees out through a queen excluder.  They didn't all go through it as well as I expected them to, but with them all spread out and carefully inspecting each frame before I shook it, I'm quite sure there was no queen in there.  However, I did find a capped queen cell.  I sort of treated that queen cell as if it was a queen and followed those instructions, so I put all the bee-less frames in the hive back on its stand and shook out the bees into the woods a good ways away from the apiary.  Also, sort of on instinct, I gave the LW hive a frame of eggs and young brood from another hive without shaking all the bees off it, in the hopes that the open brood will help and perhaps little boost of normal adult workers will too.  I also dusted the LW hive with powdered sugar before closing it up to help with fighting between the added bees and returning foragers, and also because Oldbeavo recommended it.  So now my question is this: when should I check on them again?  If it was a normal situation, I'd wait 3 weeks for the queen to start laying, but I'm not sure I should do that since the LWs could get out of hand again in that time frame.  What do you recommend?         

[Oldbeavo]

As you have open brood in the hive now, wait 3 weeks, as that will be when all the brood is hatched.
You will have eggs or polishing awaiting a queen to lay, or pollen and honey everywhere that brood should be. Decision should be easy then.

[TheHoneyPump]

Sorry to hear a queen did not materialize.  Though not unexpected.  By placing the cell frame, you have just begun take 3, round 3, of the endless cycle of false hopes of the LW condition. LW are wrought with efforts that end in despair and disappointment. They have killed their new queen they raised the previous brood frame given weeks ago and are now using one of her recently laid eggs to start another cell ... which will ultimately have the same fate.  My advice --> Go squash that cell, and shake them all out now.  Put the equipment away or redeploy it to other hives that are doing well. You will sleep better, and the other nearby colonies will thank you for the short lived boost in foragers.

If you wish to continue down the dark path, hoping to see light at the end, then you must now add a frame of open brood at minimum once per week for the next 6 to 8 weeks.  That will be the time it will take for LW to be suppressed, the 2nd then the 3rd newly raised and mated queen to be killed, eventually one will be left alive, and the 3+ weeks for her own brood to start emerging.

IMHO.

[The15thMember]

As you have open brood in the hive now, wait 3 weeks, as that will be when all the brood is hatched.
You will have eggs or polishing awaiting a queen to lay, or pollen and honey everywhere that brood should be. Decision should be easy then.

Sorry to hear a queen did not materialize.  Though not unexpected.  By placing the cell frame, you have just begun take 3, round 3, of the endless cycle of false hopes of the LW condition. LW are wrought with efforts that end in despair and disappointment. They have killed their new queen they raised the previous brood frame given weeks ago and are now using one of her recently laid eggs to start another cell ... which will ultimately have the same fate.  My advice --> Go squash that cell, and shake them all out now.  Put the equipment away or redeploy it to other hives that are doing well. You will sleep better, and the other nearby colonies will thank you for the short lived boost in foragers.

If you wish to continue down the dark path, hoping to see light at the end, then you must now add a frame of open brood at minimum once per week for the next 6 to 8 weeks.  That will be the time it will take for LW to be suppressed, the 2nd then the 3rd newly raised and mated queen to be killed, eventually one will be left alive, and the 3+ weeks for her own brood to start emerging.

IMHO.

Ah, two opposing answers.  Must be a beekeeping question.   

Here's what I'm inclined to do.  I agree that HP's description of the LW rabbit hole is risky and dismal, and I'm not really into sacrificing that much brood to prop up this hive when it might not even work.  I'd rather give that brood to the weak queenright hive that I mentioned previously, if I'm going to give it to someone.  I think I'll take Oldbeavo's advice and wait and see what happens.  Maybe it'll work.  If it doesn't take, then so be it, and I'll shake them out in 3 weeks and call it quits.  I don't really have anything to lose by trying.  Other than sleep, according to HP, but rest assured, I rather enjoy an experiment.  This was kind of a bonus hive anyway; my goal was 6 hives this year, and this one was hive number 7, so no big loss.         

[TheHoneyPump]

Hahaaa.  Different views of what to dos from  near global antipodes.  :)
You have good input and advice throughout the thread in front of you however way you choose to proceed.

[The15thMember]

I think it may have worked.  I checked on the LW hive today and although I couldn't find a queen, I saw a lot of cells with single eggs in them.  I saw 2 cells with 2 eggs, and 1 egg laid in a partially filled pollen cell, but nothing like it was with cells filled with eggs, and none of the eggs were on the sides of the cells.  The hive has lots of small drones running around that developed from the worker eggs, so I easily could have missed a queen.  I'll check again next week to see if I can find her and make sure the situation stays normal.   

[Ben Framed]

Thanks for the update. I hope this works out and the new queen survives. Yes keep us updated, interesting.

[The15thMember]

All right, I'm officially confused.  I inspected this hive again today.  There are 5 frames with sizeable patches of drone brood in all stages.  I didn't see many eggs, but the ones I did see looked normal, single eggs in the bottoms of the cells.  I went through the entire box twice and I didn't see a queen anywhere though, nor was there any worker brood to be found.  Any idea what's going on in there now?     

[iddee]

It's time to shake all bees through an excluder and find the drone laying queen, tho I feel any more resources invested in this hive is a waste. I would just shake them all out onto the grass and put the equipment away, or add it to other hives.

[The15thMember]

It's time to shake all bees through an excluder and find the drone laying queen, tho I feel any more resources invested in this hive is a waste. I would just shake them all out onto the grass and put the equipment away, or add it to other hives.

Ah, drone layer.  That makes sense.  I guess I just missed her because she is tiny.  Yeah, I am thinking the same thing about shaking them out.  Just no point putting more into them this late in the season.  Thanks so much for all the help everyone!  I have no idea what I would do without you all.

[The15thMember]

I shook out the hive yesterday afternoon, and this morning there is a sizeable cluster of bees on the cinder blocks at the hive site.  I assumed they'd disperse once it warmed up, but they seem quite content to just hang out here.  I'm worried they are going to get rained on.  Is this normal? 

[.30WCF]

I?m sure they just tried to go home, and there was no home. I wonder if you go dump the blocks off, if they would beg their way into another hive.


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