It was a nice day so I inspected my 6 hives. Three of them were oveflowing with bees, healthy looking queens and at least 3 frames of brood in each. Two others I found either a good looking queen or a little bit of brood, but about half as many bees. The last one had maybe two pounds of bees, no brood, and I couldn't find the marked queen. Not that that means she wasn't there, and the bees were foraging, but it's very weak compared to the others. There was plenty of capped food left in all the hives.
What does anybody think I might do with this weak hive? I'm pretty sure it will be a deadout before I can get it requeened.
I found out I had bottom board problems with the other two less strong hives. One of them had a solid BB, and I had standing water and syrup in it, right up to the level of the opening in the entrance reducer. The moisture inside made the candy board drip down and the syrup was all over the tops of the frames and the BB. The other one had a screened BB, but the slide in board wasn't slid in all the way, and a bunch of bees had gotten under the board and between the board and the screen and died. Thousands, maybe ten thousand. A couple quarts of dead bees. It made me sad. :( It could have been as strong now as the other three. As it is, it just started laying down brood. But I learn.
-- Kris