# is my hive in trouble?



## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

We got two hives going here the last week in April. They are Russian bees and queens in top bar hives.

We are new at this, so I don't know if what we're seeing is a problem.

One hive appears to be developing fine. My hubby says that the other one appears to be making brood and almost no honey.

Any thoughts? Thanks all, we appreciate you being here.


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## WildPrGardens (Mar 8, 2014)

Did you get these as packages of bees with queen in a separate little cage?

They could have come from the same parent hive and didn't have time to bond with the new queen and there has been some drift of workers to the one hive.

If there is a big difference in populations the easy fix is switch hive positions. Not a one person job with top-bar hives. Many of the foragers from the bigger hive will return to the original location when they come back, even though they left from the new location.

There may be a little confusion for the defenders but these are strange bees carrying fresh supplys, not coming to rob, so they will be welcomed. Your populations should equalize a little better and everything work out.

Goodluck


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## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

Yes, they both were package bees and both had a queen in the little box cage. My hubby has trouble regularly finding the queen in the hive he's worried about. But since he keeps finding more brood, she must be in there. The hive that seems good, he usually finds the queen pretty easily. One is marked green and one is quite, so i'm not sure if that is why.

We're very new at this, so it's hard to guess at things with inexperienced eyes seeing what's happening.

So, you think this is possibly related to the worker population then, and has nothing to do with the queen?


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## TxGypsy (Nov 23, 2006)

Actually it sounds like you have it reversed. The hive that is full of brood and no honey is the one that is doing really well! You will probably see that hive have a population explosion before long.

A hive that isn't actively producing brood will collect a lot of honey, but they won't do well down the road. 

I have around 50 full sized hives and a large number of nucleus hives. I produce bees for sale and I rarely get honey. The bees consume a lot of honey when they are producing wax and raising brood. Because I sell nucleus hives I am constantly manipulating my bees to draw out more comb, so they consume almost all the honey they gather.

So your bees may be doing great, they are just setting up their hive.


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## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

TxMex said:


> Actually it sounds like you have it reversed. The hive that is full of brood and no honey is the one that is doing really well! You will probably see that hive have a population explosion before long.
> 
> A hive that isn't actively producing brood will collect a lot of honey, but they won't do well down the road.
> 
> ...


Ok, so do you think I should switch the hive spots or leave them be?

We thought the one with honey and brood must be doing better and were worried the one with lits of brood and not much honey was going to starve.


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## TxGypsy (Nov 23, 2006)

These are top bar hives? I'm hoping they were built to the same dimensions. If they were, I'd just transfer a frame or two of honey over to the one that doesn't have as many stores if you are worried about them. 

They are likely gathering about the same amount of honey, but their queen is laying really well and they are using the food as soon as it comes in.

Are you seeing plenty of bees(ample population) in the hive that doesn't have much honey? A goodly percentage of the hive must stay home to tend to the brood. That means fewer foragers going out to bring in nectar. If the packages were terribly uneven or if there was a lot of drift during orientation, the one hive may be under populated. Rather than swapping places with your hives, the best way to build up the population of an underpopulated hive is to give it fully capped brood.

Fully capped brood no longer needs any feeding so it won't be a drain on the receiving hives resources. Those bees will be born into that hive and will immediately be a part of that hive. Also these are likely the age bees that are most needed. With lots of new nurse bees being born the older bees can go ahead and move on to foraging duties.


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## WildPrGardens (Mar 8, 2014)

First thing, listen to TxMex, she's good.

Continue to read and study.
Just having live bees on site is great, often the bees will teach more than the books. So observe them.

You have already noticed differences. That's one reason why 2 hives rather than just one are recommended for beginners.

Sometimes one hive is simply better than another. Expand from from that one if you do expand.

Thousands of details are needed to do a more accurate diagnosis, and dozens of posts. A seasoned beek could notice them in just a few minutes, hands-on inspection.

But we'll get there, the important thing is don't dispair and don't give up.

I'll assume a few things and go from there.

Package bees in a top-bar hive means new bees w/new queen in a new box with no stores or young. 
Starting from scratch.

New comb is fragile especially in a topbar. It is very easy to tear it loose during inspections. One reason for moving the hive instead of frames.

You said one queen was marked green and the other was quite something. Quite what?

Did you order marked queens?
Were both marked when you got them?
Is the queen in the hive with no honey now unmarked?

If so, the bees replaced her. Was there any gap in having open brood?
It seems a little quick for a new queen to be laying.

Frequent opening of hives helps with learning when new, but it also increases the chance of injuring the queen and slows the progress of the workers some.

If the hive with little honey has house bees but few field bees then they can't raise many new bees because not enough food. It will be a slow climb to full population. Swapping in capped brood will help in a little while. 

Swapping both comb and hives gets more field bees 'right now' so queen can lay 'full speed ahead' and the house bees get a boost in catching up.

Don't transfer covering bees with the comb. There will be a fight.
Blow or brush carefully any bees left on, doesn't have to be 100%.

Don't shake or bang the fragile comb to get the bees off.

What part of the country are you? 

Why top-bars? 

I've found here where we have cold winters they don't do very well.
They were originally designed for Kenya beekeepers that had been using hollow logs hung in trees and destroyed the hive and comb to get the honey out.
They had few tools and the bees have forage available year round so a simple hive was adequate to increase the yearly average honey crop without killing bees like used to be done there and with the old time skeps.

Goodluck

Later


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## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

I meant green and white. Phone autcorrected. Sorry.


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## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

We're in west ky.

We got top bar hives. Has window for viewing, and wanted kids to be able to lift just one bar at a time.

I was not confident that I could lift the other kind and move them around safely with kids and dogs underfoot. The bees were a gift for my son. Our house rules are, you get a pet when you're 10. He chose bees.

I'm driving home from Georgia, right now. I will ask my hubby to help me answer the other questions when we're home. He's spent the most time at the hives so far.


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## TxGypsy (Nov 23, 2006)

WildPrGardens said:


> First thing, listen to TxMex, she's good.
> 
> Thousands of details are needed to do a more accurate diagnosis, and dozens of posts. A seasoned beek could notice them in just a few minutes, hands-on inspection.
> 
> ...


Aww shucks....thanks. It's what I love!

Something interesting that has kind of evolved is that I now have people pay me to come go through their beehives and do diagnosis, straighten out their hives and then advise them on how to keep everything on the straight and narrow. I've not ever advertised this, but this has gotten to be something I do pretty regularly. Everyone I've done this for has thought it was absolutely worth the money. I don't name a price, but usually they pay me more than I'd have thought to ask. 

LOL.....frequent opening of hives is the reason I had to get so many hives! Otherwise I was harassing my poor bees every couple of days to see what they were up to. I need a minimum of 50 hives to keep me content.

I have to second the why top-bar sentiment. I am not a fan. The biggest drawback is that there is not a standard shape. This makes it very difficult to exchange comb. I don't even use shallow supers. Everything I use is a deep....yes even for honey. I use a different management method than most folks and deeps cause me no difficulty. This way no matter what I grab....it will fit. Nothing more frustrating that needing a deep frame and only having shallows and vice versa.

However, I am a fan of foundationless comb (which I first found out about when researching TBH's) and use it extensively in my standard hives.

Oh, something else I just noticed in re-reading the posts. One queen is marked with green? Green is a last years queen and should not have been sold in a this years package. This year is blue. Beekeepers rotate through 6 colors for marking queens. Some beekeepers use white which is just for finding the queen and does not indicate a year. I use a light version of the current year as it is easier to spot. Like this queen I marked last week.


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## Terri (May 10, 2002)

When one of my queens got old, the bees simply made a new queen.

Is the hive with less brood the hive with the green queen?


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## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

I believe the green queen is the hive with the honey and brood.

Sorry I haven't posted anymore yet. We're home, but everyone is scrambling to catch up on house and farm chores. Hubby had to hold down the fort alone last week. So as soon as I can I'm gonna have him sit with me and read through this to write back more.

J st trying to make the most of our weekend to catch up.


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## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

Ok, hubby says the hive with honey and brood is the white queen, the same queen he finds regularly with no struggle.

The other hive had the green queen, and it has mostly brood with very little honey, and he has never found her again after her coming out of her queen cage.

So, I guess she maybe died and was replaced? But, was that even enough time? Cause both hives were totally empty when we put the packages in, and they've been very active and building combs. But, the one with the green queen, (lots of brood, not much honey), he says it doesn't have a bunch of drawn comb.

The white queen has more comb, more honey, and has brood. The white queens hive is 1/3 full of drawn comb with honey, brood, and pollen.

The green queen's hive has comb that only goes about half way to the bottom of the hive boxes. It's only running about 1/4 of the length of the hive. It's mostly brood with a little honey and pollen mixed in.

The top bars were made by a guy whose about and hour or two from us in ky. he said he used them to keep him bees. so, we're hoping ours will do okay too since we're in the same region. never know, it might be a bust and we might need to try another type of hives. but, we had to pick something, so this is what we got.

I'm going outside to see the hives with him now. we're trying to see what bars/combs we should move. not sure right now.

do you think we should be feeding either or both the sugar water syrup? we have a feeder for each hive.


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## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

OK, hubby is outside taking pics of the hives and queen hunting.

I came inside and am working on not crying like a little girl in front of my kids. Got stung in the face.


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## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

I went out and grabbed a few pics. Hopefully they turn out after editing down and adding text. 

This is the location of the hives, as they appear on the property. They are all identical in shape and color. The opening for the bees is facing east.

In the pics you will see the hive on the left is the one with less comb and honey. It is mostly brude with some honey and pollen mixed in. Hope this helps.


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## TxGypsy (Nov 23, 2006)

That's not a huge difference in size. I wouldn't expect both hives to be absolutely identical. 

Something that I stress to all of my students is to look for eggs....don't worry about spotting the queen. As long as there are eggs in the hive (single eggs laid neatly in the very bottom of the cell....not multiple eggs which indicates a laying worker) that means that there has been a queen in that hive within the last 3 days. 

They may indeed have replaced the old queen. Have y'all seen any queen cells?


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## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

TxMex said:


> That's not a huge difference in size. I wouldn't expect both hives to be absolutely identical.
> 
> Something that I stress to all of my students is to look for eggs....don't worry about spotting the queen. As long as there are eggs in the hive (single eggs laid neatly in the very bottom of the cell....not multiple eggs which indicates a laying worker) that means that there has been a queen in that hive within the last 3 days.
> 
> They may indeed have replaced the old queen. Have y'all seen any queen cells?


The hives do look more even since I left for Georgia last week.

We saw one spot that looked like a queen cell maybe. I saw single eggs in cells today. Hubby said he also has seen cells with multiple eggs in them.

Anybody got any bee sting remedy tips?

The little bugger got caught in my hair and got me right next to my eyeline in the hairline area. I'm better for now, but wondering what I might do that would help if one of the kids get stung.

I did buy some bee keeper gear, but that has sat largely unused. I'm lucky if everyone remembers shoes. And the smoker just seemed to tick the bees off, so we quit using that.


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## TxGypsy (Nov 23, 2006)

Multiple eggs is bad news. Were the multiple eggs in the hive that had the green queen?

Make a paste of baking soda and water to help draw the venom out of stings. Use a knife to scrape the stinger out rather than trying to pull out the stinger. Apply ice and take a benadryl before bed.


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## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

TxMex said:


> Multiple eggs is bad news. Were the multiple eggs in the hive that had the green queen?
> 
> Make a paste of baking soda and water to help draw the venom out of stings. Use a knife to scrape the stinger out rather than trying to pull out the stinger. Apply ice and take a benadryl before bed.


Yes, the green queen hive. What is the bad news? What do we need to do?


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## TxGypsy (Nov 23, 2006)

Call me. I sent you my number.


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## gibbsgirl (May 1, 2013)

TxMex said:


> Call me. I sent you my number.


I just want to say thank you to txmex. It turns out one of our hives is definitely in trouble. But, thanks to her, we now understand why.

Also, thanks to her, we now have a plan for what possibly could help get things back on track so that the whole hive population and combs may not be a complete loss.

She said she'll post back up here when she gas time to get on. I don't want to inadvertantly explain it incorrectly.

We really appreciate all the bee people here who are helping families like us learn how to take up this important homesteading activity. It's really helped make it more practically possible for us to try and work through it knowing we can come here with questions, and sometimes get pointed in the right direction.


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## TxGypsy (Nov 23, 2006)

You are welcome and I'm glad I could help. I'm going to make a separate posting about what to do with a laying worker hive so that it will be easier for folks to find when they are doing a search.

This year has been really bad for me with having laying workers. The rain has been so bad that my virgin queens aren't making it back from mating flights or aren't able to get out to mate at all. I've had 3 or 4 end up with laying workers. I just checked a nucleus hive this evening that ended up having a laying worker. I am not looking forward to going and checking my main mating yard tomorrow.


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## alleyyooper (Apr 22, 2005)

Tex I read some place the queen has to make her mating flight with in 14 days of birth. that can be a problem too.

 Al


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## TxGypsy (Nov 23, 2006)

I read that too, but I have also read that queen breeders bank virgin queens for up to a month before putting them in a mating nuc. So, I just don't know. I have a couple of virgins that had to hang out in emergence cages for over a week that were released into mating nucleus's last Thursday. It will be interesting to see how they do. This rain has thrown a great big hairy monkey wrench into my queen rearing.


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