Weak Hive Advice for 2023

[rallyrabbit]

So Red Maples appear to be in bloom. I've got a hive of Saskatraz that are doing awesome. Bringing pollen back, feeding on the sugar syrup, lots of brood ramping up and t he hive is full of bees. Massive activity. Both 8 frame deeps are full of bees, honey, pollen.

On the other had, I have an Italian hive that has been struggling since last year. Did a quick inspection today. I bet there's not 500 bees in the whole hive. There is a queen. There's no eggs, no capped brood, and still plenty of honey and lots of pollen. I've got a bad feeling they're not going to make it through. The top box has all the bees, very few in the center most frames (including the queen), no bees in the bottom box. Out of 16 frames, I bet only 3 had bees, although, many of the frames have uncapped honey, pollen in the empty bottom box.

Curious what my options should be right now? Should I attempt to take a frame of brood out of the other high and move it there this early? Should the Italian queen be laying right now? Should I try and find a replacement queen this early?

[reedyfork]

Great question! I have basically the exact same situation with one of my 20 hives, and I'm trying to decide whether it's worth nursing them along or not. They were an aggressive hive last year, so I requeened them in August. Although I treated them for mites exactly like my other hives, they had HUGE mite numbers in the fall (I'm guessing a mite bomb from robbing). I hit them with a series of OA, but I think by then they were already on the downturn. They never sucked down syrup like the other hives leading towards winter, and just don't show much activity.

The queen is still there and she has a small patch of capped brood (like the size of a mason jar lid). I considered pulling a full frame of capped brood and nurse bees from a strong hive, but my gut tells me to not waste the effort and resources. Instead, I'll likely just dispatch the queen, shake out the remaining bees, and stick their frames in the freezer for later use...

[Jacobs]

I like reedyfork's answer. I wouldn't add brood where a queen wasn't laying at all. An Italian queen should be laying something-even a couple of eggs if she is functioning and has some helpers.

[Wally]

I second Reedy's idea. Then split in March or April when you have swarm cells, if you want 2 or more hives.

[rallyrabbit]

Thanks for the feedback.

So to summarize. Do you think I should kill them off (or at least the queen). Or should kill the queen, smoke the daylights our of the workers and shake them into the other hive? Problem is nowhere to "freeze" something this large.

But yes, I want 2 hives. In fact, I am trying to expand this year to 5 or so and see how that goes. I'd like to investigate doing this as more than just family production.

[Jacobs]

Get rid of the queen and shake the bees out in front of your good hive. Let the good hive decide which bees to admit. I wouldn't want to risk the bad queen finding her way into your good hive and causing trouble. If you have limited freezer space, rotate frames on a 3 day freeze schedule.

[Wally]

Kill the queen, shake all bees out 10 feet in front of the strong hive. Place empty hive on top the strong hive. If more than one box on the weak hive, spray the empty box frames with B401, or substitute. It would be a good idea to spray all frames with B401 or sub.

[reedyfork]

Personal opinion here, but if you're looking to eventually have 5 hives, a chest freezer would be an invaluable piece of beekeeping equipment... I use mine for storing honey prior to extraction, storing partial honey/nectar frames for later use, and for freezing frames to kill pests.

[reedyfork]

So I totally failed to heed my own advice and chickened out last week when it came to my weak hive... I ended up pulling the 2-3 frames of bees, queen, tiny patch of brood, and a couple honey frames from the hive and putting them in the bottom of a double 5-frame medium setup. I added 2 frames of solid capped brood and nurse bees from a strong hive, a pollen frame, and 2 more honey frames to the top box.

When I peaked in on them yesterday I was pleasantly surprised to see almost all of the capped brood hatched out, both frames in the top box now full of eggs, and the queen alive and well! I think reducing the space and giving her an immediate boost in worker population may have done the trick.

I'll probably give them another couple of weeks before deciding whether to move them back into a 10-frame setup or keep them like they are and use them as a resource hive.

[Jacobs]

One advantage of having the number of hives reedyfork has is that you can afford to do what he did and see how it turns out. I make attempts to "see what the bees will do" all of the time. Sometimes it works out. Sometimes it doesn't. For me, that is part of what makes beekeeping fun. But with only one strong hive, I think reedlyfork's and Wally's advice to pinch the queen and shake out the bees was correct--especially where you were not seeing eggs or open brood when reedyfork was.