I got started last August with 2 hives and have learned a lot this year. Both hives made it through the winter and survived a bear attack this spring. Unfortunatly I had the bear return the next night and I lost 1 hive. I caught a swarm from a friends farm and think I lost the queen. I brought a couple of frames of brood and eggs over to it from the strong hive this weekend.
Now the problem: I put a honey super on the strong hive last week with a queen excluder and there are very few bees in it and they haven't started to even draw out comb. Do I remove the excluder?
On my new hive should I try combining it with the strong hive and then order a queen and split it later this sumer or just hope they make a queen?
Never put foundation above an excluder. Drawn comb will work, but they are very reluctant to draw comb . Remove the excluder until they are drawing 2 or 3 combs, then replace it if desired.
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