[bobthebeeman]

Have introduced beekeeping to my father in law, and his first year was great. However, into the second year now, one, maybe 2 full hatching cycles. Now there seems to be no brood that is capped over, and most of the cells are open with no new brood in them. Maybe a dumb question, but do queens take a time out when the weather gets hot, or am I sensing correctly that there is trouble in paradise?

 

[G3farms]

are you feeding this hive? if so is the brood comb filled with syrup, could be honey bound.

are there any eggs? if not may not have a queen

are there any supercedure cells? something could have happened to you queen and they are trying to raise a new one.

look around a little more and see what you can find, hopefully some eggs.

G3

 

[BjornBee]

There are a good number of queenless hives at this time of the year. I have found that up to 25% of hives that swarm, will never be queenright again without beekeeper intervention.

Your hive could of swarmed and now is queenless.

During this transition in the hive (queen mating, period of no eggs, queen waiting to lay, etc.) there is no danger. But once there is no capped brood (Capped brood inhibits worker from developing ovaries, like the queen's pheromones do) than you have about 10-14 days before you will start seeing workers start to lay eggs.

Clue....Is there an area on the brood chamber that the bees have cleaned out waiting for the queen to start laying? If it is cleaned out, that is a good sign. If not, and they filled in with nectar, that is not good.

Do another search and introduce a queen, or at least introduce a frame of brood in various stages to the hive if possible.

I doubt your hive shut down due to any dearth. Your hives last eggs were at least three weeks ago, and you should of had nectar since then. You have a problem or situation. You just need to work through it.

Good luck.

 

[barry42001]

Brood production continues even through a dearth of nectar--slows down not quite as large of a brood pattern, after all the field bees are not far from the end of their life cycles, and within 2 - 3 weeks will be dead they need replacements. A totally broodless combs the queen probably is dead that's precisely why I personally prefer to purchase the queens of my choosing rather then settle for whatever the bees raise, no risks of queen becoming bird feed on mating flights. Look for more then one egg in cells, not centered in cell, spotty drone brood in worker cells laying workers are then the immediate problem if not enough time has elapsed for laying workers to develop, is still opportunity to introduce new queen, but the clock is ticking, whatever your doing do it today or sooner. remember life cycle of worker bees 21 days from egg to hatching, another 3 -4 weeks for that worker to start foraging, almost 3 months for a substantial increase in population, population you will need to overwinter in MN and feed the heck out of them. consider even pollen substitute, as will need that was well if your encountering a lack of natural sources, fall will start fairly quickly up there, cooler weather even frosts in september the clock is ticking. Do you know what kind of a fall nectar flow you can expect? You do have your work cut out for you. Good luck
Barry

 

[tecumseh]

bob writes:
Maybe a dumb question, but do queens take a time out when the weather gets hot, or am I sensing correctly that there is trouble in paradise?

tecumseh:
maybe in texas but never in minnesota (ha). an exception to this is that here on occasions the lack of anything coming in the front door will shut the queens egg laying down. a small bit of feed added over a short period tells all here.

just casually it sounds like the hive has no queen. if the very last of the brood is about hatched??? then a critical clock is running and a queen needs to be established before the hive goes all wrong.

first you need to look closely at anything that looks like a queen cell (or what may remain of a queen cell). as bjorn has suggested at or about the time a new queen is about to lay a hive begins polishing areas of brood within the central brood area. it will have a low sheen polished look and by appearance the worker bees appear to not like to tread over these newly polished 'floors' (you may visually first note that there are significant areas on the face of the frame with no bee attached).

if you notice no positive signs of the presence of a queen then depending on season (or length of season left) you may need to acquire a mated queen or possible combine.