Photos of dead hive

[Diane Packett]

In spite of one hand being in a splint, I took apart my dead hive one frame at a time to get pictures. It was 4 mediums high, with two fondant cakes on the top bars and the vented winter cover from Capital Bee Supply that I used successfully in my first winter. There were no bees in the top box, but a dead, soggy, small cluster in the honey frames in the second box, and a  tiny cluster on the honey in a corner of the bottom box. The bees on the open screened bottom board were all dry. No sign of brood anywhere, so maybe I lost the queen early on? Sorry about the burring; I did need two hands to hold a camera, and that didn't work so well. I'm pretty sure they didn't starve.

[Paul Zelenski]

That definitely doesn't look like they starved. It looks like quite a small cluster. And you said there was a separate cluster elsewhere in the hive? If so, twphat could be a sign that youmlost your queen. Do I remember you had something interesting with your mite treatments in the fall? Or did I just make that up? Your hive did swarm this year, but had a good queen after that, right?

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[Diane Packett]

I thought the main cluster was pretty small too, then there was this tiny subcluster in a different box. I was sure I had more bees than that going into winter. I did scrape dead ones off the bottom board a couple of times before the hive died (reached in with a stick), but there weren't that many. The hive did swarm in summer, and because of that I didn't treat for mites. I remember it seemed like I waited a long time for the new queen to start laying, but I'm impatient, and she eventually did, in a nice pattern and I thought she was doing well when I wrapped the hive.

[lin...@tds.net]

This situation is typical of the F2 or second generation of a queen. The F1 is great in that it builds up and swarms. the next generation (often) is a mutt and does not recover and build up population.  By applying management things such as mite meds, protein supplements, and/or merger of smaller colonies one can possibly build populations necessary to overwinter.  Note mite treatments are now being applied up to 6 or more times a year by many larger colony beekeepers.  It would be interesting to do an alcohol wash to see what varroa mite counts are on the instant colony.

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From: "Diane Packett" <dlpa...@gmail.com>
To: "madbees" <mad...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, February 4, 2018 10:27:14 PM
Subject: Re: [madbees] Photos of dead hive

I thought the main cluster was pretty small too, then there was this tiny subcluster in a different box. I was sure I had more bees than that going into winter. I did scrape dead ones off the bottom board a couple of times before the hive died (reached in with a stick), but there weren't that many. The hive did swarm in summer, and because of that I didn't treat for mites. I remember it seemed like I waited a long time for the new queen to start laying, but I'm impatient, and she eventually did, in a nice pattern and I thought she was doing well when I wrapped the hive.

[Joseph Bessetti]

How many frames of brood were there in the hive the last time you inspected last fall, and what month was that? 

The amount of brood they raise in late fall directly influences the size of the winter cluster.

A small cluster like this is also typical of bees suffering from mite-transmitted disease.  Disease reduces the longevity of the bees, so the cluster shrinks rapidly.  Without sufficient cluster size the bees freeze to death with food just inches away.  Sometimes you find a small patch of brood, but quite often you don't.  I wouldn't assume that the lack of brood is any evidence of lack of queen.  If you dig around in the dead bees on the frame you would probably find the queen, though she will be harder to find with a very small abdomen due to her not laying. 

Joe

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From: mad...@googlegroups.com <mad...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Diane Packett <dlpa...@gmail.com>
Sent: Sunday, February 4, 2018 10:27 PM
To: madbees

Subject: Re: [madbees] Photos of dead hive

I thought the main cluster was pretty small too, then there was this tiny subcluster in a different box. I was sure I had more bees than that going into winter. I did scrape dead ones off the bottom board a couple of times before the hive died (reached in with a stick), but there weren't that many. The hive did swarm in summer, and because of that I didn't treat for mites. I remember it seemed like I waited a long time for the new queen to start laying, but I'm impatient, and she eventually did, in a nice pattern and I thought she was doing well when I wrapped the hive.

[Diane Packett]

I don't remember how many frames of brood I had, but I don't remember being concerned. I think my latest inspection was late summer because a) I was supposed to stay out of there and let them prepare for winter and b) what was I going to do, with only one hive and nothing to combine them with if they were weak?

I just packed everybody up again, so I can still take Larry's suggestion and do the alcohol wash and see how many mites I get.

So what about the fact that the biggest mass of bees were soggy? I thought that would implicate moisture problems.

[Joseph Bessetti]

Dead soggy bees are only evidence that there was moisture after the bees were dead.  Dead bees generally tend to get soggy.  It doesn't mean they were soggy before they died.   I've seen plenty of photos of moldy dead bees too, and I'm quite certain they weren't moldy before they died.   Dead soggy bees eventually grow mold, but it wasn't the mold that killed them either.  You would need other evidence to suggest there was a moisture problem, such as water marks on the tops of the frames from water dripping down on them or pools of water on your bottom board.

Late summer inspection is way too early to provide any assistance in narrowing the possible causes of this hive's death.  Notes from an inspection in October or November would have been helpful now for speculating about cause of death.  If they were completely broodless you might have suspected queen failure.  Nothing you could do about it, but you would have known instead of being left guessing after the hive died.  If they did have brood, the number of frames would have given you a sense of the colony's strength and expected cluster size heading into winter.  Inspection of frames of capped brood at that time also could have revealed evidence of high mite numbers, often evidenced by perforated and chewed cappings.  You can usually see mites on the bees too if you have sharp eyes and know what you're looking for.   I always do a fall inspection in order to make these observations so I can correlate them to hive survival later.

Joe

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From: mad...@googlegroups.com <mad...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Diane Packett <dlpa...@gmail.com>

Sent: Monday, February 5, 2018 5:11 PM

To: madbees
Subject: Re: [madbees] Photos of dead hive

I don't remember how many frames of brood I had, but I don't remember being concerned. I think my latest inspection was late summer because a) I was supposed to stay out of there and let them prepare for winter and b) what was I going to do, with only one hive and nothing to combine them with if they were weak?

I just packed everybody up again, so I can still take Larry's suggestion and do the alcohol wash and see how many mites I get.

So what about the fact that the biggest mass of bees were soggy? I thought that would implicate moisture problems.

[Marcin]

[Marcin]

On the topic of late season inspections and colony strength going into winter, what is everyone looking for? Personally, I like my colonies to be at 7 frames of bees and 3 of those frames to contain brood. I'm using October 15 as my hard date and would like all of my hives to be at that level around that date. What about the rest of the group?

On Monday, February 5, 2018 at 5:57:35 PM UTC-6, Joe wrote:

[Diane Packett]

Joe,

Good to know that dead bees always get soggy, so I won't worry about catastrophic failure of my ventilation system.

November, for a last inspection?  OK. I actually did keep notes my first year, when I started writing down what was on every frame because by the time I had gotten through the top two boxes I had forgotten what I had seen. When Craig Petros came out to inspect the hive, I told him this and he looked at me and said "That's obsessive." But better to have the data, I suppose.

What do you do for mite treatment?

Thanks for the explanations.

[Joseph Bessetti]

Diane,

You don't have to look at every frame.  Just by looking at the top and bottom of a box of frames you can tell if the frames have capped honey or not.  You can pull one frame from the middle to see if there's brood.  Once you know you're working in a brood box, with that frame removed you can see if there's brood on the adjacent two frames without even removing them.  Shift them over slightly to expose the next frames over and in 15 seconds you've confirmed what is on the 5 middle frames.  Pull that box and repeat the process in the box below it.  In a couple minutes you can get a sense for how many frames of brood and how many frames of honey a hive has in it.  You write down "8 medium frames of brood, 16 frames of honey" in your notebook and you're done. 

I don't treat for mites.  I catch swarms and select for resistance.  I split the (mite resistant) survivors.  I don't buy bees, so I don't have an investment to protect.  I've learned a lot about mites and the biology of mite tolerance, as well as the prevalence of mite resistance in our local bees by doing this.  

Joe

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From: mad...@googlegroups.com <mad...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Diane Packett <dlpa...@gmail.com>

Sent: Monday, February 5, 2018 7:25 PM

To: madbees
Subject: Re: [madbees] Photos of dead hive