OSU Honey Bee Lab

Question: I bought a 3# package in May of NWC (New World Carniolans). The queen was an egg laying machine. The hive grew rapidly, I had older drawn comb, some new comb and brand new frames for two deeps so I mixed it up. Once the first deep was 8 frames full I added the second. A little less than two weeks ago the second deep was about one quarter full, brood, pollen, larva, eggs, honey beautiful lay out. I was so excited. We left on vacation for one week.

The first day I could I opened the hive. The brood area is full of nectar in the second deep. A few uncapped larva and capped brood but no eggs lots of honey and nectar all ten frames have something. I got my husband to lift the top deep off, it’s so heavy. There was more capped brood, and nectar, honey etc. I searched the whole bottom deep I didn’t spot the queen (she’s marked) and found one tiny area of eggs…yeah. So it means she was there possibly three days ago.
But what do I do? None of my books cover what I’ve now learned is referred to as honey-bound. I put a super on top so they had some space to move to, no excluder in case the queen is there.
I didn’t see anything that looks like a queen cell, there are lots, lots of workers and drones.  How do I fix the lack of room? How long to I wait to be sure the queen is gone. Should I hope the ladies will raise a queen from those few eggs? I feel so stupid but I can’t find anything on this.
I do have another small hive, I caught a small swarm before we left and did get the queen. They arrived with mites so they weren’t very strong. I powdered them and then bought some sucracide. I am hoping to rid them of the mites before they really get going. The queen is laying well and I have high hopes for them. The point of this is to say I have a place to shift frames to that would actually be a help to the small swarm but I don’t want to make, another mistake.

Answer: It is amazing how quickly bees can fill frames once a good flow is underway.  Putting the super on top was a good start, but it may only get you brood in a super.  Worse things have happened than that.  I’m sitting here in a AC-cooled office trying to imagine your colony on this hot June afternoon.  There is still white clover everywhere.  Basswood is in passing its bloom phase.  Once the clover is gone, it will be hot, dry and a dearth of nectar will transpire.  It may very well be that the season has passed already.  In a perfect world, where it is cool and equipment is plentiful, I would remove the center four frames of both full deeps and move them to a third deep.  The remaining one-two frames in the top deep (3rd deep) could be at the outside and would, I imagine, be empty.  As the nectar flow is passing, the penchant to “honey-bound” the brood nest will be passing also.  The empty center frames will, in theory, be available for the queen to use as a brood nest.  Just to be sure, once I had the three reconfigured deep hive bodies in place, I would still put the super on top (probably over an excluder).  The weather has dried and the temperature is hot, so I suspect the nectar flow is waning, but one never knows. Give them space anyway.  Just by giving the bees the space that you did (the super), they may very well move some of the honey from the brood nest to the new super and open the brood nest up themselves.  Before doing all the moving I suggested, check a brood nest frame to be certain.  Be careful when moving frames.

At worst, this just cost you part of a honey crop.  If you do move deep frames around, of course, be extra careful.  The frames are full and hard to manage and (again) you have no idea where the queen is.  There should be presence of eggs within a few days.
So far as problems go, this is not a great one.  As the summer passes, the bees will open the brood nest back up and brood production should restart.  As you said, I hope swarming was not a problem.