Today, as I was watching my bees come and go from the hive, I was overcome by curiosity- what is going on in there? It was a warm day, I'll be gone tomorrow and it's supposed to rain Saturday, I work Sunday, so... into the hive I went.
I was surprised at the large number of bees; I would expect the population to be noticeably smaller in a dying colony.
On the drone frame were many larva and a couple of dozen capped drone cells. I decided to leave it in for another week. I could also see several drones.
Then I took a look at the brood frames, and on both sides of one frame was a hand-sized patch of capped brood cells! I looked and looked for a queen, to no avail. However, I doubt my ability to spot an unmarked queen.
Now I have to assume that if there are capped brood cells, there is a laying queen in there. And, I believe, there were more capped cells than the larvae I saw on last inspection. I would love to have had the camera with me.
I already emailed Jeremy to ask for his opinion. I will post his reply.
I also scraped the honey comb off the frame that was in the house and put the sticky frame back into the hive for the girls to clean up.
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