Problem with new hive

14 years ago

I caught a swarm on Wednesday and put it into a new hive. I'm providing sugar water but they aren't taking it. The first couple days they did orientation flights and yesterday they were foraging heavily.

Last night we had a heavy rain.

This morning when I went out there were around 5 dying bees struggling around on the hive platform in front of the entrance. I knocked them down and discovered around 15 more dead bees under the hive along with a few more of the struggling ones.

The struggling ones are flopping around or laying on their backs moving their legs. They seem disoriented and partially immobile.

The rest of the hive looks healthy and is clustered together on frames (I haven't opened the hive yet because it is still somewhat cool out so I was looking at them through the entrance hole). Once it warmed up they started foraging. But I've seen a few more of the sick looking bees come out of the hive and fall off the platform since then.

Any ideas? Is this normal for a new swarm hive or a disease/pest?

Here's a video of it:

Here is a link that might be useful: Swarm Hive w/Problem Video on Youtube

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Comments (3)

Konrad___far_north
14 years ago
Not sure...could be some sort of poison from spray's or just old bees dying?

Keep an eye on this swarm, if the queen is laying, or start to lay
in about 2 or 3 weeks if you have a new one coming,... you should be OK.
Perhaps post this on Beesource.
julysun
14 years ago
You may want to feed these bees with commercial food patties. As a quick feed mix a little water in sugat to make a sugar patty, just barely damp. Put this in a saucer or jar lid an slide it into the front entry. Ideally you can get a feed spacer , or use an empty super (no frames) on top of your hive then place the sugar saucer on the top bars. The spacer or empty super will give the bees room to get to tthe food. Also you can dissolve one cup of sugar in one cup of water put that in a clean spray bottle and spray your bees with this food even to the extent of lifting out comb frames and spraying the bees and the wax. Works great to give the bees a food boost.
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JRG13
14 years ago
15 dead bees I wouldn't worry about. Swarming is probably pretty hard on some of the bees. But it could be a pesticide but there isn't much you can do about that.

Jeff