16 June 2008

Mastermind


OK, see if you can solve this one.


On Sunday, I looked through the hive with the usual objectives - enough room, queen present, stores - and with a view to taking off some honey. The hive boxes are arranged as follows (from the bottom up): brood, brood, QE, super, super, super, super.


Apart from the fact the the hive is choc-a-bloc with bees and honey, I found capped brood in *all* the supers - *and* in both of the brood boxes. What are the possible reasons for this? I figure they could be:


Two queens, one above the QE and one below

One queen, small enough to wriggle through the QE

Laying workers going bonkers because there is no queen


Plus one hideous final possibility hit me, after I had closed up the hive and gone home with puzzled expression ... I leave this up to you, gentle reader, to figure out.

No comments: