I check bottom board every morning. I’m in SW FL. I have seen what looks like parts of bee larve. Today, there was a completely formed bee larve on the landing board. I cannot get into the hive until tomorrow. What should I be looking for? Hive is 95% packed with flow super on. Nothing in the super yet.
Morning Linda,
Not panic … Your hive will n is probably okay. We all see dead bees as well as bits n pieces out on the hives front porch. That’s normal healthy bee house keeping !
As for checking the SBBoard daily. That seems a bit much but doesn’t hurt … At least your checking. I usually pull mine once a week unless I’ve observed some really unusual habit chance in the colony (you’ll gain that visual off-normal experience along the way) so don’t PANIC. We’ve all been there in the beginning n still at times.
As for the inspection: check for proof a queen is alive n well. Try careful to find her but with my crsppy eyes look for very small larva n a progression of brood rearing from eggs to hatching new baby bees. Brood is usually in the central frames n a mix to brood, more nectar/capped honey n pollen. Outer wall frames are often stuffed with capped honey at the outer frames but bees are bees n can do what they want. I usually try to scrape n clean up any wrongly placed burr comb n add it to my wax bucket for later melting n use.
Always work slow n carefully. Do you have a mentor (a beekeeper with experience) that could walk you thru an inspection or two. Also joining a beekeeper club n taking a class or so sure isn’t a waist of time either. Soon you’ll get use to what stuff looks like but there’s always new stuff that comes along. When that happens try to get several clean good pix’s n post here. It helps us help you. I’m guess others on here will read you SOS request n comment as well.
I added a couple pix’s to show you some of my colonies n inner hives.Good luck n happy beekeeping.
Gerald.
If you have hygienic strain (VSH) bees, it may be varroa. Otherwise the commonest reason is chalkbrood. Might be unlikely in Florida, but still possible if you inspected on a cold or wet day in the past. I would look for chalkbrood and do a sugar roll or alcohol wash mite count.
Thank you so much. I am just a little obsessed with them. lol I am taking classes once a month and tried to call and email the guy but I have not heard back from him. I hope its just a little house cleaning on the bees part. Love all the feedback
Thank you so much. I will try the sugar roll.