Observation Hive

[JordanM]

I took a frame from a hive that had a bad queen and was laying mostly drones but some workers to and put it in my observation hive about 1.5 weeks ago. Yesturday i was looking and i noticed there were eggs beeing layed ontop of new pollen so i looked through the hive and find a bee that would look in the cell rurn around wag its butt and then stick it in the cell and move around, then she would get out of the cell and turn around look in it and somtimes reapeated the same thing in the same cell. I assume this is a laying worker that has been laying these eggs. What should i do, this frame is in a 4 frame observation hive?

[RayMarler]

There are lots of differing opinions on how to manage a laying worker problem. And, by the way, there's always more than one laying worker.

I myself would shake all the bees out of the Ohive onto the ground 50 to 100 feet away from the entrance to the hive. I would then take the most empty frame out and swap it with a frame of eggs and open larva with adhering bees from a stronger hive. The bees shook out from the Ohive will come back, all except the laying workers as they are heavier with eggs and should not be able to fly so well. You'll also have a frame of good eggs and larva with nurse bees added. You can then watch the Ohive raise up a new queen for you!

[Michael Bush]

http://www.bushfarms.com/beeslayingworkers.htm

Doing queen rearing I deal with laying workers on a regular basis...