queen not moving up

[Jana]

Hi all,
I'm a new beekeeper and got a nuc in mid-June. The bees had pretty much filled the first box and I added another in the beginning of August. Now a month later, it appears that the queen has not moved up and laid in the new box. instead, it looks like the bees are just packing it full of honey. I had a look at the first box and though I did not see her, it looks like there's laying still happening. (I sound a little unsure becaue I had to get my boyfriend to do the actual lifting of frames, etc. as I have a broken arm and can't do it. with only 1 veil between us, I had to observe from a few feet away.)

I plan to have a more experienced beekeeper come and have a look, but in the meantime, anyone have any ideas as to what's going on?

Thanks!

[Joseph Clemens]

You did not mention what size supers your bees are in. Are you using deep supers for brood chambers, and are all your supers the same size? What you describe sounds like it is probably about right for bees in your area. I am not sure how far north you are, but I once kept honeybees near Anacortes, Washington.

[LEAD PIPE]

My queen wont stay down. Every time I check shes up in the food chamber and I move her down where there is plenty of empty cells for her to lay eggs.

[Finsky]

Hi all,
I'm a new beekeeper and got a nuc in mid-June. The bees had pretty much filled the first box and I added another in the beginning of August.

Nuc has been quite long and there should be more bees than what you tell. But if it get a lot of honey, combs are few.

Now you should extract capped frames so you get more space for brood. If she does not lay more,  may be that queen is not a good egg layer.

Small hives have problems if they get too much honey.

[Michael Bush]

For BC this time of year it sounds pretty normal to me.  They'll probably fill the bottom up too, soon getting ready for winter.

Many people keep bees in one deep with supers above that.  Not that the queen doesn't sometimes lay in both boxes, but it's not a problem that she's only laying in one.  It's just one of the variations of normal.

[beemaster]

Hi Jana:

I agree with Michael Bush (as I very often do - he has extensive knowledge and hands-on) which can differ from single-hived bee yards, but your bees are driven by instintual traits and NOTHING can break their actions (other than extreme intervention by us) so give her time and she will be moving up.

Better stated, in milder climates, people may only keep ONE SUPER over winter, so there is no "UP" to to go! But keep in mind the weather and when cool weather generally comes to your area and work with that.

Make sure the upper super is filled with frames that are full of honey and when the time is right, everything will happen as it should. Remember too that queens (as all honeybees) are always active, even into the cluster during the coldest days of Winter - so there are always "things to do" in the hive and each warm day gives the bees another chance to PERFECT their Winterization of the hive and the queen may be staying low JUST to keep out of the way.

Lastly, think of that last statement as like when the PRESIDENT comes to the stricken areas of the US Southern States, you need to change what you are doing to accomidate his trip - when the queen comes to the honey supers, it is telling the REST of the hive that something different is happening and the WAY THINGS ARE DONE are about to change to "Shuffle" multiple tasks in this NORMALLY queenless box (that goes whether you use excluders or not) so have patiences with the hive, all should work out fine and honeybees RARELY have a poor sense of pre-Winter preparation!!!!

[Jana]

Thanks for all your interesting responses!

I'm using dadants. Also, I've been feeding sugar syrup since I got them.