How to recognize a queenless hive: 9 reliable ways

A queenless hive is a problem for any beekeeper because a colony cannot survive without a healthy, mated, laying queen. For new beekeepers, identifying a queenless hive is the first hurdle. But how can you distinguish a queenless hive from a normal one?

The signs of queenlessness change over time

Unfortunately, the signs of queenlessness are different in a newly queenless hive compared to a hive that’s been queenless for days or weeks. On inspection, a newly queenless hive may appear normal. You may see brood in all stages of development, an average number of drones, and workers behaving normally.

Within a few days, however, things will start to change. At some point, the workers will build supersedure cells, the amount of worker brood will drop, and nurse bees with nothing better to do may forage, filling brood cells with nectar and pollen.

Next, laying workers may develop. When this happens, you may see multiple eggs in cells, lots of scattered drone brood, and an abundance of drones. In addition, the population of workers will plummet. And with no queen pheromone to guide the colony, the remaining workers may act listless or lazy.

Learn to spot a queenless hive early

Because things inside a queenless hive get worse in a hurry, you can save yourself a lot of trouble by learning to identify queenlessness early. If you suspect queenless just by looking at a hive from the outside, you may have time to re-queen before laying workers get established.

No two colonies are the same, of course. But with practice, you can often tell when one of your hives loses a queen. Once suspicious, you can open the hive and look for other clues to queenlessness.

Three outside signs of a recently queenless hive

Here are three signs of a newly queenless hive you might notice just from walking near the hive.

1. Irritable, grouchy, or aggressive bees

The pheromones (odors) secreted by the queen bee keep the colony cohesive and orderly. But when those odors become weak or go missing, the workers get cranky and misdirected. Instead of doing regular colony chores, they may lash out at anything that comes close to the hive, including beekeepers, pets, and children. They may sting for no apparent reason. If one of your hives suddenly turns nasty, check for queenlessness right away.

2. A loud roar or high-pitched whine coming from the hive

Normally, a colony makes a soft purr, a pleasing industrious sound that’s soothing to a beekeeper, a soft sound that signals, “All is well.” But a queenless hive may sound scary.

Two distinct sounds are common, often occurring together. The one I hear more often is almost a roar. I can hear it from a distance, powerful and threatening. It’s purring on steroids.

Less often, I hear a whine coming from several bees at once. Like a high-pitch whine emitting from the back of a human throat, it can be long or short. I think of it as a distress call.

3. An increased number of foragers coming and going

With no source of fertilized eggs, a newly queenless colony has fewer larvae to tend. This leaves the nurse bees with little to do, so many of these become foragers. Gradually, you may see more and more workers at the entrance, hauling in pollen and nectar.

Be sure to look carefully. A sudden increase of bees at the entrance can also mean robbers are trying to steal from the hive. But real foragers arrive with loads of nectar (you can see extended abdomens) or loads of pollen on their legs. Robbers never carry pollen and leave with extended abdomens.

Six signs of queenlessness inside the hive

If you are lucky, you will recognize the outside signs of queenlessness early. But regardless of the timing, the next thing to do is open your colony for further inspection. As you search for your queen, be on the lookout for the following signs of queenlessness.

1. A progressive loss of brood

Once a queen goes missing or becomes incapable of laying eggs, the brood nest gets progressively smaller. After three days, all the queen’s eggs have hatched. After another six days, you will see no more larvae because it all has been capped. And by the end of three weeks, all the queen’s brood has emerged. That means the brood nest alone can give you an idea of how long the colony has been queenless.

2. Supersedure cells

Supersedure cells appear fairly soon after a queen is lost or disabled. A colony can usually tell the queen is missing within about 15 minutes, so a sudden flush of supersedure cells may be a clue to trouble.

However, some colonies build queen cups (the foundation of queen cells) regularly, so don’t be fooled by these. Look for cells that the bees are building around existing larvae. Queen cups built around empty cells may be nothing to worry about.

3. Food stored in the brood nest

As the brood nest goes empty, a lot of the nurse bees have little to do. Many of them may begin to forage, and because the brood nest isn’t being used for brood, the workers may store pollen and nectar there.

Be aware that backfilling the brood nest before swarming is not the same thing. Because some things in a hive can be confusing, it’s best to look for several signs of queenlessness before you decide to re-queen.

4. Signs of laying workers

You may see signs of laying workers inside a queenless hive. Laying workers occur when queen pheromone and open brood pheromone disappear. These pheromones normally suppress the development of worker ovaries, but when they are no longer present, the workers’ ovaries mature and the bees begin to lay eggs.

The eggs of laying working are often not centered in the cells or they may occur on the rims or walls of cells. In addition, you may see many eggs per cell. A large proportion of the workers may lay, perhaps up to 20 percent.

Look at the brood carefully. Workers only lay drone brood, but they often lay it in worker-sized cells. In addition, workers don’t lay eggs in a tight pattern the way a queen does. Instead, they lay randomly throughout the combs.

5. Fewer workers, more drones

As the queen’s offspring dies off and the remaining laying workers produce more and more drone brood, the ratio of worker bees to drone bees changes drastically. After a while, you will notice the proportions changing until nearly the entire colony is composed of drones. 

6. Listless and confused bees

The queen’s pheromones guide a colony of bees and keep it cohesive. After several weeks without guidance, the remaining bees become listless, lethargic, and lazy. You may see them doing nothing or simply walking slowly inside the hive or outside on the landing board or nearby foliage.

The queen’s health requires constant attention

The take-home message is that the character of a queenless hive changes over time. At first, things may look fairly normal, but the bees are headed for a downhill spiral unless they can raise a queen quickly or you can provide one.

If you can train yourself to notice—or at least suspect—a queenless hive from the outside, you will be able to re-queen before it’s too late. Try to be alert for the outside signals of trouble, so you can do a thorough inside check.

Remember, always look for multiple signs of queenlessness, but do it early. For many reasons, queens don’t live as long as they used to, so queen monitoring should be high on your list of priorities.

Rusty
Honey Bee Suite