Perfect brood pattern but hopeless queen

[stechad]

As mentioned on another post, I re-queened a colony today because it is not building well and not collecting much.
I have kept the queen in a mini nuc 'just in case' but I'm coming to the conclusion that a fantastic brood pattern isn't always an indication of a good queen, the hive I removed her from had 3 full 14x12 frames of capped brood from edge to edge with barely an empty cell and another 2 frames of open brood and eggs also totally covered.
Any one else noticed this?

[AndrewLD]

What you describe is interesting but I am not sure about the reference to a perfect/ fantastic brood pattern.
Five frames of brood wall to wall - 3 sealed, 2 open/ eggs. Suggests the queen had only three frames to lay in, then stopped laying (no space?) and then had two more available. The question is why - stores bound? Foundation rather than drawn? Limited super space so the bees were filling everything with nectar whilst processing it...........

No expert here but that certainly isn't a perfect brood pattern. I think a perfect brood pattern would look like an egg taking up several frames, with pollen on the outside and stores forming a crescent above and around the pollen and brood, in the proportion would be 4:2:1 (12 days sealed: 6 open: 3 eggs). If you had a total of five 14x12 frames wall to wall - what was the matter the queen you replaced?

[stechad]

What you describe is interesting but I am not sure about the reference to a perfect/ fantastic brood pattern.
Five frames of brood wall to wall - 3 sealed, 2 open/ eggs. Suggests the queen had only three frames to lay in, then stopped laying (no space?) and then had two more available. The question is why - stores bound? Foundation rather than drawn? Limited super space so the bees were filling everything with nectar whilst processing it...........

the hive contains 3 sealed brood, 2 open/eggs, 2 of pollen and uncapped honey, the rest of the frames are drawn comb which is being ignored. Also they will only ever fill a couple of frames with food even with a feeder on which they ignore.
Today for example, the sun is cracking the flags here and other hives and nucs are pouring bees out, this hive is having a day off. If this were in a five frame nuc I received from someone I would think she was a great queen when in fact she produces very lazy bees that only forage enough to survive, but would not make it through the winter without heavy feeding from myself.

[Steve 1972]

I have a colony like that Ste..the 2019 Queen from the 2018 Queen last year that was exactly the same..6frames of brood and stores are all they can manage with the other frames being mainly empty with bits of stores here and there..typical of some mongrel colonies i would say..the 2018 Queen barely filled a super and her daughter is on the same track..for me it is just a case of some bees have good honey gathering capabilities and others do not..i have another two mongrel colonies from the same area that are totally different..one has four supers and one has three both have been Artificially swarmed with the Queens placed in nucs..the brood pattern on those two extends to 9 frames in a rugby ball formation..
what i have worked out over the years is that some Queen fail miserably through no fault of your own and the best thing to do is dispatch them and make some nucs up with what brood and stores are in there with bought in mated Queens.

[Patrick]

what i have worked out over the years is that some Queen fail miserably through no fault of your own and the best thing to do is dispatch them and make some nucs up with what brood and stores are in there with bought in mated Queens.

Or raise your own queens and make good use of the bees and brood as you say to make up nucs, rather than prop up an underperforming colony mid season which by the time her progeny are useful foragers, its all over for the year (down here anyway).

If you have a decent queen to use, I think a few spare queens every year makes sorting out the inevitable tail enders early a much easier decision. I understand not possible for everyone, but the tensions around buying in and introducing queens I suspect means people often shrug and tolerate poor colonies headed by poor queens longer than they should. Or perhaps that is just me.

I also agree about brood patterns. I wonder if it really refers to to the opposite - poor brood patterns often being symptomatic of an underlying problem? I have noticed surprisingly poor brood patterns go entirely unremarked by many beekeepers. Always worth reflecting on the reason.

Surely it’s why they put cameras in phones ?

[stechad]

Steve
Re-queened today with one from Ged and dummied down as I don't have a spare nuc, so hopefully that should improve things.
Patrick
I would normally rear my own queens especially as I have a Buckfast breeder half a mile away and they normally come good, however you need good stock to breed from and I feel mine are all too far down the mongrel spectrum to be worth the effort.

[Steve 1972]

Steve
Re-queened today with one from Ged and dummied down as I don't have a spare nuc, so hopefully that should improve things.
Patrick
I would normally rear my own queens especially as I have a Buckfast breeder half a mile away and they normally come good, however you need good stock to breed from and I feel mine are all too far down the mongrel spectrum to be worth the effort.

That sounds good to me Ste..a dummied down brood box is as good as a nuc with more options me thinks..and i totally agree with needing good stock to breed from.. i will never breed from the local mongrel colonies intentionally ..i give them a go for one season and after that they usually disappear for some reason. ..
Since being introduced to good Buckfast Queens i have not really looked back apart from experimenting with the mongrels in my location.. good Buckfast Queens are not called Buck Fast for nothing..

[NigelP]

Worth remembering we are all at the mercy of our local mongrels. Steve and I have very bad ones in our local areas, whereas Mick (from Teesside) will be along shortly to tell us how good natured and prolific the local mongrels are in his area which is between Steve and me. Bit different to some of the "local" population /wry grin/. I'm sure Adam and others will be along to reassure that not all local mongrels are as bad as the ones we have to endure
They vary.....tremendously.

[stechad]

Having lived in Spain where I kept carnolians, I originally had carnolians til about 2013 when I realised that the breeder near me was breeding buckfast and that was causing me problems, since going bucky most of my queens tend to come good, just the odd rogue.

[AndrewLD]

Now you've filled in some of the gaps the story becomes even more fascinating....
A Ged Marshall queen should certainly give you the qualities that you are looking for and on which Nigel has often expounded. I think this is boiling down to what you are looking for as a beekeeper.
I find my Buckfast bees a bit of pain, too prolific, demanding more resources than I want to provide and more honey than I really want. My Carniolans, once one accepts their inherent desire to replicate above all else and once once gets through the early swarming tendency; delight me with their "intelligence" (of course bees are not intelligent but the colony - perhaps another matter?). Quick to match brood production with the flow and over-wintering small on limited stores - they are not fecund nor particularly good at honey production. They are doing what they want to do.
I started with Carniolans, thought the swarming tendency a pain, went Buckfast. Now I value my remaining Carniolans even more.....