Queenless in mid-September in Galway and nobody has queens left — combine with the neighbouring hive or let it dwindle?
Second year, three hives outside Galway. Hive 2 has lost its queen. Last saw eggs on the 28th of August; Sunday's inspection found no eggs, no larvae, only a handful of sealed brood left, and two emergency cells on the middle frame, both torn open at the tip. Bees are calm but there's that roar when you lift the crown board.
Rang four suppliers yesterday. Nobody has mated queens, one lad might have a virgin next week. The colony is about seven frames of bees; my other two are strong at ten or eleven frames each.
So, options as I see them: newspaper-combine hive 2 onto hive 1, or hang on and hope a queen emerged from those cells and gets mated. At 53°N in the middle of September is there any realistic chance of that? And would seven frames of bees on top of eleven make hive 1 too crowded for winter?
Cork here, twelve years of west-of-Ireland Septembers. Cells torn open at the tip means a virgin emerged and is likely in there. But drones have been evicted for a fortnight and we've had ten days of rain — her chance of a proper mating now is dreadful, and a drone-layer in November is worse than no queen. Combine this week while there's still sealed brood. Two rules: FIND the virgin and remove her first, or she may kill your good queen; and put the queenless box on TOP of hive 1 over one sheet of newspaper with a couple of slits. 7 on 11 frames is a fine winter colony. Don't buy that virgin.
AlpineCarnica · Sep 15, 2026
Agree with CorkBeeRon completely. In the Tyrol our rule is simple: after the end of August no more queen mating, we unite. You are not losing a hive — you are gaining eleven drawn combs and a stronger colony that you split back into two in April. That is a better spring than a dead box and a weak one.
DevonBees_Em · Sep 15, 2026
Made the same call in Devon last September. One caveat: look for that virgin twice, on two different days if you can — they're small, unmarked and quick. If you genuinely can't find her after two proper looks, most people combine anyway and the bees usually settle it in favour of the laying queen, but it's a coin I'd rather not toss.
GalwayBees · Sep 16, 2026
Found her — a tiny unmarked virgin skittering across frame five, second time through. Removed. Newspaper went on last night, hive 2 on top of hive 1 exactly as described. Thanks CorkBeeRon, and AlpineCarnica for the reframing, I was treating it as a failure and it isn't.