BCBA's Discussion Forum

Our bees did not survive this past winter.

After excavating the old hive, we found a frame that shows irregular honeycomb. I've uploaded the pictures. Does anyone know what might be the cause of this? They had plenty of honey left in the upper box of the hive and they did not swarm, although there were queen cells. It seems as though they lasted a good portion of the winter since most of the bottom box was empty of honey.

Those could be drone cells. Drone brood cells are larger than worker bee cells, and you wouldn't see a lot of them.