Drone laying queen
A drone laying queen is a queen bee that primarily lays unfertilized eggs, which develop into drones (male bees). This condition typically arises when a queen runs out of stored sperm (after mating flights) or if she was never properly mated. A colony with a drone laying queen will have a poor or failing brood pattern consisting mainly or entirely of drone brood. Drone brood are capped and raised in worker cells, appearing raised and uneven. A drone laying queen cannot sustain a healthy worker bee population, leading to colony decline. Requeening is usually necessary to correct this issue. Diagnosing a drone laying queen involves inspecting brood patterns and confirming the presence of primarily drone brood.
- Requeening5
Remove the drone-laying queen and introduce a new, mated queen to restore normal brood production. A mated queen lays fertilized eggs, quickly returning the colony to a healthy worker-bee brood pattern. This is the most direct and widely recommended fix for a confirmed drone-laying queen.
📌 commercial📌 best practice4/16/2025, 9:22:01 PM
🛠️ Queen cage, hive tool
- Combine with a queenright hive4
Merge the drone-laying colony with a strong, queenright hive using the newspaper method. The functional queen and her workers will take over the combined population, and the drone-laying queen will be eliminated by the bees naturally.
📌 diy📌 traditional4/16/2025, 9:22:01 PM
🛠️ Newspaper, hive tool
- Shake out bees and requeen3
Shake all bees from the drone-laying colony onto the ground in front of the hive, destroy the drone comb, and set up the hive box with clean frames and a new mated queen. Forager bees will return to the hive and accept the new queen, while the old drone-laying queen, being a poor flier, typically…
📌 diy📌 commercial4/16/2025, 9:22:01 PM
🛠️ Queen cage, hive tool, extra frames or foundation