Shiny black bees

[Silvbee]

Hi all,

Bit of a strange one this. On Sunday I had to do a few anti swarming splits, nothing unusual and all went well. As I had a few queen cells to use I made up a mating hive, one of the Warnholz ones. No issues and I gave the bees a lump of fondant to get going on.

I checked them today and the queen had emerged but all the bees had become black including the queen. They were still active and flying but they look like they've been dipped in oil. I looked up on the web and saw CBPV leads to black bees but I've never had this before and for it to happen to every bee in 4 days seems very quick. Also the bees were flying and mobile and not acting like the symptoms described for the virus.

One thing I thought was the heat? It was really hot today and the poly hive was in a very exposed location and the bees were all tightly clustered as seen in the pic. Could this be the cause? Any thoughts?

2063

[Jon]

I think they have got coated in fondant or nectar.
Were they introduced to the mating nuc as a wet ball of bees?
Sometimes they have difficulties getting dried out especially if they get sticky.
If you are shaking bees off frames and there is fresh nectar in the frame, which coats the bees, you can find a ball of dead bees in the Apidea next day especially if it is very hot.

[Silvbee]

Thanks for this Jon I was hoping it would be something like this but sometimes best to check. Bees were put in dry so must have become all sticky on the fondant.

I'll go up and check on them tomorrow and see if there's any change.

[nemphlar]

Last year I filled 6 apideas and 3days later found a wet stinking mess in all of them, I've been very careful this year not to repeat it. Not sure why they did this.

[Jon]

Fresh nectar in the frames when you shake them off can do this.