Laying workers  arise as the result of the loss of a queen in a colony with no
suitable eggs to be made into a supercedure queen. It is suspected that queen
pheremone supresses egg-laying behaviour in the workers and the loss of the
queen removes this supression.
The signs are:
a) no queen
b) general queenless behaviour
c) often, a small colony size
d) THE POSITION OF WORKER-LAID EGGS. These are about 1/2 way down the sidewall
of the cell, not at the apex, as the worker can't reach the bottom.
 
The eggs will be drones.
 
Treatment:
 
Re-queening is not too reliable, as the colony is in a mode where it is creating
its own queen. One solution is to introduce  a 'scratch' (low-cost, non
valuable) queen or capped queen cell to give the colony a queen on a temporary
basis and once she is established, re-queen properly using your lucky method.
Otherwise, you can try and unite the affected colony with one that is
queen-right, to save the workers for use.
 
Chris Deaves
Twickenham & Thames Valley BKA.