>>2 of the hives (Italian) this year I checkered and went 3 deep them.
These 2 really took off and did very well with the locust flow this
spring.

Nice to hear that.:)

>>...the NASTIEST bees I have ever dealt with. The bottom 2 deeps were FULL of nasty 
bees but no brood, or honey, and very little pollen). <...> The top deep had quite a 
bit of brood(capped and uncapped)and honey in it as well as the first honey super above 
it).

Thanks to the rains we've had, my bees are raising a lot of brood at this time.  Here on 
Long Island, it's a record year for predation by yellow jackets (a local garden center 
told a friend of mine that they've sold record amounts of yellow jacket spray).  Yellow 
jackets will make bees very defensive but not like you've described.  A little bit of 
smoke should calm them quickly.  I assume your hive inspections are methodic and 
non-disturbing.

There may be several possibilities for nasty bees:

What was the source of your Italian queens?

Could there be a chemical contamination?

Could there be predation by opposums or skunks?

>>I figured I needed to reconfigure the hive so I move the deep w/ the
brood to the bottom and put the 2 other deeps on top.

It's best not to reconfigure the nest after the reproductive swarm period passes.  The 
bottom deep should have a lot of pollen - I am sure goldenrod is blooming beatifully 
upstate - and most of the brood should be in the middle and 3rd deeps.

>>I then placed the super w/ foundation on top of those followed by the 2 capped 
supers and then the super that had brood in it.

Unless you have a good flow going, I would not have them working foundation.  I would 
extract any capped honey and let them back fill the frames with goldenrod honey.

>>I tried to make sure the queen was not in that one. I was hoping the brood would 
hatch out and then honey would back fill behind them.

Right.  How was the brood pattern?  Perhaps they had undergone supercedure and the new 
queen was just getting up to speed?  Do you have marked queens...?

>>Any suggestions on what I SHOULD have done with the above situation?
Why were the bottom 2 deeps devoid of everything except bees?

The bees always have the brood under the honey dome.  They work from the top down.  If you 
experienced a drought in July, they may have shut down brood rearing and only restarted 
after the flow re-started.  Supercedure often has a similar effect if the older queen 
ceased laying.

>>This is late August with the knotweed and golden rod is just coming into bloom 
here. I would have thought by now they would have placed quite a bit of honey in the brood 
nest.

What kind of shape was the other 3-deep hive in?  It's always good to baseline.

>>What is the best way of requeening this hive given
their aggressiveness? I have heard that mixing Italian and Carnialons
can create a nasty cross? These look mostly Italian.

Looks are very deceiving re. race.  As far as requeeing, you can move the hive to a new 
location leaving behind a single deep to catch the nasty foragers.  Re-queening in the new 
location should be more successful.

>>Does anyone know a good late season supplier of queens?

Most suppliers should still be shipping queens.  Or you can raise your own queens.  There 
should be plentiful drones through September.

Waldemar

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