I have what appears to be a drone-laying queen, and I'm wondering what to do
about it.

This particular hive threw at least one and possibly two swarms three or
four weeks ago. Since then we have had (as we typically do here in the
Seattle area) many cold rainy days interspersed with a few sunny ones. When
I checked the hive last night I found solid sheets of brood in all stages of
development, BUT everything that was sealed had the typical bullet shaped
cappings of drone cells.  There were some fairly large solid sheets of
sealed drone brood.

So I assume that what happened is that the virgin queen that resulted from
the swarm(s) failed to mate adequately during the rainy periods.

My question is, can I simply requeen in the ordinary way?  Would it be
better to give the hive a comb of eggs and hope they'll superscede the
drone-layer, or should I buy a queen and try to introduce her after
dispatching the drone-layer>

Thanks for your opinions...

Dan Brown
[log in to unmask]
Western Washington State