Advice please they swarmed again

[rbaz]

My bees swarmed on the 13th of this month I caught them and it was the main swarm (old marked queen present)
I removed all but 1 cell (or so I thought) and they threw a cast swarm on the 23rd and I lost them.
Today they swarmed again. I did get them into a nuc but they all returned to the main hive. I guess they will go again today or tomorrow.

I haven’t opened up the main hive since the 17th as I wanted to leave the new queen to get mated.
Should I open the hive now to check for more cells? Maybe they made more after I removed all but 1?
I take it the oldest queen leaves so the new queen will have to be mated again?

Appreciate the help.

 

[Hebeegeebee]

After the prime swarm with the laying queen the colony would have had queencells - usually one or more sealed. The general rule is to leave one open queencell. then you know you have >8 days before emergence of the young queen. With a sealed q/cell you just don't know. As the bees can produce more queencells including emergency ones after the queen has gone, you need to check 5 - 7 days later and remove any other queencells. OR you can get a swarm from the first queencell to open leaving possibly a grotty emergency queen to remain in the hive. Or several casts until the colony is pretty much exhausted.

 

[rbaz]

Thanks for the help so what would you do now? Check make sure there is only one cell preferably unsealed?
They did swarm again this afternoon I managed to catch them but I have just moved the hive on to a stand and they have all decided to go back into the old hive
Should I have not moved them until tomorrow morning?
They will probably go again tomorrow so will have to do it all again hopefully I will be here

 

[enrico]

It depends why they returned to the hive. They may have lost the queen, virgin or otherwise, in which case they returned to the hive, in this case you need a queen cell in there to replace her, if however the queen returned with them which IMHO is less likely then they will go again if you leave a queen cell, and may go anyway even if you don't.
I am afraid you are in a catch 22 situation now. I would leave one open cell but others may not.

 

[Outlander]

Whatever happeneds good luck. I have this all to come so reading everything on the subject from the forum to books.

 

[mbc]

One way to stop cast swarms is to "pull" any queen cells. This involves hatching any virgins mature enough manually by opening up their cells and letting them walk free into the hive. Any virgins too immature to survive don't, and its a good idea to destroy any unsealed queen cells while your at it. The hive wont throw a cast however many virgins are released into the hive, they just fight it out until only one survives. Don't know why, but it works every time( so far !).

 

[enrico]

Missing queen cells is so easy. I have been checking hives for thirty years. Today I went through a brood and a half carefully, they had already swarmed so not too many bees, however I went back through them shaking bees off every frame, found three more, they can get covered by bees, hidden in drone brood and in every crease and hole they can find! You will never believe you have left one ....... But you will, we all do!

 

[rbaz]

Thanks again for the help and encouragement.

Think I will wait and see what they do tomorrow. If they swarm again I will try to catch them but leave the hive where it is move it the following morning hopefully that will keep them in.

Then I will open the old hive make sure there are still enough bees to keep it going and check for any more cells but it would have been 17 days since my old queen left so there shouldn't be any new cells and any queen cells should have already hatched out.
Unless a new queen has mated and started laying already.