Another Nightmare Today

Millet · Jul 14, 2018

I went through a colony today to look for a nice fat Queen to clip and mark... on opening up the bees where nice and calm but as i got through the frames i spotted polished cells but no eggs.. i kept going and onto frame number nine i spotted a small patch of eggs in drone cells and a few capped drone cells..

So i went back through the hive again and spotted another small under developed Queen... from the last palava i had i walked 10yards away from the hive so i did not loose her like i did with the last one..??? .

Got the Queen catcher ready and then methodically went over the frame..after 10 minutes of looking could i hell find her again so i stuck the frame in a nuc with another frame and left them for 15 mins while i went for a drink of water (entrance disc closed) ..

Another 15 mins and i still could not find her...it was a warm day and my head was starting to get stressed..

I decided to go back to the original hive just incase and there she was.. the little devil had flown of the frame without me seeing and straight back into the original hive..the relief was unbelievable..needless to say she was splatted on the spot damaging comb in the process but i was not going to go through that again..

Eyeman · Jul 14, 2018

Millet said:
I went through a colony today to look for a nice fat Queen to clip and mark... on opening up the bees where nice and calm but as i got through the frames i spotted polished cells but no eggs.. i kept going and onto frame number nine i spotted a small patch of eggs in drone cells and a few capped drone cells..

So i went back through the hive again and spotted another small under developed Queen... from the last palava i had i walked 10yards away from the hive so i did not loose her like i did with the last one..??? .

Got the Queen catcher ready and then methodically went over the frame..after 10 minutes of looking could i hell find her again so i stuck the frame in a nuc with another frame and left them for 15 mins while i went for a drink of water (entrance disc closed) ..

Another 15 mins and i still could not find her...it was a warm day and my head was starting to get stressed..

I decided to go back to the original hive just incase and there she was.. the little devil had flown of the frame without me seeing and straight back into the original hive..the relief was unbelievable..needless to say she was splatted on the spot damaging comb in the process but i was not going to go through that again..

Always have a couple of Butler queen cages in my pocket for immediate catching and safe keeping. I can then calmly think about what I'm going to do with her. Note to self don't put her back in your pocket as she'll still be there when you get home!

Millet · Jul 14, 2018

Eyeman said:
Always have a couple of Butler queen cages in my pocket for immediate catching and safe keeping. I can then calmly think about what I'm going to do with her. Note to self don't put her back in your pocket as she'll still be there when you get home!