Drone laying queen or workers

[Allie M]

One of my hives lost its marked queen (whether by a swarm or the queen dying) but when I inspected had sealed queen cells, so I kept the best one and waited the advised 3 weeks (actually nearly 4). When I looked in after this there was just drone, no worker brood. Couldn’t find a queen so decided to try a frame of brood and eggs from my other hive. One week on, there is one rather small sealed queen cell, but I think I can see some eggs (more than one per cell) and certainly small and larger larvae plus sealed brood so clearly drone laying is still going on (still couldn’t see a queen). My question is do I leave well alone for another three weeks, or could try moving the hive so the flying bees are away from home to see if I can get a better look for a queen, or shake the bees off the frames so that if there are laying workers they are not in the hive any more. My other hive is thriving and buzzing!

 

[blackcloud]

How soon did you check in?- the new queen can take weeks to get going.

 

[The Poot]

One of my hives lost its marked queen (whether by a swarm or the queen dying) but when I inspected had sealed queen cells, so I kept the best one and waited the advised 3 weeks (actually nearly 4). When I looked in after this there was just drone, no worker brood. Couldn’t find a queen so decided to try a frame of brood and eggs from my other hive. One week on, there is one rather small sealed queen cell, but I think I can see some eggs (more than one per cell) and certainly small and larger larvae plus sealed brood so clearly drone laying is still going on (still couldn’t see a queen). My question is do I leave well alone for another three weeks, or could try moving the hive so the flying bees are away from home to see if I can get a better look for a queen, or shake the bees off the frames so that if there are laying workers they are not in the hive any more. My other hive is thriving and buzzing!

It seems to me they are laying workers. I would wait a couple of weeks to see if a queen is in existence and laying but if there are still multiple eggs in cells and no evident queen, shake them out and take the hive away

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

waited the advised 3 weeks (actually nearly 4)

four weeks after a swarm is nothing, sure you just didn't see the remaining drones from the original queen, the larvae on the test frame would have been from the eggs that there were originally. I'd apply patience and wait another few weeks