I Panicked!

[timallen]

My hive swarmed yestrrday for the second time this week. Actually, a cloud of bees came out of the hive on Wednesday, clustered on a tree very close to the hive and by the time I had got suited up to investigate, had disappeared. Did they go back to the hive? Anyway on Thursday, another cloud of bees emerged and this time clustered on a tree stump a bit further away from the hive and settled very quietly. They stayed there overnight and having had a think about it and done various jobs, I decided try to collect them and keep them with a view to starting another hive. By the time I got to them they had gone! Very frustrating but I don't have any spare equipment so maybe a good thing.

Having had them swarm possibly twice, I rather panicked and went through the brood box and destroyed all the remaing QCs. I lost count of the number but there were at least eight some of which were capped. It was only when I looked again at one of my books that I realised I should have left at least one QC for the new Q.

My question is, assuming I did in fact find all the QCs, will the bees create a new one to keep going? Was the old Q laying up to the time they swarmed? If so, then the books say the workers could use an existing egg but that would depend on the Q laying up to the time of swarming. In my panic I didn't look to see if there were any eggs in any cells. I am actually away for the next three weeks so won't be anle to check the hive. What should I be looking for when I get back? How will I know if the hive is queenless?

Sorry for the length of this post but looking forward to getting some answers!

 

[Thymallus]

If you are top of the job non of this should have happened as you would have seen them preparing to swarm about a week ago and could have taken preventative measures.
But no point crying over spilt milk, you are where you are.
Pray you missed a queen cell or two. Check again today before you go away. If you find one, great. Check for eggs, but unlikely to find any, although you never know. If you find some mark the frames. But be careful if there are no queen cells and no eggs particularly if some older (3-4 day larvae around) as they may attempt to raise another queen from larvae that are too old to revert.

If no queen cells and no eggs beg a frame with some and add.
Otherwise enjoy your holidays and see what the situation is on your return.

 

[Luka22]

Hi timallen,

Sorry to hear about the mistakes you made, but I am sure you are not the first one. One of the mistakes you made is to not buy a spare Hive. That is something we learnt in our first year, you can never have enough spare kit, but at least have 1 extra Hive in case Bees swarm and even if you only want 1 Hive, you could always combine at a later time.

Your Queen must have gone with the first Swarm, the second swarm was a cast swarm which is normally run by a virgin queen. The bees normally swarm, when they have capped the Queens cells and after a further 7-8 days the new Queen would hatch and run the original Hive. As you have found out already, you should have left the Queen Cells for them to raise their Queen, because your colony is now Queen-less and will be, besides they still have some eggs again to raise a new Queen.

When you are back, you will either see a new, young Queen and with luck she started laying or you could end up with a laying worker. A laying worker is not the end, but you would need to get a new Queen by either getting a frame of Brood/Eggs from another Beekeeper or a Queen.

All in all, nothing you can do while you are on Holidays I suppose besides, enjoy your Holidays and have a go again when you are back. Let us know in 3 weeks what you have found in your Hive and we will see from there...

Others might have a different view. Anyway, have a lovely Holiday !

 

[pargyle]

Hi timallen,

Sorry to hear about the mistakes you made, but I am sure you are not the first one. One of the mistakes you made is to not buy a spare Hive. That is something we learnt in our first year, you can never have enough spare kit, but at least have 1 extra Hive in case Bees swarm and even if you only want 1 Hive, you could always combine at a later time.

Better to have a spare hive - even if it is only a home made box or a nucleus so that you can do an artificial swarm BEFORE they actually swarm not to hive them when they have already swarmed - this is beekeeping.

Your Queen must have gone with the first Swarm, the second swarm was a cast swarm which is ALWAYS run by a virgin queen. The bees normally swarm, when they have capped the Queens cells -Not always when queen cells are capped - if you leave your AS to the point when the queen cells are capped the odds are that you are too late and after a further 7-8 days the new Queen would hatch and run the original Hive. As you have found out already, you should have left One or Two the Queen Cells for them to raise their Queen, because your colony is now Queen-less and will be, besides they still have some eggs again to raise a new Queen.After a prime swarm and a cast and the time now elapsed there is little chance of them raising another successful queen unless there was another queen cell that was missed when the OP destroyed 'all' the cells. That's your best hope. .. They may try and raise a queen from a grub but the old queen may have stopped laying before they swarmed and any larvae in there could be several days old. The colony tends to slim down a queen prior to swarming and she can (but not always) stop laying days before she leaves with the swarm.I think you would be clutching at straws hoping for another queen to be raised ... if there are eggs then the odds are that (as the OP destroyed all the previous QC's) they will raise lots of QC's and continue to issue casts until there is no colony left.

When you are back, you will either see a new, young Queen and with luck she started laying or you could end up with a laying worker. A laying worker is not the end, but you would need to get a new Queen by either getting a frame of Brood/Eggs from another Beekeeper or a Queen.

Hmmm ... three weeks away ... that will be end of July before you can fix things... and if they are queenless there could be laying workers or no bees worth mentioning if they cast... you will need a mated and laying queen if this colony is going to survive and grow sufficiently for winter and even then it will need some nurturing

All in all, nothing you can do while you are on Holidays I suppose besides, Is there nobody you have available that can look at the hive in your absence and check whether they are queenless - a frame with eggs will test and if they are Q- then NOW is the time to get a new queen in there - not in three weeks

enjoy your Holidays and have a go again when you are back. Let us know in 3 weeks what you have found in your Hive and we will see from there...

I would take a copy of Wally Shaws pamphlet 'I have Queen Cells in my hive' and a good bee book and read them both - several times - we all make mistakes and I'm not going to criticise what you have done but it's a wake up call for you - and a costly one at that.

Others might have a different view. Anyway, have a lovely Holiday !