Larvae found in my honey supers- advice wanted

[MuswellMetro]

previous thread there are two QC at the bottom of the frame

Did I miss something?

More like a comic again trying to befuddle another new beek!

RAB

i see RAB, well, there is no point giving answers as they will be wrong unless get told the full story, so lets see how both threads devlop

 

[beeno]

Hi MM,
Perhaps you could be kind enough to pronounce on whether the two downward pointing peanut textured cells pictured on OP's first thread picture two are unsealed QCs or drone cells? If they are indeed drone cells then I am confused.

 

[radhartgeorge]

Beeno,

Updated post following hive inspection about to follow... with close up photos.

In answer to your point, whilst they are downward facing and reminicent of a (short) peanut, I didn't think they were long enough for QCs. Upon closer inspection, one of the cels you suspected was a QC was open and empty, the other was sealed and empty. Now, both are gone.

Photos should make things clearer but I'm giving up trying to use the forum's photo uploading and just providing a dropbox link. Should be up in 15 mins or so.

Thanks anyway for your input, really appreciate it.

Rad

 

[thorn]

What do you mean by BIAS? Forgive my ignorance.

Brood In All Stages.

 

[radhartgeorge]

Update post hive inspection

Hi Folks,

Firstly, I'd like to thank everyone for their input. Whether it ended up correct or not I'm very grateful for sharing your experience.

I have just got back from today's hive inspection. Photos of this can be seen here:

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/q6oce8b6k0shhz4/JOhia6P96U

I have given up trying to use this forum's photo uploading function - am I the only one that thinks this needs attention?

Anyway, I started by inspecting the super, where there were what appeared to be randomly placed drone cells, some capped some not, surrounded entirely by honey and it was this issue that was the motivation for this thread.

There were 16 of these cells in total, and were only located in the central 3 super frames. I decided to use the end of a long matchstick to empty these cells be they sealed or not.

When I moved onto inspect the brood box, I took particular care to look for queen cells (which Beeno suggested he saw on my photo). The cells in question I thought were not long enough but I opened them up with a matchstick anyway and I am very relieved to say that they were completely empty and bone dry- one of them was actually open at the bottom.

Thankfully, there were no other suspect QCs anywhere in the brood box, just quite a lot of hanging brood (not sure if this is the correct term) from the bottom of the frames, all of which looked like drone cells but this could just be the way they look when they are not based on foundation.

I decided to make another thread for this as it wasn't strictly related to the cells in the supers. Some of you have kindly commented on both threads. There was mixed opinion on whether I should get rid of these hanging cells but in the end I decided to get rid of it. It felt pretty weird (wrong) cutting off all this brood in various stages of development but hopefully it's for the best.

For those that were concerned that the queen had gone, I can (thankfully) say that the queen is still there, safe and sound. This time I made sure she was below the excluder- even though I suspect the cells in the supers were from laying workers.

Anyway... that's all really. I'm really relieved that they weren't QC and it hasn't swarmed.

Thanks again for your advice.
Rad

 

[radhartgeorge]

Perhaps I spoke too soon?!

After re-reading my post above, I went through the photos again and realised that there were 2 frames which showed potential queen cells in remarkably similar places.

During my inspection I established one frame did not have queen cells but now I am worried that the other one does... here is a photo.

Are these queen cells in the bottom right?! I now think these were the cells Beeno was referring to and am now thinking he was (unfortunately) right!

Gulp...

 

[Tawny Owl]

Glad to hear it all looks good. It's often a relief to be wrong.

 

[radhartgeorge]

@tawny owl,

So you don't think the cells in my last photo (posted above) look suspicious?

Rad

 

[REDWOOD]

Play cups, anything inside ?

 

[charlievictorbravo]

Hi Folks,

.... I have given up trying to use this forum's photo uploading function - am I the only one that thinks this needs attention?
......
Rad

I am too inexperienced myself to offer a view on whether or not you have Queen cells although having said that, they don't look like classic queens cells as shown in the text books.

As for your frustrations with uploading photos onto the forum, you may be failing because photos from a good camera are too large to be accepted by the forum's program. The limit seems to be about 1mb but I am not absolutely sure.

The method I use to upload large photo files is to use the Microsoft Office Picture Manager program to compress my camera's photo files to what it says is for Web Pages. The alternative is to use, say, a mobile phone to take the pictures. My phone gives much smaller files than the camera and these can be uploaded without compressing them.

If it dry, calm and warm tomorrow here, I've got to get into my brood box and try to find the Queen - three days ago she appeared to be AWOL but the pollen has continued to go in and this, I am assured, is a sure sign that the queen is there.

Good luck with yours

CVB

 

[REDWOOD]

A bit of help I think you need about QC's
http://www.wbka.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/There-Are-Queen-Cells-In-My-Hive-WBKA-WAG.pdf

Digest this as you will need it

 

[Tawny Owl]

I was referring to you having a queen being a good thing. The queen you have is the marked one, if the cups are empty I wouldn't worry about it. I might check them again in a few days though if you're still worried.

 

[radhartgeorge]

Thanks Tawny Owl,

Yes, I think the consensus is that they are play cups. I've spent much of today reading about queen cells and play cups etc and I am far more relaxed... slightly embarrassed if anything that I got so concerned!

Let's hope the situation hasn't changed when I get back from holiday.

Thanks again,
Rad