Mini Nuc - question

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plumberman

House Bee
Joined
Jul 14, 2009
Messages
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Location
Surrey
Hive Type
National
Number of Hives
5 and ahem "a few more"
Grateful for any help: not used mini nucs until today!

I made up two of my mini nucs today, each with a queen cell inside a protector. Bees still seem fairly unhappy ( roaring) despite presence of cell - is this normal?
 
Were they ripe cells,like just about to emerge?
 
They are probably about 3-4 days from hatching
 
Did the cells have orange tips?

Do the cells contain queens?

I have found that as soon as a ripe cell goes in they calm down as fast as turning a light on.

Its amazing to see how calm they become in an instant with a good ripe cell.
 
Unfortunately I don't have the luxury of great timing - the main crux of todays inspection was to remove excess queen cells from the swarming hives that I split last week.

Is it worth continuing what is basically an experiment, or return the bees from whence they came?
 
I would leave them.
There is a good chance they will hatch,if not its good experience for you.
 
Thanks for your replies - I'll wait and see what happens.........
 
Update - they have hatched! I also hot wax glued some spare q/cells onto the underside of a couple of jars, put some damp cotton wool in the bottom and then placed them in the airing cupboard - one has already hatched, so I have run her into my final mini nuc. Thanks to ( Grizly?) who mentioned this last year. Looks like I may have to squish any further hatching virgins, unless anyone has any use for them.

All very exciting for the first time - now I guess got to see if they mate ok.
 
Plumberman - what a lovely situation to be in - too many queens:D I have 4 Apideas with virgins which will hopefully mate and only 1 colony that needs to be requeened.

Regards Mike

PS don't know if BCrazy is still looking for queens for his microscopery might be worth a PM.
 
Looking at all the weather forecasts for the month, one may wonder when all these early queens are going to get properly mated. Too cold round here a lot of the time for even the drones to come out for a bit of exercise!

MJBee may have a serious advantage, in this respect, over some of us. I am not pressing my bees to produce queen cells yet, for that very reason. I would prefer later, but properly mated queens rather than risk supercedure problems further into the season, but good luck to all those with hatching queens; you may get them properly mated with some good luck....

Regards, RAB
 
Looking at all the weather forecasts for the month, one may wonder when all these early queens are going to get properly mated. Too cold round here a lot of the time for even the drones to come out for a bit of exercise!

MJBee may have a serious advantage, in this respect, over some of us. I am not pressing my bees to produce queen cells yet, for that very reason. I would prefer later, but properly mated queens rather than risk supercedure problems further into the season, but good luck to all those with hatching queens; you may get them properly mated with some good luck....

Regards, RAB

Unfortunately my bees chose for me when they were going to produce Q/cells.

I'm never that keen on long term forecasts, and generally anything beyond the next 72 hours I think to a degree is conjecture. However, I take the point that I am in the lap of the gods over the next fortnight or so and will need a bit of luck. My insurance policy is that I still have the original (late 2009) queens from the three hives in nuclei.

I did remove a total of 24kg honey from my 3 hives tonight, so at least I have something to show from this year!

As regards my spare virgins (if they hatch!) they have already been assigned a good home...

Cheers

Roddy
 
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