More early supercedures?

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itma

Queen Bee
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Kent, England
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There's an article in the new edition of Beecraft, reviewing 2014 news on Neonics.

One of the matters arising is the matter of "early supercedures". Commonly, we'd likely just put this down to "poor mating" or somesuch.
But Sandrock et al (2014) http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0103592 found neonics associated with early supercedure, and the observation had been previously made in 2012 in Sussex BKA's submission to the Parliamentary Environmental Audit Committee. There are reports (from OSR areas) of an unusual (recently dramatically increased) number of new (~6 week old) Qs being superceded even though they appear to be laying well.
It is hypothesised that this might be explained by an otherwise good Q being deficient in (essential) Q pheromones.

Anyone else encountered this increased early supercedure phenomenon?

There have been plenty complaints of "poor mating" - but my concern is supercedure of an apparently healthy, young, laying queen - ie without actual evidence of "poor mating".
There was a recent report of exactly this on the forum, and a friend (with OSR) has had puzzlingly repeated (and seemingly unnecessary) supercedures this summer.
One swallow doesn't make a summer, so, I'm asking the forum if this rings any bells with them.
 
Early supercedure

I am surrounded by OSR and this year I have had four out of six hives superceding from new queens. All my new queens were laying well and seemed to be doing well. The only other factor that I can highlight is the sudden change in weather that we had in August. From the heat of June and July, it was wet and windy in august. This is when they started superceding.
The new crop has already been planted and as it is now neonicotinoid free, it will be interesting to see what happens next year.
 
One for me

I bought a mated Carnolian in late May 14. Although they are in a OSR area this had finished by the time she was installed. In late August 14 she was laying well, lot of frames full of sealed brood plus plenty of unsealed larvae and eggs. The queen was marked and was clearly visible moving smoothly across the frames. No sign of any physical problem such as paralyzed leg. The bees were extremely good natured. 2 Supercedure cells had eggs in them during 1st week in Sept 14 and were sealed a week later.
 

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