New hive, plenty of space but have Queen cells

[mole999]

I’m in a dilemma.

I got a NUC (6 frames) 4 weeks ago, did my first inspection today. Been feeding them 2:1 sine they were placed in hive.

queen is laying, sh is clipped, drone cells evident, at least 1frame of stock produced, comb built out on new frames except 3 frames.

there are a number of queen cells evident. One cell is open with egg laid. So have at least 10/15 days. Location near the top of the frame.

There is plenty of space in the hive so a little confused on reason why.
I’m thinking that the queen is not preforming.
Do I:

1) leave alone any let things play out?
2) kill queen cells
3) kill existing queen
4) split the hive (not sure an option with the age of the hive)
4) or other

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

 

[Murox]

Are the brood frames stuffed with the syrup you have been feeding?

 

[Boston Bees]

I’m in a dilemma.

I got a NUC (6 frames) 4 weeks ago, did my first inspection today. Been feeding them 2:1 sine they were placed in hive.

queen is laying, sh is clipped, drone cells evident, at least 1frame of stock produced, comb built out on new frames except 3 frames.

there are a number of queen cells evident. One cell is open with egg laid. So have at least 10/15 days. Location near the top of the frame.

There is plenty of space in the hive so a little confused on reason why.
I’m thinking that the queen is not preforming.
Do I:

1) leave alone any let things play out?
2) kill queen cells
3) kill existing queen
4) split the hive (not sure an option with the age of the hive)
4) or other

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Welcome

To clarify, when you say "there are a number of queen cells evident. One cell is open with egg laid" do you mean

a) there are some capped queen cells or
b) there are only open queen cells, and one has an egg in

Did you actually see the queen on the inspection? Did you see eggs and young larvae in brood cells?

And when you say "1 frame of stock produced", what do you mean? By "stock" do you mean brood? And do you mean one frame of the frames they have just drawn out? Or that there is only one frame of brood in the hive? What is the situation on the 3 or 4 frames of brood that presumably came with the nuc?

EDIT: Also, please put your location in your profile so we have this for context

 

[mole999]

sorry for the confusion, see my clarifications below.

There is at least one qc open, ALSO there are a number of dead queen cells.

queen is there and looks active.

stock -food pollen and honey

the 6 frames from the nuc are full of brood, larvae and food, drones along the bottom, not a significant amount. They have drawn out on 2.5 of the new frames, 1 of them is full of food.
3 remain untouched

yes they came from NUC

In Ireland

 

[Boston Bees]

sorry for the confusion, see my clarifications below.

There is at least one qc open, ALSO there are a number of dead queen cells.

queen is there and looks active.

stock -food pollen and honey

the 6 frames from the nuc are full of brood, larvae and food, drones along the bottom, not a significant amount. They have drawn out on 2.5 of the new frames, 1 of them is full of food.
3 remain untouched

yes they came from NUC

In Ireland

When you say "dead queen cells", what do you mean? Queen cells can't die - they are just wax

They are thinking about swarming perhaps - who knows. Keep an eye on them and inspect regularly. If there is an egg in a queen cell, inspect again in maybe 5 days. But stop feeding now. They have food. By constantly injecting nectar into the hive you will trigger swarming sooner or later, especially if you do it in the middle of swarm season as we are now.

When you see queen cells with milky liquid (royal jelly) in - THEN you have to split the hive to deal with their swarming intention. Come back if that happens.

 

[enrico]

We need to know what the queen cells look like. Do you mean cups like acorn cups or full blown queen cells?

 

[mole999]

I went back in found 7 queen cells, I vast majority closed. Removed them. I’m confident the queen is laying and will keep an eye out for swarming. Thanks for your help. P

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

I’m confident the queen is laying

did you see the queen?
did you see eggs?

 

[jeff33]

I went back in found 7 queen cells, I vast majority closed. Removed them. I’m confident the queen is laying and will keep an eye out for swarming. Thanks for your help. P

Pointless exercise as they will make more straight away and still swarm. Qcs should not be removed without a proper assessment of the hive and understanding of what is happening.

Bees don't have plenty of space in your hive, they have plenty of frames with foundation which are useless to them. Most beginners (incl myself) will have their 1st nuc swarming because of the lack of drawn frames for them to use. You could put dble brood and 4 supers it would be the same.

I anticipate they're making swarm preps so you will need to make an A/S if more Qcs (cells with royal jelly and a larvae) are made.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

are you a member of an association?
Have you done a course?
Do you have a mentor?

 

[Erichalfbee]

did you see the queen?
did you see eggs?

OP says queen is there and laying well

I went back in found 7 queen cells, I vast majority closed. Removed them. I’m confident the queen is laying and will keep an eye out for swarming. Thanks for your help. P

They are making swarm preps.
Having removed the queen cells the bees are likely to make more starting with three day old larvae which will be capped three days later so they might well be off in four days, well before your next inspection.
Bees don't make queen cells for nothing and knocking them down is pointless

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

OP says queen is there and laying well

OP says they're 'confident' the queen is there - totally different thing my feeling is, either she's gone or is about to

 

[jeff33]

OP says they're 'confident' the queen is there - totally different thing my feeling is, either she's gone or is about to

I would agree and if she has gone the hive may now be hopelessly queenless.

 

[Murox]

I went back in found 7 queen cells, I vast majority closed. Removed them. I’m confident the queen is laying and will keep an eye out for swarming. Thanks for your help. P

Make sure you go back in 2-4 days. Take some pics of any Q cells and any eggs. Do you have a 'bait' hive/spare nucleus box ?

 

[mole999]

did you see the queen?
did you see eggs?

Queen looks strong, plenty of eggs. Only thing I can put the reaction down to is the moving and unsettling of the bees. Took out 7 queen cells. Hope works

 

[Boston Bees]

Queen looks strong, plenty of eggs. Only thing I can put the reaction down to is the moving and unsettling of the bees. Took out 7 queen cells. Hope works

What you can put it down to is that it's swarming season. They have plenty of food, and brood, and have decided to swarm. It's what bees do - there would be no bees if they didn't. They will almost certainly try again, and when they do, you need a plan to deal with them (i.e. an artificial swarm of some kind) - tearing down cells won't work.

 

[Swift Nick]

OP says queen is there and laying well


They are making swarm preps.
Having removed the queen cells the bees are likely to make more starting with three day old larvae which will be capped three days later so they might well be off in four days, well before your next inspection.
Bees don't make queen cells for nothing and knocking them down is pointless

I read this comment and heard this massive penny drop. In previous years of beekeeping, years 2 to 4, I sometimes, when busy, knocked down queen cells to “buy a week”, and then was surprised by midweek swarms. It never occurred to me that the bees could then use older larvae that could be capped 3 days later.
This year I was determined to get the swarming under control, so I got all the kit together, presuming every hive would swarm and did a queen to nuc straight away instead of trying to buy time. This approach has worked really well.
I guess it is obvious the bees will cap a cell in 3 to 4 days from older larvae if you know the lifecycles, but I missed it and have never read it in a book or covered it (that I remember) in any training. So for any new beekeepers (or not so new like me) please take note, it’s a key point.

 

[ericbeaumont]

Hope works

Not really.

You may have bought a nuc that was congested before sale and which had already decided to swarm.

One option: nuc the queen, remove all but one good QC, repeat seven days later and leave well alone for a minimum of three weeks. Alternatively, carry out a standard artificial swarm.

If you want to continue knocking down QCs (and work in opposition to the bees) then try this: alternate foundation frames with brood combs in the middle of the nest. Sometimes this blunt message persuades the colony to change its mind, but if you go back in after a few days and find they're not drawing the foundation, then they mean to swarm.

Bees don't have plenty of space in your hive, they have plenty of frames with foundation which are useless to them.

How did you put the nuc into the hive? Combs in one group and foundation on the flanks? Better option would have been to put one frame of foundation in the midle of the nest, and one or two more a week later as each is drawn. This gives bees work in the warmest part of the nest (35C needed to draw wax) and the queen can lay straight away.

I got a NUC (6 frames) 4 weeks ago, did my first inspection today

Inspections for new beekeepers should be done every seven days.

Been feeding them 2:1 sine they were placed in hive.

Why? The quickest way to switch bees into swarm mode is to congest, and a nuc is easily able to forage for itself unless there's a nectar drought. Do you know if nectar is coming in where you are?

Have you done a course?

Beekeeping is more complex than putting bees in a box and looking now and then; technical and practical skills must be learned, and I get the feeling that you may be working from limited knowledge (or even worse, Facebook knowledge or something another well-meaning beekeeper told you).

Probably too late to join a beginner course; instead, get hold of a Haynes Bee Manual.

 

[drex]

My bees will put up queen cells while still having plenty of room for brood and stores. It is what living things do - reproduce

 

[ForageFlight]

I’m in a dilemma.

I got a NUC (6 frames) 4 weeks ago, did my first inspection today. Been feeding them 2:1 sine they were placed in hive.

queen is laying, sh is clipped, drone cells evident, at least 1frame of stock produced, comb built out on new frames except 3 frames.

there are a number of queen cells evident. One cell is open with egg laid. So have at least 10/15 days. Location near the top of the frame.

There is plenty of space in the hive so a little confused on reason why.
I’m thinking that the queen is not preforming.
Do I:

1) leave alone any let things play out?
2) kill queen cells
3) kill existing queen
4) split the hive (not sure an option with the age of the hive)
4) or other

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

It would have been a good idea to have super ed the hive when transferring the Nuc The free heat from the central of the brood nest easy to occupy the space above. (The chimney affect )You may have to feed to get the bees to draw out the comb.

Does not look like your going to be able to keep them home so go for No 4 is your best bet. Take the queen out on a frame and take a fame of food and place on original stand in either a Nuc box or another hive. Take the original away to another stand Some then would say cull to one queen cell. I often leave more than one queen cell provided they are around the same age. If you leave a queen cell younger than 5 days after say. They could make yet another cast. At 1000 bees per day you have a cast of 5000 bees in 5 days.


How many times have I heard from a newbie that the colony swarmed and the colony lost the virgin queen afterwards ?