Newbie Queen Cell Error Help!

[knotty]

Hi Folks,

Please rescue my from my self inflicted newbie error!

I'm a new beek and managed to overwinter my first nuc (now a full national hive).

Last weekend I found 3x queen cells . As they were towards the corners of the frames and I had 7 frames caped brood, a frame of eggs & "fair amount" of bees my thinking was swarm control. My queen in this hive is not marked and i have difficulty finding her. I attempted a split by making up a new nuc by taking out a capped queen cell, a frame of capped brood and shook in some bees from above the queen excluder as I could not find the queen. I replaced frames in the original hive with new foundation at the edges. My error is that I left the original hive in place and put the new nuc a few yards away.

Today (1 week later) my hive inspection reveals 4 x new capped queen cells and the bees are only covering the old frames I have 3 supers on this hive, the first two full of bees. Any ideas as to how to deal with the QC appreciated.
Have they already swarmed? I can't see any "taken down cells" and there still appear to be a fair amount of bees (although not on the new foundation) and two supers full of nectar. Perhaps I should do another split but move the original hive (which is what I should have done last time!).

Thanks for your help beeks.

 

[oliver90owner]

Had you, like all new beeks should, written down, on a large sheet of paper, several possible scenarios you would have likely easily found the error of some and the drawbacks of others, leaving fewer practical choices. That is the way I did it in my early days.

That said, you now have a problem. First, supercedure or swarm? Only 3 cells and you don't give too many clues as to where. There are four corners on each of eleven or twelve frames.

Capped cells usually means she has gone or is going very shortly, if it is a swarming situation.

Take 2 capped cells as you don't know whether they are both good. Remember the queen has likely already gone at this stage, but may still be there.

You don't say what you did with the other Q/cells last week.

The first question would be was there eggs present. If so good queen cells can be produced for at least another 3, probably 4, days, so the other Q/cells could be destroyed with impunity. If no eggs, leave one (preferably uncapped) Q/cell.

You could then add bees to the split (being very sure the queen was not in there) and leave the main hive for another day (next step after thinking about things).

At that point you would not have made anything worse than it might be.

By now I would think it certain she has gone if these were swarm cells (I'm still not convinced of that).

My error is that I left the original hive in place and put the new nuc a few yards away.

Not necessarily so! Where do you think all the returning foragers (if still a full hive) were going to fit in that nuc box?

Simple question is: is there any eggs now? If there are, she did not leave and therefore supercedure, not swarming.

and there still appear to be a fair amount of bees

House bees are hatching all the time.

If you have lost a lot of your bees, watch that the collected honey does not granulate (as a further problem) if it is OSR derived.

You can reduce these cells to the best, as the other (in the nuc) should be emerging any time now.

Not knowing the timescale, I cannot give a time to do it, but just prior to expected emergence is best as you can see if the cells are 'ripe'.

Another split might be a good idea, if enough bees, depending on you future aspirations regarding colony numbers.

Lots of options, but I have given only a guess from a distance and may haver missed some simple options, but hope it helps.

RAB

As an addition: 7 frames of capped brood and a frame of eggs is what you said?

That would mean about another 2 or 3 of open brood, so your hive seemed to be very overcrowded on a single brood!

 

[knotty]

Thanks for your considered reply.
I'm off to bother my bees for eggs (or no eggs!) and scratch my head. I am now a man with a plan, or several plans actually depending on what I find.
Thanks again.

 

[Midland Beek]

Mark your queens.

I think the failing with your nuc was that it needs to contain the youngest of bees ... bees which nurse brood and not bees you find in the supers. But you did what you did, and if the nuc was provisioned with both honey and pollen it might work.

But ... you have still got a colony that wants to swarm and the only way of really sorting that out is to create an artificial swarm around the queen. Putting the artificial swarm on the site where the stock was has the effect of bleeding a lot of bees from your stock to the 'swarm'.