Queens seem to take a long time to hatch.

[jd101k2000]

Yesterday I hived a swarm headed by two virgin queens. I know that there were two because I heard them both piping in the swarm.

They had come from a queenless split that I made 12 days earlier. That covered three 14x12 frames in a poly brood bode.

Today I checked the queenless split as there had obviously been other queen cells that I had missed.

Found the two empty queen cells and found several others still full. Reduced the 'live' queen cells down to one.

Only two days earlier, I had looked at those queen cells and they did not appear mature. (There was no darkening of the end.) But at that stage they had already been sealed for 10 days. I had thought that they must be dud.

That would mean that from egg to hatching was at least 18 days, possibly 20.

Does anyone have a plausible explanation?

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

Warder bees?

 

[oliver90owner]

Hatched? Eggs hatch after three days. Imagos emerge after pupation.

 

[jd101k2000]

As you correctly point out, I should have used the term 'emerged'.

I had considered 'Warder bees', but the cells did not appear to be ripe. The end was still quite pointed and had not darkened.

I also dismissed 'warder bees' as there was no mated queen present (waiting for her own swarm) so these were the first to emerge. I also know that these were the oldest QCs present as I did this split in the presence of a bee inspector.

Are there any other reasonable explanations?

 

[ellypatt]

(what are warder bees, please?)

 

[jd101k2000]

(what are warder bees, please?)

My understanding (which may not be complete) is that when the old queen is ready to leave and there is bad weather the workers 'imprison' the virgins in their queen cells.

This is to prevent the new queens from coming out and there being all out war between the old queen and the new queens.

Once the main swarm has left the warders let out the new queens to either head their own cast swarms or battle to the death with the other emerged queens or kill in their cells the un-emerged queens.

There may be a fuller explanation.

I also understand that this is why, when there are lots of nearly emerged queens and the bee keeper does and inspection the warders get distracted and all the virgins emerge.

There is a good booklet about this: http://www.wbka.com/pdf/a012queencells.pdf

 

[ellypatt]

Interesting, thank you!

 

[MuswellMetro]

yep it is a funny year, had reports of similar 21 day and 23day queens on the parent side of an AS splits

Warder Bees: wonder if it is that the workers have not thined down the wax of the queen cells so the brown coccon is not showing rather just keep her in

 

[Finman]

.
That long hatching time is not possible.

.

 

[Finman]

.
That long hatching time is not possible, 18-20 days

.

 

[MuswellMetro]

yes, finman, i tend to agree with you and have never heard of it being that long before but i am getting reports of capped QC 20 days old (temperatures have been low at 12-14c daytime) emerging day 21 and 23

i dont understand how either!

 

[jd101k2000]

I take it that it is just a mystery.

I double-checked the time-line.
30/April Created new hive. The inspector saw the twin queen cells on the bottom of the frame. Very distinctive. So they should be at least 8 days old by then.

11 May Cells have not been opened - perhaps they are 'dud'.
12 May Swarm - first good day for ages
13 May Checked cells - twins were open.

I think that my favourite suggestion is the one that the workers had not thinned the capping to keep the new queens locked up.

 

[Finman]

capped QC 20 days old (temperatures have been low at 12-14c daytime) emerging day 21 and 23

i dont understand how either!

Once I have engaged queen cells in an upper hive box, and bees had abandoned the box. It took 3 extra days that queens emerged.

Normal procedure is that when I move one day old larvae to the queen cells in Sunday afternoon, the queens start to emerge 12 days later in Thursday evening.

When I got those 3 days too old queens, I killed them. I did not wait to see, what they are.

Swarm cells? Yes, hive makes swarming cells which have different age. Some are 2 weeks old and some 1 week old

Some queen cells emerge never if the pupa or larva is dead (rotten).
.
.

 

[drstitson]

"the cells did not appear to be ripe. The end was still quite pointed and had not darkened."

as per MM - the cells don't magically change, they are just inert wax after all. the queen inside can't do it as she is inside.
The warder bees thin down the cap to produce the flattened brown appearance you allude to.

 

[oliver90owner]

More likely they had emerged and the cells closed again? After eleven days, I would not be just leaving them as possible dud - I would be checking. I would be wanting to know what was going on and if there was another queen loose in the hive, etc, etc.

 

[Finman]

I think that my favourite suggestion is the one that the workers had not thinned the capping to keep the new queens locked up.

When you put queen cells each into gage, no one thin their heads and still queens emerge. No problem.


.

 

[bontbee]

As an aside, I was removing surplus Q cells yesterday and, in one, the queen was upside down - head up. I've never seen that before - has anyone else?

 

[Finman]

As an aside, I was removing surplus Q cells yesterday and, in one, the queen was upside down - head up. I've never seen that before - has anyone else?

If the Queen returns into the cell, it is so

 

[bontbee]

Sorry, I wasn't very clear in my comment/question - the queen pupa was upside down....

 

[MuswellMetro]

ok, it is not my hive so have to go on what is said, but this is an expereinced beekeeper with a dozen or more hives but this is the wording of the email i recived on a single hive in his garden

Anyway, this hive had capped queen cells in it on the 13th of April. I managed to find the queen and removed her into a demaree. On Sunday the 20th I knocked down queen cells in the old box - down to two. On the 21st the demarree swarmed (old queen) and she was caught with the bees and I dismantled the hive and reset everything as a classic Pagden AS. I put a QE under the new brood plusold queen(for about five days) and when I looked on Monday 5th May (after catching a swarm on a neighbour's garage roof that came from the old box) the queen was still where she should have been in thenewbox and they were now drawing out the foundation and I had to add a third super as two were full with the second starting to be capped off.

So, today [edit 9th May].the old box swarmed again This evening I went though it and found four emerged QCs and two still to pop. One virgin I squashed and the other I left. Why I don’t know - there was hardly a cup of bees in there (swarm the size of a rugby ball, apparently.) What I don’t understand is the timetable:

The old queen was removed from the old brood box on Sunday 13th of April. That was 26 days ago!

ok, i have no idea what the timetable of events could be, views please