Supercedure.

[Nige.Coll]

stick the old queen in a nuc and cover your ass.
bees cannot read and don't give a monkeys what you think is going on.

I know I tried leaving a book open at the entrance and all they did was crap on it.

 

[Excession]

Nope, checked again still one cell, now capped. And queen still in residence and still laying.
She was a very good queen last year, so going to let this happen definitely supercedure sorry to disappoint all of you convinced it is a swarm cell!

(Not sorry)

 

[Excession]

stick the old queen in a nuc and cover your ass.

bees cannot read and don't give a monkeys what you think is going on.



I know I tried leaving a book open at the entrance and all they did was crap on it.

I am making up a nuc this weekend from another colony, I might bank the old queen with them for insurance. (And possibly raise another!)

 

[leonotron]

If it's supercedure, will the old queen keep laying until the new one comes into lay?

I've opened a hive today and found what I think is two supercedure cells. One each on the first and last frames of brood in the hive.

I removed what looked like the younger cell and left one that looks like it's close to being sealed.

 

[beeno]

I am making up a nuc this weekend from another colony, I might bank the old queen with them for insurance. (And possibly raise another!)

If you do that they will make emergency queen cells.

 

[foghornleghorn]

If it's supercedure, will the old queen keep laying until the new one comes into lay?

I've opened a hive today and found what I think is two supercedure cells. One each on the first and last frames of brood in the hive.

I removed what looked like the younger cell and left one that looks like it's close to being sealed.

You could come back and find the old queen gone the next day you visit or two queens could be laying side by side for a while

 

[leonotron]

Gone as in the hive gets rid of her? She's a good layer but I guess her pheromones are reducing?

 

[oliver90owner]

Bees have a survival instinct. If they think (or know) their queen is failing they will replace her. They will not eject that 'still laying' queen until the new queen is proven to be a worker laying queen. Bees are not that stupid.

 

[Teemore]

Marked two supercedure queens on Saturday afternoon. One I knew about and just hadn't gone looking for her so she got marked when i happened to see her. The other was a surprise. 10 days ago I had been looking at a clipped and marked 2014 Queen laying in the hive so I was smiling to myself to see an unmarked, unclipped queen in the colony and no sign of mum! I suspect the two queens had been laying alongside each other for a while as there was no sign of the remains of any queen cells and the hive is full of BIAS and will probably get a second brood box or at least another super for the queen to lay in.
Have had three colonies supercede in the season to date. Two of them have been able to store a good surplus of honey so far (two supers extracted from each and three supers still on each hive) but the third has been a bit of a wash out....

 

[Eyeman]

Marked two supercedure queens on Saturday afternoon

Assuming they are going to supercede during the 'swarming season' doesn't always work out.
How did you manage the one that you new about? Was there only one QC?

 

[Teemore]

I try not to make assumptions but you are correct to intimate that hoping there is going to be supercedure doesn't always work out. This is particularly so when many people have yet to learn the difference between supercedure cells and swarm cells. The terms seem to be incorrectly used for the position of the cells rather than the intention of the colony..... still, I think I learn something new every time I watch a colony of bees.
Where I knew about the supercedure, there were single QCs.
I know my bees and the stages at which I can expect some of them to produce queen cells. The majority have favoured swarming later in the season over the past few years and around half of them didn't swarm in 2013, 2014 and 2015. Other consistent factors include only moving to swarm when they have filled at least a brood box with BIAS and where they have a reserve of stores above the BB. Where I knew colonies were superceding they started this early in the season prior to there being large numbers of Drones around. They were not filling the brood box and they had minimal or no stores above the Brood Box. Consequently I left them to it. I was hopeful that I might see perfect supercedure. I have enough colonies that leaving one or two to their own devices in the interest of seeing whether they superceded or otherwise wasn't going to inconvenience me or neighbours in the vicinity of the apiaries affected.