Workers moving eggs?

[Greatbigchicken]

My father-in-law has hurt his back so asked me to take a look at this bees. He hadn't inspected for two weeks and the day before I inspected them they swarmed.
What I found was the marked queen above the excluder and no brood in the brood and a half below although there were a few hatched queen cells and a couple of capped. What do you think has happened? Could the workers have moved eggs below the excluder to enable them to swarm?

 

[pargyle]

My father-in-law has hurt his back so asked me to take a look at this bees. He hadn't inspected for two weeks and the day before I inspected them they swarmed.
What I found was the marked queen above the excluder and no brood in the brood and a half below although there were a few hatched queen cells and a couple of capped. What do you think has happened? Could the workers have moved eggs below the excluder to enable them to swarm?

If you found the marked queen then how come they had swarmed ? It's usually the old queen that takes off with the swarm ... was she wing clipped ? What made you think they had swarmed ?

 

[Dazzabee]

I pondered this possibility myself today.....

I found 2 x supercedure cells next door to one another in the super directly above the 14x12 brood box and the queen excluder. Very small larvae and royal jelly in each but there was no other eggs or brood up there, Just these two. The queen and all other brood/eggs was where it was supposed to be and no other queen cells were present in the hive. Checked the excluder for defects and nothing found. This super is the new one added last weekend so it is only half full. I figured if the queen had got through then she would have filled more than just 2 cells.

Very weird........

 

[Erichalfbee]

Could FiL have stacked the brood shallow on top of the supers while checking the bottom brood box and forgot to place excluder between, allowing queen in? However, that aside, for there to be no brood in brood boxes the queen would have been absent for over three weeks so as you say how are queen cells which were started after she was excluded present?

 

[Greatbigchicken]

If you found the marked queen then how come they had swarmed ? It's usually the old queen that takes off with the swarm ... was she wing clipped ? What made you think they had swarmed ?

The marked queen was unable to leave as she was above the excluder. I know they swarmed as MiL saw them.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

The total lack of brood is the only little mystery IMHO. My thoughts are - Queen got into super somehow, therefore no more laying in BB - Emergency QC's built on the last knockings of eggs, new queen swarmed, possibly still another new queen in brood box.

 

[Goran]

I pondered this possibility myself today.....

I found 2 x supercedure cells next door to one another in the super directly above the 14x12 brood box and the queen excluder. Very small larvae and royal jelly in each but there was no other eggs or brood up there, Just these two. The queen and all other brood/eggs was where it was supposed to be and no other queen cells were present in the hive. Checked the excluder for defects and nothing found. This super is the new one added last weekend so it is only half full. I figured if the queen had got through then she would have filled more than just 2 cells.

Very weird........

As I learned, sometimes workers due to less queen pheromone in supers can "fire" some eggs. which later mainly they clean or maybe some drone grown. I had this season simmilar above excluder 7-8 queen cells with eggs and no other brood or eggs present. I marked their positions and after 7 days when I checked eggs were gone ( not present anymore). So now practically I saw that is most likely the case.
In state of emergency, like I had knowingly laying workers in one hive previous seasons - they pull the queen cells and cap over drone larva ( their surface was smooth, and by looking seems something wrong with them).
Also not rare situation when queenless to start qcells above pollen filled cells ( I had recently in one hive such - some weird swarm and I was expecting such development, and dealt with that properly).

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

I know they swarmed as MiL saw them.

Is MiL a beek? Might it have been an orientation flight?

 

[oliver90owner]

The whole hive organisation, timings, etc. may come out eventually. Might be a few more realistic suggestions instead of 'flying in the dark' guesses.

My guess, at the moment, is that there was more than one super on the hive.

 

[Greatbigchicken]

The whole hive organisation, timings, etc. may come out eventually. Might be a few more realistic suggestions instead of 'flying in the dark' guesses.

My guess, at the moment, is that there was more than one super on the hive.

You are quite correct, there were several supers on top. I was hoping to not go into the whole set up of the hive as quite frankly it was a mess, with missing frames, a mixture sn1 and sn4 frames with random spacing. I think FiL got a little overwhelmed.