I installed a new package on April 9th. 3 days later I had to release the queen. I have checked them once a week or so since but havent been able to find the queen at all. Today I spent quite a bit of time examining them. They are bring in a lot of pollen, but there is no brood at all. One frame had 4 queen cells on it. I removed one and opend it up and it had larva in it. Could a worker have laid in the queen cells? If so could they make their own queen or would they be all drones? Should I remove all the queen cells and get a new caged queen? This is the only hive I have and I dont have any frames of brood i can add to it. I am very disappointed because I figured it was about time for the population of the hive to start qoing up, instead of going down. Any advice would be much appreciated.
Let them raise a queen themselves, should work out fine. Already capped queen cells should be hatching in 8 days or so. a week to two weeks and she'll be laying.
I have similar problem. Installed Russian package April 10th. 1 week later cage empty- assumed queen released. However just checked hive and see no capped brood! Couldn't find the queen either. I started with new Pierco frames which are being drawn out nicely- lots of activity bringin in pollen etc .- but no capped brood yet. thought i imagined larvae but i think it was optical illusion. Could wait 3 more days to see if get capped brood but bee pop will be going down. Any advice?
Not finding a queen is a pretty comon thing with new beeks, I hardly ever find a queen unless by accident. If they have brand new foundation , they can take a bit longer to start to take off. They need to pull that wax first. Give it a bit more, there's no real rush , you can always order a new queen. And get them up and running pretty quick. I thnk its rare when a queen actually doesn't make it, or leaves.