Came across this artificial queen pheromone "bee Boost" in Mann Lake's catalog that you can put in a hive that is supposed to make a queenless hive operate for several days as if the queen was there. I guess for if you are waiting for a queen to arrive when doing splits, etc.
Anybody used this stuff?? and if so, how did it work out??
My next thought is.. if you had a laying worker hive- could you put one of these in to disrupt the cycle of the laying workers and then safely re-queen without them killing her??
(Just a crazy thought I came up with. I don't have a laying worker hive, but this sounds like it would be a lot easier way to fix the issue than shaking out the whole hive...)
Thanks guys for your thoughts!