I'll try to explain as best I can with this one. I'm new to beekeeping. :)
On Sunday we installed our first two packages of bees. It went well. We are using frame style trough feeders (sits in the deep just like a frame) and I believe it holds about a gallon of syrup. We floated a stick in the 'trough' to keep the bees from drowning.
Since Sunday each hive has used about a 1/2 gallon of syrup. We went this morning to check on the syrup level and refill and to just check the hive out.
Both hives seem very healthy and the bees are definately busy, but not really leaving the hive yet. The temp has been sometimes in the low 70's during the day and at times down to nearly freezing at night.
The bees were filling the drawn comb with the syrup, but we didn't notice that the queen had been laying yet. Is that normal? Should the queen have started to lay after three days or does she need more time to settle in to her new home?
Does any of this make any sense? :-D Thanks in advance!
Also, I should add that there isn't much going on in nature in the area surrounding the hives yet. There are a few dandelions, but most of the trees are just starting to bud out.
Welcome, fellow Wisconsinite!! Are you in NW WI with not much going on? There is a boatload blooming here in central WI...
As for the queen, there's another thread here about queens. Apparently some can take more than 2 weeks to get laying. If my memory is right, I think my 2 package queens were laying within the week (maybe even 3 days) when I first installed last year.
Best of wishes and luck to you!
I'm about an hour east of Mpls/St. Paul. The little town where we have the hives located is in a pretty deep valley. I think it is kind of a mini-climate in some sense. At work (Mpls), the crabapples are in full bloom. The ones on the property where the hives are located have just started to bud out. I've seen some dandelions and little purple flowers, but that is about it so far.
That is reassuring that it sometimes takes longer for the queen to get laying. I'm going to check again on Saturday morning and see how they're doing then.
Eggs are very hard to see. Especially on fresh whitish comb. If they are packing syrup in all drawn cells the queen cant lay in them. By Saturday I would not be surprised for you to see some larva. Use a magnifying glass to look in cells for eggs in empty cells if you dont see them with you naked eye. I would not worry for about two weeks.
Things alway bloom a week or two early in the city cause of the thermal effect. My crab apple looked like they were going to open in the next day or two yesterday and im not much north of your line.
Sounds good, I'll check on Saturday (fingers crossed).
Usually a good queen starts laying pretty quickly but I have seen queens in packages that took two weeks or even a few days past two weeks. Frustrating, but that's the way it goes sometimes.
Here is the latest...
It has been 8 days since we introduced the packages and queens to their new home.
They were busy Friday and Sunday bringing in pollen, but Saturday was a rain out.
We checked both hives this morning. My stepdad is pretty sure his hive is queenless. He searched the entire thing frame by frame and can't find a single sign of her. The bees have a bunch of the comb filled with syrup, but nothing capped.
Also, both hives were extremely ornery this morning.
On my hive we found the queen right away. She looks healthy, but again no sign of her laying yet.
We found a queen cell on the bottom of the frame nearest the entrance on my hive too. I scraped it off for now. There was very little pollen anywhere in the comb.
Do you suppose the cell I found was a 'supersedure' cell because the bees aren't happy with her not laying?
Also, there were two frames on the end opposite the entrance that the bees have not even touched yet. Not a single bee on either of them.
Any and all input welcome!
tell your stepdad to give it a little more time. sometimes they take time to get to laying. not seeing them does not mean they are not there.
i don't scrape queen cells. sometimes they mean nothing. other times, the bees are going to change queens and if you remove the queen cells, you can end up queenless. that's ok if you catch it right away and want to buy another....
if you queen is not laying, what you found is probably a queen cup and they do that all the time.
Quote from: kathyp on April 26, 2010, 05:35:02 PM
tell your stepdad to give it a little more time. sometimes they take time to get to laying. not seeing them does not mean they are not there.
i don't scrape queen cells. sometimes they mean nothing. other times, the bees are going to change queens and if you remove the queen cells, you can end up queenless. that's ok if you catch it right away and want to buy another....
if you queen is not laying, what you found is probably a queen cup and they do that all the time.
If they change queens, what happens to the old one? Will they swarm with the new queen and leave?
Also, what is the purpose of the queen cup? Is this the same thing as a queen cell?
queen cups are like practice queen cells that are not capped and have nothing in them. if they supersede the old queen, she'll be killed.