Hi All...I posted this message on another forum, and I got berated. Mildly.
I'm a new beekeeper, and I got a five frame nuc with a first year queen about 2 months ago. It's grown to fill a deep brood box and a medium super so far. The weather has been extremely cold and wet here, but it's finally warmed up. The hive seems healthy...I've been feeding them a lot and the hive is growing. They've drawn out comb in every frame.
I was inspecting my hive yesterday, and I discovered queen cells at the bottom of 4 frames of the top box. I asked a fellow beekeeper what to do, and he said that it's very likely that the bees were going to swarm. He said it's been happening a lot, even with first year queens. He said I could (or should) remove the queen cells.
So...that's what I did. I then had a beekeeper on the "other" forum say that it was the worst thing I could have done.
I think I understand now that removing queen cells will not prevent a swarm.
Do you have any other thoughts or advice about this issue?
Thank you. You all seem like a much friendlier group.
Yeah, you don't want to remove queen cells because by the time they are capped, your queen may have already left with a swarm. So you could now be queenless. But you know that now. :-D :evil:
So wait a week and then look for eggs to make sure you still have a queen. If not, you will need to start looking for one, or a frame of eggs from a neighbor beekeeper, so they can make a new queen.
If you are going to ask for beekeeping advice, it would help if you went into your profile and added your location because the advice will depend on where you live.
Oh.... welcome to the forum. :-D Yes, it's a friendly and very informative place.
Do you remember if they were capped?
And if you find eggs ---- and they were indeed about to swarm---find the queen and split the hive
And always remember, you will never prevent all hives from swarming. If you can develop a method to prevent swarming you will be an instant millionaire. A lot of smart people have been trying to prevent swarming for many many years. There are a lot of methods to discourage it though. However, if the methods fail you can catch the swarm and enjoy another hive!!
welcome to the fourm,next time that happens to you ,take the old queen with a couple cap brood and honey frames and place it in a nuc.that will make the hive think they swarmed and they will have the queen cells to make their queen.i hope it works out for you . ...schawee
Thanks everyone. I appreciate the advice. I will complete my profile.
Part of the problem is that some books still recommend this and a lot of them used to. So you pick that information up. I've heard some of the "bee scientists" say things at a beginners meeting like "yea, I was in my hive this morning and had to take out the queen cells because they were trying to swarm", and I'm thinking beginners are the worst people to hear this. They will start removing every queen cell they see, capped or not, supersedure or swarm... and they will quickly end up with a queenless hive. I have never found it useful to remove swarm cells, and even less useful to remove a supersedure cell, but it's even worse to try if you don't know that if they are capped they probably already swarmed and if there is only a few, it's probably a supersedure etc.
So don't beat yourself up. There are reasons you thought you should remove the queen cells. And now you know better. :)