FULL of bees, FULL of drones, 9 queen cells piping at each other, two have emerged, saw one queen run across a frame, couldnt catch her before it got dark. Ok so I have 4 queenless hives, that I knew I had, and ordered 7 queens today before I looked in the nuc. I have a bunch of double deeps in this yard. I transferred one frame that had ONE ripe cell on it, to a queenless hive. she was making noise so its safe she will emerge and be unmolested. If the bees in there accept her. I use plastic foundation so I cant really cut it up.. or can I with a dremel.. it is ONE frame but it is completely drawn out. Im sure the would fill in the gaps right, or leave holes to pass through. I can probly make some splits and just feed the heck out of them. What are the chances that these unmated queens will successfully mate? What are my options here??
so the queen cells that are talking out loud, can i take a small pick or like that and uncap the cell, scoop up the queen and put her in a wooden style cage with attendants and place her in a queenless hive letting them chew a marshmellow up to get to her? Anyone ever help em hatch out faster?
Why not take the queen cell and put into your queenless hive? I have done this a few times in the last few weeks. No guarantee it will work for you though :-X
they are all on one plastic foundation on both sides, If I scrape it off, im sure it will mess up the cell. If I cut it out with a dremel it might work.
Oh sorry. Didn't even think of plastic foundation.
Catch them as they emerge with queen clips. A queenless hive will accept a virgin without introduction cage. ""direct release""
was transferred one cell last night.. One queen who is fat and swollen definitely mated.. Im pretty sure she got to 4 other cells before I had a chance at lunch to get to them. I transferred the frame with the remaining cells less bees to another queenless hive.. will check this evening if one emerged. Then I will transfer the frame again if one is left.. just playing musical frames. I guess I should have made some push in cages to catch them as they came out.. Then I would have been rockin! still have the 7 queens and a load of double deeps to split! OLE!
ok this is getting strange.. had 4 queenless hives I know 100% were queenless no eggs, no brood. no queen. Can a virgin queen drift to another hive that is queenless and setup shop?
.
I have hundreds of queen cells every summer and still I bye queens from proessionals.
yeah I buy queens too. What I was asking was if a virgin queen leaves a hive on a mating flight, can she drift to a queenless hive that is inches away?