I got out the green paint today. I remember what Robo taught at BeeFest 2018 how to paint the queens, and I got three, one I couldn't find.
My Qs are all physically small and scamper quickly. I'm not sure why; they were started in a box that was as loaded with bees as it could be, and they were on a flow, and had plenty of stores anyway. The Q-cells I thought were pretty big.
Two of these have been laying for three weeks, one has just started maybe Wednesday.
Will they keep growing? If so, for how long? Or did I somehow raise some mini-Qs?
Matt: My Qs are all physically small and scamper quickly.
Some queens are naturally what I call SHY. They hide under bees and run a lot from frame to frame, hide under burr comb making finding difficult. However I have veteran queens that casually stroll about the frames without a care in the world as I hold the frames and watch in amazement. Some queens are shy almost appear frightened of light whereas some are calmed by light. I have seen both.
Upon hatching queens can vary in size considerably. I have seen queens hatch that were not much bigger than a worker, a cull to me and queens so big upon hatching one would think they were already bred.
I have some three year old queens that appear a bit smaller this year compared to their previous years. Also I notice some of my 3 year old queens appear darker as they age.
So to your specific question of do queens grow bigger????? After hatching, feeding a few days, and breeding MOST, not all, queens do get bigger compared to the Virgin she once was.. Queens do vary in size upon hatching, generally larger is better IMHO.
Mr Van, do you color mark your queens?
Phillip
Her abdomen grows and shrinks with the stage of lay she is in.
X2
Usually your virgin queen abdomens are much smaller. That is how you usually can tell if a queen is mated or not. Actually it how developed her ovaries are. Once she mates, her ovaries develop more and then they enlarge. I suspect this design enables her to fly stronger during her maiden flight.
When the bees are getting ready to swarm, they will put the queen on a diet and make her lose weight so that she can fly again.
Jim Altmiller
Quote from: Ben Framed on April 14, 2019, 12:36:08 AM
Mr Van, do you color mark your queens?
Phillip
Mr. Ben, Phil: I seldom mark a queen. No need to as my breeder queens are Cordovan and as a hobbyist, I don?t run many hives, less than twenty. Cordovan is simply an Italian bee with a gene or genes for light coloring, void of black.
The Cordovan genetic factors [genotype] are not defined at this point. I have mapped as far north as Ohio and South to Florida. If any Cordovan bees exists in Canada, I am unaware but this is not saying much, what do I know about 🇨🇦 except for some of the best syrup on the planet.
Quote from: van from Arkansas on April 14, 2019, 03:34:35 PM
Quote from: Ben Framed on April 14, 2019, 12:36:08 AM
Mr Van, do you color mark your queens?
Phillip
Mr. Ben, Phil: I seldom mark a queen. No need to as my breeder queens are Cordovan and as a hobbyist, I don?t run many hives, less than twenty. Cordovan is simply an Italian bee with a gene or genes for light coloring, void of black.
The Cordovan genetic factors [genotype] are not defined at this point. I have mapped as far north as Ohio and South to Florida. If any Cordovan bees exists in Canada, I am unaware but this is not saying much, what do I know about 🇨🇦 except for some of the best syrup on the planet.
I had trouble seeing my queens at first. I had a cutout queen in particular that was a runner and hider as you described in your first post. I decided to start marking after a hard time spotting her. The next time after marking, she was still hard to find, she ole girl was hiding on the inside wall of the bottom box. Had I not marked her, I might have missed seeing her once again. I have decided to mark all queens in the future not only for (finding) purposes, but for age identification, and swarmed away queens as well. In other words, if a queen happens to slip and swarm away and is superseded, I should know by recognizing the new as being an unmarked queen. Now there is always the chance that all the paint could come off of a marked queen?
As others have said, the queen not only can continue to grow, she can shrink depending on how much she is laying.