This week I went into my hive and was surprised to find two completed queen cells and one queen cup being built. Is there anything I should do at this point? I know it's late for mating a queen.
Do you have a laying Queen in the hive? I have one right now that went queenless And has QCs in it. You may need to do nothing.
Well depending on where you are. I'm in B.C. Canada and may have a similar situation but there's no drones anywhere anymore so if I have a queenless hive-unless I can still buy a mated queen-that hive is basically toast unless I combined it with a good hive.
Don't know about drones. I'm still having trouble seeing the trees for the forest, i.e. though I knew I had a laying queen I never saw her, and I never saw drones in the hive.
Did you see any eggs? Do you have any other hives? Your farther north than me.
I have sealed brood, and some unsealed, but I really didn't see eggs, I'd say we're about to hit the peak of goldenrod bloom.
At this point, I'd let the QC's hatch and check in two weeks to see if she mated and is laying. Hopefully there's still some drones around up north where you are; I suppose so. If she's not laying, you may need to dispatch her and consider combining them with a strong hive. If at anytime you start seeing multiple eggs in cells, you're queenless hive developed a Laying Worker; Watch out for that. If the queens hatch without issue this won't likely happen so long as the reigning queen mates and starts laying, getting brood pheromone going in the hive. However, that seems to be the unknown variable at the moment with you being up in Pennsylvania where it's cooling down. Keep us posted.
Quote from: Mamm7215 on September 17, 2020, 03:38:30 PM
Well depending on where you are. I'm in B.C. Canada and may have a similar situation but there's no drones anywhere anymore so if I have a queenless hive-unless I can still buy a mated queen-that hive is basically toast unless I combined it with a good hive.
Queen suppliers in Hawaii likely have queens available if you are looking to purchase one instead of combining. I mention no names as I haven't purchased from any, but with our tropical weather, they tend to have queens year-round I believe. Heck I just did inspections and I've got hives with lots of capped drones still...and we've still got swarming going on. I've done two swarm removals this past week...
Definitely do nothing. Wait at least 2 weeks as mentioned, I would wait 3 weeks. The first week she is laying, she will probably be laying multiple eggs in cells. I have seen it multiple times in my observation hive. When you inspect just look for larvae and eggs. If you have capped worker cells stop and close it up. What you do not want to see is bullet shaped Capps in worker size cells.
Jim Altmiller
Well at the suggestion of a local beekeeper, I decided to split the hive. The frame with the queen cup and another frame of brood and some empty frames with comb went into the split while the frame with two queen cells stayed with the original hive.
Was there anything in the Cup?
There was a larva.
When a queen cup has a larvae in it it becomes a queen cell.
The next important question is are there drones in any of your hives.
Not that she will mate with them but they let you know that there will be drones in the hives a mile from you.
Jim Altmiller