So I find 2 queens and queen cells in a hive!

[joebrown]

I just got back from a 10 day beach vacation and was about to start rearing some queens. I went into the hive to place the Nicot Queen Rearing System into the hive and I noticed a lot of the bees were gone. As I went through the hive I started noticing queen cells that were not there a month ago and seemed to have been recently opened. Then a ran across capped queen cells. I then found 2 queens in the hive. The hive was full of eggs! I do not know where the old queen went, but I guess they swarmed. I made two splits. One split was made with the queen cells and the other was made with one of the queens. I think I may have made a mistake though. One of the queens did not look as big as the other. I am not sure if she is completely mated. We have had some bad weather I believe. I made a split with her. I probably should have made the split with the queen that seemed bigger and mated well. I hope if she is not well mated that she returns to the split instead of the original hive. I placed some obstructions in front of the entrance so maybe she will realize something is different if she goes on another mating flight. Or she could just not be in full egg laying mode yet. Time will tell. I thought it was interesting that I found 2 queens and queen cells in the hive. Normally the queen cells are destroyed. Here are some pictures, what do you all think?



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This Queen does not look as big as the one below!



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[Sparky]

Joe, Your right about the second queen being a bute. I would not worry to much about the first one. When she starts to lay she will plump up.