queen bee

[gdog]

I checked my hive today and could not find the queen. There are a good number of bees in the hive and they even have capped honey as well as pollen.  I did find several queen cells, most of which have a milky white substance within. Are the remaining bees making a new queen? I did not find and eggs or larva in the hive. Is my hive doomed? 

[backyard warrior]

Be sure that those queen cells dont have eggs in them for sure.  Doesnt sound too good if there isnt any brood in the hive.  Are you sure the new queen didnt already release into the hive???  Lots of times they will hatch out and the workers will start to tare the cells down. Do you have another hive??? If so take a frame of young eggs and install in the hive making sure your queen isnt on the frame if they need a queen they will make one from the frame u give them if they have a queen nothing will happen and they will just hatch out into the hive.  Chris

[gdog]

I have no larva at all. not sure why there are queen cells.

[Sparky]

Sounds like they are replacing her. Are they queen cells or swarm cells ?

[iddee]

If there is no other eggs or larva in the hive, they are neither. They are old queen cups.

My guess is, he missed seeing the other eggs and larva, and they are replacing the queen.

[bee-nuts]

gdog

it is to early for a queen to mate properly in Wisconsin.  I highly doubt you have queen cells with larva in them.  Also as idee says, if there are larva in the queen cells then you would have to have a queen laying eggs in order for them to start a queen cell.  I am guessing you missed eggs and larva.  It would be really early for a supersedure in Wisconsin. 

I do have a few hives rasing drone but those colonies are the biggest ones and the first ones may hatch in the coming week.  You have have a few drone right now but surly not enough for a queen to mate yet.  I think I have seen two queen cups so far.

I would wait a couple days and take another look.

[gdog]

How do you tell a queen cell from a swarm cell? The ones I had looked like a peanut or smaller. I may have missed the queen, I have never personally seen her in a year. Last fall I was able to see a huge amount of larva in the brood frames. This year nothing unless it is still tooo early for the queen to start laying. It has been unusually warm for the past two week, the bees havent been bothering with the syrup ive put out they jsut go about doing their business. Would they still be working as usual if there were no queen or would they be acting differently?  The bees were very calm today had no trouble with them at all. Anyone have any ideas?

Thanks

[iddee]

A queen cell is vertical, all others are horizontal. A swarm cell is a queen cell, just made prior to a swarm. This time of year, if bee-nuts has no drones, you may have very little eggs or larva. Look each frame over carefully. Do nothing but feed and look for at least a week, then look again.

[Michael Bush]

>I did find several queen cells, most of which have a milky white substance within.

Yes they are raising queens.  There are larvae in them or there would not be any royal jelly in them.  Do you have any drones flying?