Hi Doug, I also saw that queen cell, but couldn’t zoom in on it. I can zoom in on a stand alone photo with a second click, however a second click with a group of photos just takes me to the next photo. After having another look at all the photos, there appears to be two more. They look more like emergency queen cells to me…Therefore I’m wondering if the queen got accidentally killed during the first inspection. The timing would be correct for that.
PS It looks like the other 2 I saw are the same cell on 2 photos.
oh dear! Now I’m extremely worried… Just to help address this potential problem…
When we did our first inspection just over 2 weeks ago, we were extremely slow and gentle. Basically lifted frames, turned a little so I could take a photo and put back. We didn’t see the queen but we didn’t look very hard, other than a cursory glance as we were more concerned about not agitating the bees and didn’t know how much interference they would cope with. There were also several frames (the original ones) where there were piles of bees on bees so I thought the queen might be under there somewhere.
If the queen is alive in there and there is still an almost untouched frame plus some room around the other two new ones, would swarming still be an issue? My (novice) understanding is that they are likely to swarm if a) there is no queen or b) there is no room. From my very limited experience, I don’t think either of these is the case…
Am I correct in thinking that the another inspection where we smoke the frames to check for brood would be helpful? There was significant brood that I saw in the first inspection but to be honest, I didn’t look for more brood this time as there were so many bees and there has been so much progress on comb building (and the bees were a bit agitated) that I just presumed all was well.
So I suppose the question is - Doug1 - if they are swarm cells…why? Given they’ve only been in the hive for 4 weeks?
Thanks to all of you for your advice, thoughts, guidance xx
oh, one more question… if they are ‘getting ready to swarm’ what is usually the time frame… minutes, days, weeks? and how likely is it that you can diagnose and fix their issues?
Hi Tamara, going by where the queen cells are (not on the sides or bottoms of the frames), I’m leaning towards emergency queen cells. Plus the time line would be correct if the queen got killed or balled & killed during your previous inspection. With that in mind, I would hold off on any inspections during the next two weeks because from my experience, young queens are vulnerable to getting balled & killed during that first few weeks. When you do inspect, make it brief. I go in looking for evidence of a mated queen, then I’m out as soon as I see sealed worker brood. I’ll even stick my neck out to suggest you postpone the local beekeeper doing an inspection until at least 2 weeks after your last inspection. I’d also suggest you cease feeding the bees for the time being.
cheers
PS. I’d suggest you google the two things I mentioned, “emergency queens” & “balling a queen bee”.
Bees do what comes natural to them and I think as a novice you are doing just fine…so I honestly don’t know how you could of avoided this supposed problem unless you had the luxury of an experienced mentor looking over your shoulder all the time.
You are correct that she may be under that pile of bees…and the hive likely is queen right. A queen that hasn’t laid eggs for awhile is harder to spot…lacks the waddle with the swollen abdomen that makes here stick out. Your bee source was a very strong nuc that you placed in your equipment and came ahead a little faster than expected…a hot potato.
