# Why would workers ball young queen in a nuke?



## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

Yesterday while checking for signs of egg laying I found young queen on interior side of brood chamber. No sign found. They appeared to be balling her and where fanitical about staying in ball even though she could get away if I poked ball apart with fingers. Ball would split into parts and act almost like miniature swarms. Bees in close proximity appeared to be producing the collection signal. I could also hear a lot of "zeep-zeep" sounds coming from ball. Are they preparing to swarm?


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

It's one of the oddities of "beehavior". Seems like an inspection when a new queen is just getting established can, on occasion, trigger an event like this and the reason most experienced beekeepers choose to leave newly introduced queens alone for a couple of weeks to get established. If you are sure it is a viable, young queen I would suggest caging, and reintroducing her if she hasn't been too badly mauled. However, if she appears to be an older queen it may be part of an orderly supercedure.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

Queen should have been freshly mated about 1 week ago and was reared by same colony.


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## Phoebee (Jan 29, 2014)

I just ran a formic acid fumigation in which the paper I was following said that in their early tests with straight 50% FA the queens were balled about 25% of the time. They added some Honey Bee Healthy to the mix and the balling rate dropped to around 4-5% They also recommended spraying the brood frames with 1:1 sugar water and HBH to prevent balling during FA fumigation.

Maybe this is a good reason to have a spray bottle of 1:1 with HBH handy? Possibly a quick spray will interrupt whatever is setting off balling, likely some smell that they interpret as a foriegn queen?


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## ddb123 (Jun 20, 2012)

This occurred in two nucs I started this spring. I put the queens in cages with honey comb plug and within 24 hours the queens were released and no longer being balled.


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## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

Had the same thing happen last year one time, I had to cage the queen overnight. She's still going but she'll never fly again as her wings got shredded sometime after being uncaged. She was fine the first few days and laying well, a week later, shredded wings slightly, a week after that, not much left but she overwintered and has a very strong hive now.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

This happened in a hive of ours that appears to have swarmed in the middle to late part of August. When we saw queen cells we pulled out and came back looking for eggs when the calendar said to. I found a small patch of eggs, but saw queen cells on the next frame so I pulled it out and looked as well. I saw a lump of bees on the comb and thought "that looks odd". I lightly blew on them and they opened up revealing a queen underneath. She kind of took off running, the bees gave chase, one tried to sting her as she ran by and missed. I snagged her and caged her. When I put her on the top bars the bees couldn't have cared less about her. Not really knowing the next step, I popped the cage open and she walked down towards the top of a frame. They resumed the same behavior. Before I closed it up, I popped open some capped honey and lightly drizzled some honey on the ball of bees.

Came back a few days later and every available worker sized cell in the hive has an egg in it. She sure didn't appear to have been a virgin, she looked as big as any queen I've seen in my limited experience. There were still some capped queen cells in the hive after she had it laid up. I broken them off and opened them up. One was a dead larva and one was either empty or it had been emptied out in some way that wasn't obvious from the outside.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

jwcarlson said:


> This happened in a hive of ours that appears to have swarmed in the middle to late part of August. When we saw queen cells we pulled out and came back looking for eggs when the calendar said to. I found a small patch of eggs, but saw queen cells on the next frame so I pulled it out and looked as well. I saw a lump of bees on the comb and thought "that looks odd". I lightly blew on them and they opened up revealing a queen underneath. She kind of took off running, the bees gave chase, one tried to sting her as she ran by and missed. I snagged her and caged her. When I put her on the top bars the bees couldn't have cared less about her. Not really knowing the next step, I popped the cage open and she walked down towards the top of a frame. They resumed the same behavior. Before I closed it up, I popped open some capped honey and lightly drizzled some honey on the ball of bees.
> 
> Came back a few days later and every available worker sized cell in the hive has an egg in it. She sure didn't appear to have been a virgin, she looked as big as any queen I've seen in my limited experience. There were still some capped queen cells in the hive after she had it laid up. I broken them off and opened them up. One was a dead larva and one was either empty or it had been emptied out in some way that wasn't obvious from the outside.


Your observations closest to mine.

Two weak colonies set to produce queens on same day, one source of observations noted yesterday, still have queens not yet in lay. Today with second look; both queens with relatively small abdomens and they are both the most active bees on the comb. Balling occurs in both but often occurs some distance from queen location. Neither queen has been damaged. Is possible the pheromone produced to attract drones also stimulates the "balling" behavior of the workers.


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## kilocharlie (Dec 27, 2010)

Balling behavior is the opposite of acceptance.

One of the things beekeepers do in manipulating bees is to constantly put new queens on old comb, instead of letting bees swarm and make new comb. This can confuse things a bit - fooling bees with smells that have gotten built into the wax.

I've recommended the Laidlaw queen introduction cage several times before, and I'm making a run of 100 more for next year. The theory is that the cage protects the queen from balling attacks while she begins laying eggs. Laying eggs brings up her production of queen substances (including pheromones), which brings about acceptance by queenless bees, unless they are laying workers. 

BeePro of Sacramento, Ca., came up with adding a mated queen to a frame of capped brood under a cage of screen or hardware cloth when laying workers are present. She generally out-lives the laying workers, saving the hive.

Phoebee - That's a good trick you pass along - confuse the smell before they attack with a sprayer of syrup + HBH. Thank you.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

Please read details of my post to keep responses appropriate to situation at hand. Queens reared in colonies they are to head. Still both present. Balling behavior still ongoing although queen not always in the ball. No brood evident. We are roughly two weeks past when queens should have been in lay. One shows damage to extremity of wing. At this point both nukes are going to be considered a bust and reunited with a stronger colony.

Could queen productivity be promoted by placing a frame of young brood into brood area?


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

I don't understand this situation. If they are past their laying/mating period then won't they become a drone layer queen later on? If the wing is damaged then the chance of a mating flight is close to nil. No wonder there is no brood egg in there. Does she look mated at all? Yes, if the queen is mated then putting a frame of young brood will help to get her laying.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

beepro said:


> I don't understand this situation. If they are past their laying/mating period then won't they become a drone layer queen later on? If the wing is damaged then the chance of a mating flight is close to nil. No wonder there is no brood egg in there. Does she look mated at all? Yes, if the queen is mated then putting a frame of young brood will help to get her laying.


Appropriate time for nuptial flights occurred during good weather well before damage to one queens wing. I do not know how to discriminate between virgin and mated queens unless returning from nuptial flight. I will see if young brood does the trick.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

After three weeks, balling still occurs for one nuc. Queen of that nuc does not appear damaged. No brood of any sort present.


Queen of other colony can not be found but we did find 8 queen cells with all but one sealed. Two were sacrificed to confirm presence of larvae/pupae. Those cells should represent something that was produced after queens being balled should have been in lay. In addition to queen cells, there were capped drone brood scattered about in worker cells. I hope they do not attempt to rear queens from drone larvae. Did this queen lay a few good eggs before being killed?

A single frame of eggs / very young larvae was added to each in an effort to get workers back into royal jelly making mode.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

Hypothesis starting to form on this balling behavior. Colonies doing it have a deficit of nurse bees and the pheromone / hormone mix needed to sustain a queen. The deficit is not an absolute number of bees, rather it is a ratio. This is caused by a prolonged period of greatly reduced brood rearing since both colonies reared queen for second time with major infusion of new workers. Average worker age in these colonies are much older than in queen right colonies of same apiary as now evident by many with tattered wings and near hairlessness. The pheromone / hormone changes associated with laying workers are starting to kick in. When a proper queen comes in she has a much stronger pheromone mix. Since the workers have so little brood they are switching into swarming mode actually inside the hive. Colony is not going through complete mental switch to produce a swarm and simply restrains queen without getting her conditioned for coming into lay.

Two ways might override this. First is by introducing a lot of very young brood to force pheromone / hormone switch into one conducive for supporting a laying queen. This being attempted by introducing brood 2 days ago. Second couple be to simply shake all bees of comb to form an artificial swarm to force a reboot of all bees thinking they are in a new hive making so more will switch back into nurse bee mode. I might play with this next year with the nucs that fail to produce a laying queen in first go and ball later reared queens.


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

centrarchid said:


> Please read details of my post to keep responses appropriate to situation at hand.
> 
> Could queen productivity be promoted by placing a frame of young brood into brood area?


If you think this thread is off subject - well, you aint seen nothin' yet.

It never hurts to add brood. But this late in the season I MIGHT replace a queen that is laying a bad pattern in an otherwise healthy ballanced hive. But other than that Iwould shake them out and/or combine most any hive with queen or population demographic issues - I don't think there is time for them to gain ballance before winter.

The question of why may be interesting, but with every passkng day the choice of good options becomes more and more limited. Just my personal opinion though.


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## johng (Nov 24, 2009)

It can happen especially with virgins, newly mated or newly introduced queens. When you find this happening it is a perfect time to use a push in queen cage for three or four days. It is often times better to leave hives alone that are in the process of making a new queen or have been recently requeened. Or atleast doing minimal inspections.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

David LaFerney said:


> If you think this thread is off subject - well, you aint seen nothin' yet.
> 
> It never hurts to add brood. But this late in the season I MIGHT replace a queen that is laying a bad pattern in an otherwise healthy ballanced hive. But other than that Iwould shake them out and/or combine most any hive with queen or population demographic issues - I don't think there is time for them to gain ballance before winter.
> 
> The question of why may be interesting, but with every passkng day the choice of good options becomes more and more limited. Just my personal opinion though.


I am good on the number of strong hives to overwinter. Intent is to explore how queen rearing process has gone awry and how it might be corrected. Nucs in question will either be destroyed or if queen-rightness realized quickly overwintered above stronger colonies. I do see the balance issue as major.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

Colony where queen has been balled every time I checked for last 2 weeks has now stopped. Two days ago a frame of very young brood was added that greatly changed colony disposition. Queen calmer and abdomen showing signs of distension. Workers orient on her but do not try to hang on. 

Balling behavior as noted I think is different than that associated with queens released from cage.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

Queen referred above now in lay and filling out brood comb very well. She will need to be swapped out early next year owing to wing damage. Remaining colony that re-queened itself from a very young queen now has a new queen that should be ready for mating flights in next day or so. Very young worker brood will be added today to prevent balling of her when she starts giving off stronger queen pheromones. Both colonies have worker demographics skewed towards very old bees although newly queenright colony should start to recover from that in less than two weeks. Latter colony will be infused with emerging brood from strong colonies to get them balanced out for wintering. Should have no problem getting energy reserves (honey) and pollen stored for winter.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

Third colony with balling problem was provided a frame of very young brood yesterday. Tomorrow colony will be checked for balling status and few days later for eggs. The balling appears to start about time queen should take mating flights. I wander if queens are able to break ball easily enough to get out and mate. What is really interesting that colonies that ball generally have multiple balls at any given moment although the largest is on the queen. Drone number has taken a nose dive so queen may have trouble getting her quota of dates.


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

centrarchid said:


> I wander if queens are able to break ball easily enough to get out and mate.


No, this is impossible when the intention is to kill her. I have seen this happened so many times in my hives. The queens
ended up dead. I cannot save any of them. The 3rd day is when her hormones, smell changes to see if she can dominate
this hive or not. Perhaps there are LWs inside to prevent this change from happening. It happened to one of my hives in my 2 months effort to
re-queen a hive.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

From what I have seen the ball of bees is not trying to kill her, at least not intentionally. The interactions with her are very similar with what you see in a swarm where bees hang on to queen and each other. The differences are duration and size of the ball. The swarm is usually a day or two while the balls in hive last multiple days to two weeks, The same grappling typical of a swarm when carried out for longer duration causes damage. Also the ball moves, not fast but it moves. The most plausible mechanism for killing is food deprivation but queen has at least intermittent contact with comb and I am not at this time able to say workers in ball will not feed her if she requests it.

I am of the opinion this is not about domination, rather it is about hormone balance on the worker side of equation that complicates reactions to queen pheromones whether she is in lay or not.

Balling may play itself out differently with different hives / situations. Next year this will be explored more thoroughly to see if I can get the balls organized with intent to kill queen.

Has anyone seen a video of workers balling a queen? If balling ongoing today with this third queen, then we will try to film it.


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## AR Beekeeper (Sep 25, 2008)

I have seen the bees ball a laying queen to stop her from laying eggs when they were in a starvation situation. When they were fed they released the queen and allowed her to start laying again. I have seen them ball virgins to keep them from fighting other virgins, and they will keep them balled until they decide which virgin they will allow to mate. They will keep them balled until the new laying queen has larvae in the cells. I have seen them kill balled queens by stinging them, and I have read that they will kill them by generating heat within the ball which causes death to the queen.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

Heat production I think is going on and likely promotes pheromones released by workers indicating location of queen. At this point I am not ready to say they are motivated to cause harm or exercise a choice.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

De-balling third colony a fail. They already committed to rearing new queens. That unit will be combined with another hive. This will be revisited next year.


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## kilocharlie (Dec 27, 2010)

Another hypothesis - in line with yours, somewhat - the older bees may have been right on the verge of going Laying Worker, with their ovaries beginning to develop, possibly due to low queen pheromone production, or perhaps due to reduced sensitivity to normal pheromone production due to exposure to pesticides or other chemical, or perhaps both or neither. Laying workers have been known to attack queens.

The introduction of young, open brood seems to have worked, and is in keeping with Beepro's technique of making a cage over a frame of brood to introduce a queen.

Ideas?


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

kilocharlie said:


> Another hypothesis - in line with yours, somewhat - the older bees may have been right on the verge of going Laying Worker, with their ovaries beginning to develop, possibly due to low queen pheromone production, or perhaps due to reduced sensitivity to normal pheromone production due to exposure to pesticides or other chemical, or perhaps both or neither. Laying workers have been known to attack queens.
> 
> The introduction of young, open brood seems to have worked, and is in keeping with Beepro's technique of making a cage over a frame of brood to introduce a queen.
> 
> Ideas?


Somehow the following plays a role in the balling as well.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12955229


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## Phoebee (Jan 29, 2014)

centrarchid said:


> Somehow the following plays a role in the balling as well.
> 
> http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12955229


I wonder, if you look with a magnifying glass, are the anarchic workers wearing Guy Fawkes masks? 

On the news lately, I can spot some anarchists quite easily.


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## beeware10 (Jul 25, 2010)

one reason for bees balling the queen is caused by the beekeeper opening the hive too soon with a young queen. experienced beekeepers leave alone for a few weeks.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

beeware10 said:


> one reason for bees balling the queen is caused by the beekeeper opening the hive too soon with a young queen. experienced beekeepers leave alone for a few weeks.



I expect more thought to be put into replies than that. My intent was to explore a biological mechanism, not tickle the fancy of a smarty-pants.


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## beeware10 (Jul 25, 2010)

the fact that you saw it after opening the hive should have been your first clue. just basic beekeeping. many on here have the same problem with package bees. they look for a queen soon after the queen is released and wonder why the queen is killed. read a basic book or follow the queen breeders instructions.


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

I don't think it was a smarty pants answer....the OP asked if the queen being balled was an indication that they were preparing to swarm....the answer is no, what you observed was most likely a result of you opening the hive too soon.

I do think there is some aspect of "loving her to death"....and I wonder if in the restricted space between combs offers her some refuge, and by removing combs a 2 dimensional ring transforms into a 3 dimensional ball that the queen won't survive.

This is probably also related to behavior seen introducing a queen....the bees would kill her if they could, but since they can't because of the cage, they will feed and care for her through the cage.

Deknow


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

Reading through this, I can't help but picture a blind man trying to figure out what kind of dog is standing in front of him with his walking stick.

From his perspective, he is just trying to look at the dog. From the dogs perspective, someone is whacking him with a stick.

The blind man therefore observes that all dogs either run away or attack when you look at them closely.

Methinks the observer effect is in full force.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

deknow said:


> I don't think it was a smarty pants answer....the OP asked if the queen being balled was an indication that they were preparing to swarm....the answer is no, what you observed was most likely a result of you opening the hive too soon.


I agree, this is pretty much exactly what I said in post #2.......except I got a pass and didnt get called a "smarty pants".


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## Santa Caras (Aug 14, 2013)

centrarchid said:


> I expect more thought to be put into replies than that. My intent was to explore a biological mechanism, not tickle the fancy of a smarty-pants.


Tsk Tsk....If you dont like or agree with an answer, it's best to ignore and keep going. Calling people names here is frowned upon. Heck, calling people names is frowned upon period.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

I am the OP. Queens in question reared by colonies doing the balling which means they are not introduced and comparisons as done with introduced queens may not be best. Observations intensive to explore how re-queening process goes awry when worker force goes for extended period without colony being queen-right. Such does occur with newbies and old salts alike.

Read thread in it entirety before whipping out the trolling gear.


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## Lburou (May 13, 2012)

centrarchid said:


> I expect more thought to be put into replies than that. My intent was to explore a biological mechanism, not tickle the fancy of a smarty-pants.


The 'thought' requirement goes both ways......Sometimes workers *protect* a queen by balling. Re: post #27, I'd be careful ascribing qualities of the capensis bee to mellifera bees, they have quite different traits relating to the ability of a capensis worker to lay a fertilized egg without mating.


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

I would have thought that the procedures you followed with these queens and NUCS would have been described in much more detail if the goal was to solicit thorough answers to your question. 
The responses given are a direct result of your lack of describing the situation in detail.
Odd as it may seem to you many of these responses should prove valuable to your situation, especially the responses that call attention to a very basic and long standing queen introduction technique - leave the colony alone for a couple of weeks after introduction. 
Something you did not do. why not?
If the intent was to explore a biological mechanism, why wasn't it done through a observation window/hive of some sort?


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

Errrr, if the queen was being balled in a lethal manner when the hive IS NOT being opened by the beekeeper, one would expect to find a dead queen out front or on the bottom board.....certainly not alive in the hive waiting to be balled the moment the beekeeper pulls combs.

The fact that you keep seeing queens being balled when you keep opening the hives is an indication that any balling that is happening when you do not have the hive open is not lethal to the queens (if it is happening at all).

I often break the rules and "peek" in on a young queen too early, but I am willing to take the chance and I know it can be risky (it makes sense under some circumstances, but not if the queen in question is of great value to you).

What advice or behavioral information are you basing the assumption (that your queens should not be balled by your doing what you are doing under normal circumstances) upon? Who has suggested or advised that opening the hive at this point is safe and won't lead to queens being balled?

Many here have offered you good advice and answers to your questions. It seems to me that you are 8 sitting that there is a complicated reason for these queens being balled.....I for one (and I think others agree but I won't speak for them) see your observations as normal bee behavior....and any good queen rearing advice would advise you not to do what you are do8ng because what you have experienced can happen.

Deknow


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

The part of the process that went awry is the opening of the hives.

Requeening techniques are well known. A large push in cage is near 100% effective, and is what anyone would use with an especially valuable queen.

Read or watch videos by Mike Palmer or other breeders that do things on a large enough scale and with enough thought and experimentation that they don't do things (like peek early) that hinder success.


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## centrarchid (Jun 13, 2014)

Lburou said:


> The 'thought' requirement goes both ways......Sometimes workers *protect* a queen by balling. Re: post #27, I'd be careful ascribing qualities of the capensis bee to mellifera bees, they have quite different traits relating to the ability of a capensis worker to lay a fertilized egg without mating.


To get passed all the ruffling of feathers, I apologize for omission of details.

The behavior I saw might be an indication that some of the genetic background / mechanism operating in _M. capensis_ might manifest itself as what appears to be balling behavior. Balls formed are 3-dimensional. Also worth noting, balls could form rapidly on to bees dislodged from a larger ball. I could also hear / feel the zeep-zeep sound normally associated with virgin queens but I do not think it always came from the queen. Is it possible workers can or do produce the sound as a more rapid method for indicating the queens location. The sound must be energetically demanding owing to the volume and frequency of its production.


My pursuit of this is as much academic as anything. This not a regular occurrence for me, but one can easily make the phenomenon manifest by simply having older bees in a nuc that has not been queen-right for an extended period of time. If this is not the appropriate forum for trying to develop greater understanding of western honey bee biology relating to queen rearing, then can someone point me in that direction?


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

The point is that the 3D balling behavior/structure can't happen if the queen is between combs...there is not room for bees to surround her 360 degrees between combs. This balling behavior is more of a doughnut behavior (mmmmmm doughnuts) when it happens between combs
It seems to me that either the balling behavior isn't happening when you aren't pulling combs, or if it does, something (perhaps the lack of space) is keeping the workers from killing the queen when the hive isn't opened (otherwise you would find dead queens instead of live queens being balled when you open the hive).

More to the point, what you are observing is exactly what one would expect to see. It is 3 aptly the reason it is not recommended to open hives with new or newly introduced queens.


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