# Queen cells in new hive.



## REN (May 7, 2011)

Hi all,

I installed three packages of bees about two weeks ago. I checked the hives a few days later and the queens were out of their cages and looked fine. I checked the hives today and two of the hives looked great. In the third hive, though, there are multiple queen cells. I couldn't locate the installed queen. I called Koenens and they said that they would provide me with a new queen if I wanted one. I'm not sure exactly what to do now though. Could the queen be in the hive and there is a supersedure of the installed queen or do you think she is gone/dead, etc? Could there be a laying worker? How are they building queen cells if the old queen isn't laying? Should I install a new queen and if so, how should I do that? Should I destroy the existing queen cells? Thanks for your advice.

Bob


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## fish_stix (May 17, 2009)

Never, ever destroy queen cells! The bees know what they're doing and they know when they need to replace the queen. When they have cells you cannot introduce a new queen, she'll be killed, usually while still in the cage or shortly after escaping the cage. Wait and see how their new queen performs and then do a queen replacement if she's not a good one. Check some posts on this forum; you'll find that many, if not most, folks who install packages have one or more supersede shortly after starting the hive.


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## REN (May 7, 2011)

I don't see any brood, though. How can they produce a new quality queen without brood?


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

REN said:


> I don't see any brood, though. How can they produce a new quality queen without brood?


If you have a capped queen cell then she is on the way. 

Do you have a capped queen cell?

One future issue with no brood will be by the time the queen is raised, mated and begins to lay your bee population will be on the decline. Not a huge thing this time of year but deadly in the fall as there will not be enough young bees for winter.

Move a frame with eggs and brood in the hive from another hive. Make sure the queen from the other hive is not on the frame you are moving (find her - don't trust that you just don't see her) and don't worry if you move a few nurse bees with the frame. That is if you have the drawn frames to move without hurting the other hive.

At some point you can move nurse bees from the other hive if you have to.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

There are always a lot of possibilities. They could be queenless and are trying to rear queens from a laying worker egg which is virtually sure to fail. They could have a supersedure queen going from some eggs that a failed queen laid. The cheapest insurance that doesn't require you to figure it out, is to give the bees the resources to resolve the issue.

There are few solutions as universal in their application and their success than adding a frame of open brood every week for three weeks. It is a virtual panacea for any queen issues. It gives the bees the pheromones to suppress laying workers. It gives them more workers coming in during a period where there is no laying queen. It does not interfere if there is a virgin queen. You don't end up getting a queen only to have her killed by the virgin queen. It gives them the resources to rear a queen. It is virtually foolproof and does not require finding a queen or seeing eggs. If you have any issue with queenrightness, no brood, worried that there is no queen, this is the simple solution that requires no worrying, no waiting, no hoping. You just give them what they need to resolve the situation. If you have any doubts about the queenrightness of a hive, give them some open brood and sleep well. Repeat once a week for two more weeks if you still aren't sure. By then things will be fine.

If you are afraid of transferring the queen from the queenright hive, because you are not good at finding queens, then shake or brush all the bees off before you give it to them.

If you are concerned about taking eggs from another new package or small colony, keep in mind that bees have little invested in eggs and the queen can lay far more eggs than a small colony can warm, feed and raise. Taking a frame of eggs from a small struggling new hive and swapping it for an empty comb or any drawn comb will have little impact on the donor colony and may save the recipient if they are indeed queenless. If the recipient didn't need a queen it will fill in the gap while the new queen gets mated and not interfere with things.


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## REN (May 7, 2011)

Okay, thanks for the detailed advice! So, you wouldn't recommend getting another Queen from Koenens? Instead, just add brood from one of the other hives right? I was worried about taking brood from another hive that is just starting out...only a few frames of brood, but Michael's answer helped resolve that concern. And yes, I have multiple capped queen cells, but nothing else. Some of the cells are larger than others, but there are at least 3 capped queen cells.


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## REN (May 7, 2011)

REN said:


> >If you wait for the bees to make their own queeen it could take 30 to 40 days before she starts laying eggs which means the bees you got with the package will be between 50 and 60 days old then.
> 
> The problem with this theory is it often takes me a week to FIND a queen. Another week to get it delivered and sometimes that queen takes two weeks to start laying IF she isn't rejected because they already have a virgin running around in the hive. AND she'll probably be genetics from somewhere other than where you live. I'd let them raise their own. QUOTE]
> 
> I just read this post from Michael on another thread. I'm still wondering if it would be better to pick up a new queen from Koenens tomorrow morning and add her to the hive. I can get a new local queen right away, so it seems that if the bees accept her, she would be laying faster than if I wait for a queen to be raised. The bees could kill her, in which case I wouldn't really have lost anything since Koenens is supplying a new queen free of charge. I could always add brood later if that happens. Am I missing something? What would be the drawback to adding a new queen?


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## RayMarler (Jun 18, 2008)

You're not missing anything at all. The downtime and lost production of waiting for them to raise a queen with such dwindling resources would be greatly reduced if you can get a replacement queen. Just go through and destroy ALL queen cells, then introduce the queen in her cage. This is what I would do anyways. You can always make splits later after they've had a chance to build up into something for seeing how they raise queens themselves.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>What would be the drawback to adding a new queen? 

If they have a queen they will kill her.

If they have laying workers they will kill her.

That's the down side.


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## Mud Songs (Sep 30, 2010)

I recently found what I thought was a queen cell, but it was a queen cup. I'm new at this. I took some close up photos of the queen cup:

http://mudsongs.org/possible-swarm-cell/

If that's what you're seeing, then I assume it's nothing to worry about. (I haven't read this entire thread yet.)


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## fish_stix (May 17, 2009)

Mud Songs; very nice detailed pics! :thumbsup:


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