# Queen Killed in strong hive.



## RayMarler (Jun 18, 2008)

Don't stress, and check back in a week. You'll probably find one of two things; The queen is OK or they have queen cells. You'll be warming more and more as the spring progresses, the queen, if they off her and start cells, will be 10-12 days to emerging, and another 10-14 days after that for mating flights, so that's 3 weeks or more out from now. I'm betting it'll be fine.


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Sometimes a sudden disturbance will cause them to be overly excited in a fairly strong hive.
Then they will try to protect their queen that might of caused the balling and killing. What you
can do is to allow them to raise a new queen or distribute the hive resources to the other weaker
hives. This will help the weaker hives to grow faster. Another option is to take one weakest hive
to swap the hive position with this strong hive. Then you will have an instant boost in the hive
population absorbing all the foragers from the strong hive to help the weaker hive out. This is call the "fly back" method.
Very helpful if you use it wisely. Since there are no flying drones yet in the too early Spring time, I would not let them raise a new queen. It is like the last week of Jan. here. She might not be well mated even when she make it back from her mating flights. Over here, I keep track of the drone population every year to see if I can make some very early Spring queens. It will be early March to see some good mature drones flying around. It all depends on your local condition!
If this is my situation right now I would use the fly back method and then distribute all the hive resources to the weakest hives. If in the Spring time say the last week of Feb. then I would allow them to make a new queen. Some will use the purple eyes cap drone as an indicator to make some new queens.


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## A.B. (Sep 15, 2016)

Thanks Guys, at the moment I have no option but to let them raise cells as I only have queenless colonies now.
I suppose I can always replace the queens if they aren't performing well later in spring.


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## DavidZ (Apr 9, 2016)

there are several people selling Queens right now. 
here in the usa we have them

just sw you are down under


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

During the early Spring time with limited mated queen I would wait until
the queen graft season to make a hive split. Now we're in the early Autumn but not
quite there yet. I try to make as many mated queen as I possible can to put them in
a queen castle or nuc hives. These will be the spare queens just in case for the early Spring
splits and replacement before any new queens can be made here. Nobody will sell their
mated queen individually that early. You will have 4-6 weeks to get them a mated queen before
they turn into the LWs (laying workers) that you have to deal with. That is why it is so important to have
extra queens on board for the winter and Spring transition as some queens will not make it over the winter.


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## bee keeper chef (Nov 1, 2015)

The good thing I have found about letting a hive requeen its self in a strong hive there are a lot of bees to feed the queen cells I find that I get nice queens. I know you said it is early there but like Ray Marler said you do have a couple of weeks before she will try to go get mated. Good Luck


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## A.B. (Sep 15, 2016)

bee keeper chef said:


> The good thing I have found about letting a hive requeen its self in a strong hive there are a lot of bees to feed the queen cells I find that I get nice queens. I know you said it is early there but like Ray Marler said you do have a couple of weeks before she will try to go get mated. Good Luck


Cheers mate! Fingers crossed


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

In late Jan is when the queen first lay her eggs. So after a month in late Feb. the
bees emerged on their first hatch cycle. Before the queen make the drones, she need to
ensure that the hive population is sufficient enough to carry on their daily activity. If your area
get lots of rains during the early Spring time then the queen and drones will not goto their mating
flights. This will end up not a good laying queen or a drone layer queen later on. The mature drones also
need time to develop their flying ability. I just hope that your weather cooperate and lots of early drones for
your queens. It is all about timing in making these well mated queens. Does your area support them?


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## A.B. (Sep 15, 2016)

beepro said:


> In late Jan is when the queen first lay her eggs. So after a month in late Feb. the
> bees emerged on their first hatch cycle. Before the queen make the drones, she need to
> ensure that the hive population is sufficient enough to carry on their daily activity. If your area
> get lots of rains during the early Spring time then the queen and drones will not goto their mating
> ...


It depends,we have sort of an unpredictable climate here in Tasmania, here's hoping for sunny days.


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Last winter I overwintered 3 virgins.
They did not take their mating flights as a result of the rainy weather through
late Feb. Needless to say they did not make it. In order for the queens and drones to be out
flying the weather needs to be warm and constant. From now on I will wait for more stable
weather before making the queens. Less effort is wasted this way. However, this is a gamble you're
willing to take at this point.


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## Slow Drone (Apr 19, 2014)

Beepro the man is in Australia their seasons are the opposite of ours. I defer to and agree with Ray Marler. I believe you'll be alright!


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

You are right.
I certainly don't know his weather and bee environment.
I can only give my own experiences for him to consider.


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## A.B. (Sep 15, 2016)

Weather is looking O.K. and drones are emerging.
there are queen cells being built and I've even had a go at grafting some young larvae into some old swarm cells(in a nuc) as an experiment and so far they have built out 3 of these out of 5.


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## RayMarler (Jun 18, 2008)

You are doing great, carry on!


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## Nordak (Jun 17, 2016)

A.B. said:


> Weather is looking O.K. and drones are emerging.
> there are queen cells being built and I've even had a go at grafting some young larvae into some old swarm cells(in a nuc) as an experiment and so far they have built out 3 of these out of 5.


Very nice!


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