# Do Bees Ever Move Eggs to Queen Cells



## Vance G (Jan 6, 2011)

Move in a frame with soft light new comb. Then the bees can tear down the cell wall and make a queen cell around the lain egg or larvae. I don't believe they can move them.


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## D Coates (Jan 6, 2006)

A very few people have claimed as such but I've never seen it. It is my belief they do not.


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## TriJim (Mar 11, 2011)

I have seen bees carrying eggs and small larvae in the observation hive. Not sure if they are moving or 'removing' unsuitable eggs. Read that some species of bees will steal an egg from an adjacent hive if they need it to raise a new queen - although I don't think our honeybees can do this. Sounds like an interesting research project.


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## mgolden (Oct 26, 2011)

Just seemed very odd to me that the queenless hive would build queen cells where there was no eggs or larvae. Yet not build queen cells on the frame that had both????????????


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## jmgi (Jan 15, 2009)

Are you saying that there were queen cells where there was no brood, and that even after the queen cells were built there was still no other brood on that frame? If so, then I would say it might be possible that the bees moved them or else the hive was not queenless to start with.


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

Laying workers frequently lay eggs in queen cups. Often, multiple eggs. 

When I set up my cell builders, brood goes over an excluder for 10 days before the graft. When I check the brood on day 9, there are always some cell builders that have a cup with an egg above the excluder.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

Huber went to great lengths to find out if bees move eggs and put bees in positions where they should be desperate to move eggs. They never did. They removed them. They ate them. But they never moved them. 
http://www.bushfarms.com/huber.htm#commonbeesdonot

Laying workers will lay in queen cells and the bees will even feed them and cap them, but they never emerge. They tear them down before they do. Drone laying queens will also lay in queen cells and they will feed them but they tear them down before they emerge. If you look closely you will also see that a typical queen cell, while slightly round, is flat compared to one of these "drone queens" which will have the typical "kix' shape. So the bees know they are drones...

http://www.bushfarms.com/huber.htm#maleeggsinroyalcells
http://www.bushfarms.com/huber.htm#onlymaleeggs


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

mgolden,
Having seen the same thing myself, and in spite of all the naysayers, I say yes! In my case, either an egg or larva was moved to a preexisting insurance cup on another frame.
No question in my mind, and they reared a viable queen.
In addition, have seen hopelessly queenless colonies suddenly have a queen cell. They must have acquired the means elsewhere. (Stealing)
Walt


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## Beeophyte (Oct 17, 2011)

Saw worker carying a white bee sized larva during my last cutout. She was carrying it all over the bee vac cage.

I've seen ants pick up eggs and carry them around but not bees.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>They must have acquired the means elsewhere. (Stealing)

While stealing an egg has never been documented, workers laying viable diploid eggs and the bees raising a queen from those HAS been documented as far back as the 1800s and as recently as 1991

http://www.beesource.com/point-of-v...n-a-strain-of-us-honey-bees-apis-mellifera-l/


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

Am aware of that consideration. Don't remember the numbers, but do remember the odds against that happening were quite high. Your library is impressive.
Walt


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>but do remember the odds against that happening were quite high.

Agreed. But it seems to me that the odds of something happening that has been observed several times before (thelytoky) is a much more likely explanation than something that has never been observed, although many attempts to observe it have been made (moving eggs). I would certainly not depend on either to right a queenless hive.


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

MB,
Can't argue with that logic. But I'm likely the only person on the planet that believes in communication between different colonies. Have seen two different cases were I believe a superfluous Queen in one colony was recruited to move to a queenless one. One of those was a marked Russian. (one of two marked queens in my inventory) The concept of borrowing an egg from another colony does not seem that outrageous to me.
Walt,.. Plan to see you in N'ville.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

mgolden said:


> Just wondering if bees ever move eggs around in the hive?


No, they don't.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

What prevents a laying worker or soon to be laying worker from taking flight and getting inseminated by drones?


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## Dragonfly130 (Dec 12, 2008)

We do know some bee line's have tendencies to exhibit different traits. Perhaps egg or young larvae movement isn't documented because they didn't study a line of bee's that exhibited this trait. This is also why you will get different answers to the same question from different knowledgeable beek's. They will tell you how to best manange their familiar bee lines. 

From personal observation I also say yes it is likely some line's of bee's ( probably having some Russian background) will move egg's or larvae (I believe young larvae as opposed to eggs). I also found it to be common with bee's I had a few years ago(Mutt's w Russian influence), for queen's to move back to the original colony location after being split. 

I've never observed this trait in our standard commercial lines of bee's. 

*Do not count on egg/larvae movement showing up when needed as a normal part of colony management.*


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

More than once, when visiting Dee's bees, I've witnessed an experienced beekeeper freaking out that Dee doesn't want to move a frame of eggs/brood into an obviously queenless colony. As Dee put it in February, "Why should I select against a good backup mechanism?" Dee has demonstrated that her bees are able to produce laying queens from laying workers.
http://www.beesource.com/point-of-v...n-a-strain-of-us-honey-bees-apis-mellifera-l/

deknow


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## Dragonfly130 (Dec 12, 2008)

Thelytoky could certainly account for what I saw. I assumed they were moving egg's or larvae but after reading the article you linked Thelytoky would make more sense. I have a question about it but will start another thread. Don't want to hijack this one.


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## Cleo C. Hogan Jr (Feb 27, 2010)

I learned years ago, to always remember, and never forget, to never say always and never, Especially when discussing living things, both plants and animals. They will prove us wrong. Sometimes you just can't explain why something happened. It is so difficult to control all the variables in an experiment or control group, utilizing living things.

cchoganjr


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## Adam Foster Collins (Nov 4, 2009)

wcubed said:


> MB,
> ...I'm likely the only person on the planet that believes in communication between different colonies....


No you're not. That's a subject I'm really interested in. Not to thread-jack, but just a note to say that I think the question of interaction between colonies (or inter-colony awareness) is an area that could use a lot more investigation. Personally, I wonder if drones have a lot to do with that interaction...

Adam


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Acebird said:


> What prevents a laying worker or soon to be laying worker from taking flight and getting inseminated by drones?


They are physically incapable of doing so. They don't have a spermatheca. The organ in which sperm is stored in a queens' abdomen.

Life is a mystery.


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## buzz abbott (Mar 6, 2012)

"life will find a way" Michael Crichton, Jurassic Park


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## jmgi (Jan 15, 2009)

Acebird, funny you mentioned that because just today I think I was reading ABC and XYZ of Bee Culture and it stated that it has been observed somewhere back in time that drones will occasionally try to mate with workers.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

And Cows will try to mate w/ Cows. And that ain't Bull. But they lack to necassary parts. Which is true of worker bees.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

How would y'all think Ocums Razor would apply to this discussion. "The simplest answer being the most likely correct answer." Or something like that.


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## waynesgarden (Jan 3, 2009)

Beeophyte said:


> Saw worker carying a white bee sized larva during my last cutout. She was carrying it all over the bee vac cage.
> 
> I've seen ants pick up eggs and carry them around but not bees.


I see workers carrying larvae on occasion. I will only assume they are dead, defective or damaged.

Ants always move the eggs, I believe. The queen simply expels lots and lots of eggs without moving around. That's how she can lay far more eggs than her bee counterpart.

Wayne


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## Tnmedic (Mar 22, 2012)

I have a hive that I'm pretty sure is queenless. Most all the cells are full of honey. This is a swarm I got a while back. I don't know how they became queenless, but the fact remains. There were no eggs or larvae in any of the cells. I had to put the swarm in a medium super because all my deeps were full at the time. So I cut down a frame of eggs from another hive and put them in this hive. I checked it today to see if they were making a queen cell. The comb that I put in that was full of eggs is now full of honey/pollen. There are several scattered places through the frames that have larvae in them now. Also there is a queen cell on a different frame and there is a larvae in it. It sure looks to me like they moved the eggs, but I'm a first year Beek. I'm not claiming to know anything.....


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Not trying to be an --- about this, but, Occum's Razor, in my mind anyway, says y'all aren't seeing what you think you are seeing. Where in Nature does it make evolutionary sense for bees to move one egg from another colony, usually a distance away, back tyo the home colony to maybe successfully raise a new queen? Seems like they would have to move many of them to have a chance of success. Not one.

Tnmedic,
Queenless hives often outshine neighboring queenright hives in the gathering of pollen and nectar. They have no brood to attend to, so there are more adults working the fields.


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## millerdrr (Dec 5, 2012)

Sorry for the necro-bump, but I have a bizarre situation. Two weeks ago, I robbed four frames of capped brood, pollen, and honey, and put them in a five-frame nuc. I intended to attempt grafting this year. A few days later, I checked to see if they had any rogue queen cells (they didn't), and I looked for larva in other hives. Unfortunately, for whatever reason I was unable to find appropriate sized larva in any of our other hives. I wrote it off as too late to prevent swarming, and figured I'd just combine the nuc with the first available swarm.

But, today, that nuc had a capped queen cell. I've opened it five or six times in the two weeks looking, and hadn't seen one. I'm almost positive the nuc included no eggs or larva, and even if it did, shouldn't have hatched by now? I'm not so arrogant as to state that I'm incapable of mistakes, but I'm almost 70-80% certain that egg was stolen...

Thoughts?

EDIT: More detail...the nuc was made up sixteen days ago. Two frames came from one colony; two frames came from another. Both donor colony's queen have been spotted since, so I know she wasn't shaken into the nuc. I'll let y'all know if I have a laying queen in there in a few weeks.


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## Joseph Clemens (Feb 12, 2005)

Possibility: Some colonies are known to have more than one queen.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

I have a stupid question. What prevents a worker bee from becoming mated in an emergency? They already have the ability to lay eggs.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

I don't think they give off queen scent, so drones wouldn't be attracted to them. They don't have a spermatheca, where sperm is stored in a queen's abdomen. I don't even know if their tail end would open were a drone interested. It isn't an ingrained behavior, to get mated.


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## Solomon Parker (Dec 21, 2002)

Occam's Razor is not a law, it's a principle. The simplest answer is not always the right one, it just tends to be. But skepticism, there is a law unto itself. I just had an idea: Parker's Principle, the simplest answer is rarely the most satisfying one.

I inspected my mating nucs on Wednesday, and I found several with eggs in queen cells, where none should be. Laying workers? Only ever found one egg at a time. I don't know ultimately what's going on and it's not going to keep me up nights.

I had read Dee Lusby's works on thelytoky with interest, but can't say I've ever experienced it myself. But I rarely find a queenless hive, maybe clean wax is to blame. Or maybe they fix the problem before I can find it. Not going to keep me up nights.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

> What prevents a worker bee from becoming mated in an emergency?

They don't have the instincts to try, so who knows...


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

How long does it take for a colony to "know" it is queenless? And then how long before a colony responds and starts drawing a worker cell down in to an emergency queen cell? Which they usually do to more than one worker cell, making the odds of their picking the correct aged larvae a good choice.

Having thought to ask those questions, why would bees move eggs when they could simply modify a cell occupied by a worker larvae? It doesn't make sense to me that bees would recognize their colonies queenlessness, not do anything about it, such as modify a worker cell, yet go out to another hive, where they would be attacked for entering, steal an egg, not a larvae, take it back home and properly place it orally in a queen cell and raise it up to adulthood some 16 days later?

I'm sorry, too fantastical. I have seen colonies go queenless and never replace the queen, still bringing in nectar and pollen to beat the band. But never the egg moving trick. Until someone can show me that it occurs I'm gonna continue believing it doesn't.


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## kenaikathy (May 10, 2013)

I am sure they do!. I have just read about how they move eggs to a queen cup. But I want to know if you all have seen them move a lot of eggs? I have an observation hive and one whole area was full of eggs a few days ago. They are ALL gone. I have seen them carrying some white things and some chunks of pollen that we fed them. So the question is: What makes them do this? It is possible that they were moved to the other side of some comb they built...or possibly destroyed them.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

You are sure they do what? Move eggs? Remove them to clean out cells? Or what? Do you believe everything you read? Because you shouldn't.
If bees took eggs out of a comb which you saw occupied just yesterday I would think that they were getting rid of them for some rerason. I wouldn't think that they were moving them from one side of the comb to the other.

I used to believe in the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, and Santa Claus. Then I learned the truth. Now I don't.

Maybe I should Delete this Thread from my Subscription List.


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## kenaikathy (May 10, 2013)

Yes. I am sure. At first I just thought I was wrong....but they had built a big lobe of new comb (very white) and I saw her laying and then saw at least 20-30 eggs in a good pattern. Saw them the next day.... I looked every day and then waited a few days and then lifted the cover to see the grubs.....NOTHING....no eggs where they had been and no larvae. And now some of the cells have sugar water.


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## kenaikathy (May 10, 2013)

Just to let you know, I did see the workers running around with some white stuff (thought it might be wax). I agree it seems really fantastic and that is why I did not believe it at first. But then when I paid attention I watched closely where they were laid and they aren't there now.
Why?:
Maybe they don't like the light and we are observing them too much? (Although it doesn't seem to bother them...the queen keeps laying)

Or they finally got a chance to go outside and there is little to no pollen and no flowers yet, and the temperature has been cold....(we are feeding them and giving them last years pollen), but maybe they don't want to have too much brood until they know for sure it is summer (these hives were sent up from the lower 48)

Outside hives are all doing well.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Then they probably ate them. Bees will do that.


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## kenaikathy (May 10, 2013)

*Re: Do Bees Ever Move Eggs?*

Interesting, wonder why they would do that?? Ay ideas?


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## millerdrr (Dec 5, 2012)

*Re: Do Bees Ever Move Eggs?*

Bah...nevermind; nothing groundbreaking to see here.

They still have quite a bit of capped brood, which should have emerged several days ago, or the dead bees should have been dragged out of the cells. There are some dead bees that have accumulated on a towel in front of the hive, but the population hasn't gone down much. More telling, there are now two other decent queen cells very close to the first, midway up the frame. I noticed them yesterday, but I thought they were abandoned from long ago, as the comb is so old it's almost black. I still didn't see a queen, but I'm guessing she has to be in there somewhere. I'm speculating that either the two-queen theory factored in and I shook in the extra, or they quickly raised an emergency queen that I missed, and are now in the process of superceding her. I might be willing to believe they rob a few eggs from another hive, but five hundred might be excessive. 

Well, I wanted to graft about twenty cells, but I suppose I can't complain by getting three decent cells out of my science-fair playtime.


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

wcubed said:


> mgolden,
> Having seen the same thing myself, and in spite of all the naysayers, I say yes!


I agree with Walt on this one or at least that has been my experience.

Danny Unger


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## Kidbeeyoz (May 8, 2013)

I worked at a honeybee factory that also specialised in tourism. We had two observation hives. I remember being told by someone that at one time one of the latter hives became queenless and after several weeks a queen cell suddenly appeared. He, who I believe, reckons that they stole the egg from a nearby hive and built the queen cell from it.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

*Re: Do Bees Ever Move Eggs?*



kenaikathy said:


> Interesting, wonder why they would do that?? Ay ideas?


Lack of protien. Not enuf bees to cover the brood and it got chilled. Some other reason. Those are all I can think of at this time.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

*Re: Do Bees Ever Move Eggs?*

> I remember being told by someone that at one time one of the latter hives became queenless and after several weeks a queen cell suddenly appeared. He, who I believe, reckons that they stole the egg from a nearby hive and built the queen cell from it. 

Most likely it was only queenless long enough to raise a new queen and get her mated, which is long enough for all the brood to emerge. Then the "miraculous appearance" of the new queen is just that she got mated and stopped being a small flighty, fast running, hard to see virgin, and become a large, lumbering, laying queen.

It takes several weeks.

http://bushfarms.com/beesmath.htm

And that is what usually misleads people.


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## Tomkin (Feb 7, 2018)

I had three queen cells on a frame. I cut out one, and the bees culled a second before I got to it. Now it seems they are reusing that cell to make another queen; and they had to of stolen an egg from another colony.

If bees know whether a queen is good before she hatches I doubt they would be confused by a laying worker egg. If they recap the cell I'll cut out the third queen cell to see what hatches.


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## psm1212 (Feb 9, 2016)

Cool seeing Walt's old posts in this thread.


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## Tomkin (Feb 7, 2018)

My colony started another completely new queen cell, no signs of any other eggs, more less laying workers. Crafty little kleptos.


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## Tomkin (Feb 7, 2018)

My bees tore down both new queen cells. So Bush may be right about the laying workers in queen cells, and it takes a couples days after hatching for the bees to figure out gender.


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