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Subject: Orange County, NC Beekeepers

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Chronological Thread  
  • From: jacquelynclymore AT yahoo.com <jacquelynclymore AT yahoo.com>
  • To: ra41717 AT gmail.com, cabell.anne AT gmail.com, ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [ocba] late season swarm...
  • Date: Wed, 16 Sep 2015 17:34:04 GMT

Not too late in the season to introduce a new queen?


Sent from my Sprint phone


------ Original message------

From: Randall Austin

Date: Wed, Sep 16, 2015 12:55 PM

To: Anne Cabell;NC Beekeepers Orange County;

Subject:Re: [ocba] late season swarm...


Apologies, my quick response told you what you wanted to know but not what you need to know.

2-1/2 weeks after swarming is too early to see evidence of a new queen.

Bees can swarm after the first queen cell is capped, another week is required for that queen to emerge.
The new virgin takes several days to get in shape before her mating flights.
Mating flights may span about a week.
It takes several days for the mated queen to begin laying.
It takes 3 days for the first tiny tiny eggs to hatch into even tinier larva, which are all difficult to see. Three to five day larvae are big enough to easily see.
The first new brood will be capped 9 after the first eggs are laid.

So if your colony swarmed on August 30th, the virgin queen may have emerged on September 6th.
She may have began began mating flights on or around September 9th.
She may begin laying eggs on or around September 19th or so, maybe earlier, maybe a little later.
You may clearly see new larva on or around September 25th or so.
You may see capped brood on or around September 28th.

All of these dates can move one way or the other depending on when the actual events occurred (capping the queen cell etc.).

Introducing a store-bought queen into a hive with a virgin queen in development will be a waste of your purchase price; the colony will kill her. 

More info on this subject is <here>.

Hope this helps.

Randall


On 9/16/2015 12:10 PM, Randall Austin wrote:
55F9948E.3040108 AT gmail.com" type="cite">
Bailey Bee Supply still has queens for sale.

Randall

On 9/15/2015 9:08 PM, Anne Cabell wrote:
Any queens available for sale?  Mine wasn't nowhere to be seen as of Sunday, 2 weeks after swarm.  I thought I'd try my best to introduce one...

On Wed, Sep 9, 2015 at 6:05 PM, Anne Cabell <cabell.anne AT gmail.com> wrote:
Whoa is me.  Swarm last week.  If I verify the queen is mated and laying, thoughts on whether I should:

1. add frames from other hives (cobbled together from friends) to bolster the population and hope that they make it through the winter? 

2. punt and just start fresh in the spring with a package?

Thanks,
Anne



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