Beemaster's International Beekeeping Forum
BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => REQUEENING & RAISING NEW QUEENS => Topic started by: Steel Tiger on May 22, 2014, 11:25:12 am
-
I just gave a frame of eggs to a possible queenless hive. If the hive is queenless, how soon would they start building emergency queen cells? I was wondering if they would start right away or wait for the eggs to start hatching.
-
As soon as the eggs hatch at 3 to 4 days unless you have a laying worker.
-
Did you do anything such as tear down the walls of a few cells to encourage them?
Ed
-
Two of the brood frames had about 1/3 cut out of the middle (wonky comb). The bees did nothing to start fixing them. All they've done was move honey up and bring in pollen and nectar.
I pulled one of the cut frames and replaced it with a partly drawn frame full of eggs. I'll be checking Monday for queen cells. If no queen cells by then, I'll take a closer look at the rest of the frames.
-
If there is any larva less than 6 days old (from being laid) they may start right away floating the larva out to where they can start building a vertical cell. How old/dark is the wax? The newer the wax the easier it is for the bees to make the queen cells.
Jim
-
It's brand new wax. The bees in the other hive just started drawing out that frame and it looked like the queen was laying as they worked.
-
In that case they can make queen cells any where they want to.
Jim