Found a wild queen today.

[.30WCF]

Ok, a little swarm, but nonetheless, for all intents and purposes, probably not enough to mess with this late in the year.



I have a queenless hive with 20+ queen cells that I was planning on whittling down this weekend. I could pinch them all and introduce her.

I could try to let a cup of bees fill a box.

I could let her be.

I could split a hive.

Right now I have her in a clip in the bottom of this box because if I let her out she flys away.

I clipped her off the wall and put them all in the box. She flew out of the clip when I let her out and flew in circles around me. She landed on the wall, took off again, I lost her for a few minutes, then I saw her hit the landing board and go inside. I closed them up and moved them 25? and set them on a block.
I went to Walmart and when I got back they were all back on the side of the barn again. I clipped her off the wall again and put the clip in the box to stay until I can get a introduction frame.


I?m limited on supplies right now, but can hit a store tomorrow or make something.
Presently, that box has one empty frame and one drawn frame.

What ya think?


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[.30WCF]

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[.30WCF]

Those bees wouldn?t fill one frame alone.


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[TheHoneyPump]

I think you have a queen and a few bees.  I think the queen is also likely a virgin queen.
I think you treat the situation like you have a virgin queen in a clip .... ignoring the few bees and ignoring the equipment.  You have a VQ, nothing more.  Dont get your hopes up. 

[.30WCF]

So what does one do with a virgin queen?


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[Mamm7215]

You could try grabbing a frame of brood and shake some more bees into it, see if they stick - if you have resources to spare...

[Ben Framed]

You could try grabbing a frame of brood and shake some more bees into it, see if they stick - if you have resources to spare...

Yes, you can even place this in a quick, homemade, makeshift one frame mating nuc of cardboard if necessary, being you are low on equipment, buying time for real equipment. Make sure it is covered in case of rain.  (Just a reminder, in beekeeping it is a good idea to have extra equipment on hand at all times).

[TheHoneyPump]

So what does one do with a virgin queen?


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First off, do not put her in a hive or go pulling resources to make up a nuc special for her.  Do not spend resources on her until she is a laying queen.
https://www.mannlakeltd.com/mini-mating-nucs

If you do not need another hive or a spare queen, just pinch her and carryon like you never found them in the first place.
If you need or want a spare queen, put her in one of these with those few bees.  Go back in 12 days to see if she is laying or lost. Once she is laying, then decide what you want to do - ensuring that meets your overall beekeeping goals.  For example; if you are already out of equipment the last thing you want to be doing at this point is starting up another colony.  If you existing hive(s) have queens that are going into their 3rd winter, use this extra to requeen one of them.

[Ben Framed]

So what does one do with a virgin queen?


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First off, do not put her in a hive or go pulling resources to make up a nuc special for her.  Do not spend resources on her until she is a laying queen.
https://www.mannlakeltd.com/mini-mating-nucs

If you do not need another hive or a spare queen, just pinch her and carryon like you never found them in the first place.
If you need or want a spare queen, put her in one of these with those few bees.  Go back in 12 days to see if she is laying or lost. Once she is laying, then decide what you want to do - ensuring that meets your overall beekeeping goals.  For example; if you are already out of equipment the last thing you want to be doing at this point is starting up another colony.  If you existing hive(s) have queens that are going into their 3rd winter, use this extra to requeen one of them.

Mr HoneyPump, I did not know you could add a virgin queen to an existing hive, even a small one with an existing queen?  Will the hive not ball her being they already have a laying queen? If not does this mean the virgin will return mated and we will have two laying queens in the same hive?

[TheHoneyPump]

I do not follow what you are thinking or asking there Ben.
I am clearly saying either pinch her and forget about it or put her in an mini mating nuc with the bees she came with, the bees as found on the wall. Only after she is a proven laying queen shall she be of any value to the OP.  I am also saying to not bother even trying if OP is already out of equipment and does not have an existing plan of expanding the apiary.

As for introducing virgin queens to new bees. I do that all summer long, in the mating yards. However I feel that topic would be a separate extended discussion, beyond the scope of this thread.  Perhaps best as topic to startup under the ReQueening and Raising Queens section.

[.30WCF]

I didn?t want to go too in-depth with the back story, but a little more info might help.
We are assuming she is not mated. I don?t know if she is or not. I?ll try to get a better picture later. I don?t know how to tell for sure, but she is long.

A friend called me and said he had a swarm in his tree in the front yard. It?s a ball of bees as big as your head, he says.
8 days later I get time to go look. They were all there that morning, but by the afternoon when I got there, I found a scant cup of bees. I shook them into a nuc, didn?t see a queen. I looked a few times over Friday-Monday with no luck spotting a queen.

I needed the drawn frames I had in the nuc to convert a 3 box high nuc over to a 10 frame with a super.

So I dumped the Bees out on the barn wall and took the frames, switched my hive over, and went to work for the day.

After work, I was about to give them a pot full of soapy water when I spotted her in the group.

Was she there all along?

Did she just show up when she saw some lone bees hanging out?

Was she the mated queen that initiated the swarm, but never found a new home?

Was she a virgin that left with the main swarm but stayed in the tree when the rest left?


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[Ben Framed]

> If you need or want a spare queen, put her in one of these with those few bees.  Go back in 12 days to see if she is laying or lost. Once she is laying, then decide what you want to do.

Okey Doke. I understand now. I did not know you were referring to a mini mating nuc.  I should have first opened the link. My misunderstandings, I thought you were referring to placing her a small established hive. Lol  thanks Mr HP. I thought I was on the verge of learning a new trick!! 😁😁😁

[van from Arkansas]

WCF: more questions than answers.  I?ll add another possibility, an abscond.  If there is a flow in your area, then ignore this text, but if you are in a dearth, swarms are most likely absconds this time of year.  I am talking about the original swarm in neighbors tree, an abscond most likely IF in a dearth.

Virgin or mated queen?  Put her in a nuc as suggested, give some food, frames if available and time will tell.  For a virgin, that queen has a lot of bees with her.  I am betting she is mated, but what do I know?

Cheers

[.30WCF]

Well, for giggles, I stole a couple frames of brood and all the bees on those frames from a queen right hive, and put the in a queen cage. I stuffed the exit hole full of marshmallows.
I wired the entrance of the hive shut.
Tomorrow I might go to another hive and steal a frame or two depending on how they look when I open them.
Then I?ll move them away for a week.
Yes, I know, this picture of a queen?s butt does nothing for identifying if she?s mated, but that?s all you get through wire.



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[TheHoneyPump]

The butt picture is fine 3030.  It is near impossible to tell the difference between a slimmed down flying mated queen or a virgin queen anyways.  Indicators are a paint mark, of course, and the size of the cluster of bees flying with her.  My observations are virgins typically go with tennis and softball size clusters in multicast swarm situation.  Mated go with volleyball and basket ball size clusters in primary swarm situation.   There is a third scenario, a large cluster with multiple queens in it when all the VQ's leave on the same day in the same hour.
Hence, my suggesting that what you found is a virgin. From the picture of the few bees on the wall.  Since you screened them in, keep them screen.  If you have eggs in there in 7 days, she is a mated queen.  If you have no eggs in 7 days, she is a virgin.  In either case remove the screen in a week and let the bees to bee things. 7 to 10 days after taking the screen off check again for stability and progress.

[van from Arkansas]

HP, just a note.  I have had queens hatch, then get mated and laying in four days.  Now understand 4 days is my record.  Yes, I agree with your 7 day observations.

[TheHoneyPump]

Just to clarify.  Saying if want to know if she is prior mated or not - to keep screened in, no one flies, for 4 to 7 days.  If there are eggs after 7 days, and she has not left the box because of the screens ... there would be your answer as to whether she is prior mated or not.  If no eggs after 7 days then she is virgin. Remove the screens and let her fly to mate ... while hoping she doesn't get lost and does come back to the same box.

[.30WCF]

I presently have her in a queen frame. That means there is no access to the comb. If I added bees and brood from a queen right hive, and she only had a handful of her own bees, don?t I need to let the other bees accept her first or or is she safe to release into the general population and keep the entrance closed? There is more transplant bees than her bees.


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[.30WCF]

I don?t mean to ignore input, but am reacting with what is readily available. I should get some mating nucs and plenty of extra frames to keep on hand. I have foundation frames in the building, but since this is the first year, I don?t have spare drawn frames.


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[.30WCF]

Recap/Update
That little swarm I got from a friends pear tree a few weeks ago, I couldnt find a queen for a week, dumped out on the side of the barn, found the queen a day later when I was about to give them a soapy bath, flew from the nuc box twice and had to recollect her, then I moved them back to my house.

What you don?t know is once I got them home, I tried to mark the queen. As soon as I got her out of the cage she flew away again. I shrugged my shoulders, walked over to the queenless hive and took out one of the two frames that had capped queen cells. I put an undrawn frame back in the queenless hive and the queen cell frame in the nuc.

Two days later I found her again. She was in the grass underneath the hive next to the nuc.



I picked her up, marked her, and opened the nuc and just tossed her in on top of the queen cells.

Today I looked inside and she was still there. Laying like crazy.


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[van from Arkansas]

That queen should get a gold star for persistence.  Good going WCF.  That is quite the story with a totally cool ending.