I have a mystery question.
After the big freeze, as soon as it warmed up enough, I went through my hives. They were thriving! The deep freeze did not seem to bother them except for one thing that has me puzzled.
Late last fall just before the temperature dropped, I made sure all was prepared for winter to the best of my ability. All had marked queens. Some red, some green, and some blue. (I try and follow the year queen color most of the time. Now, after the big freeze, I had trouble finding some of these queens. Even though I had plenty of eggs, larva, and brood, not to mention VERY strong with bees!
After looking more closely on next inspection I found most of them. The ones that were hard to find were unmarked. Now I know they did not swarm this past winter and did not have time to swarm after the big freeze before I had a chance to go deep into them. ( First warm enough day to really explore) Plus this is the best shape my bees have ever been in, coming out of winter! Most every hive has several frames of capped brood, eggs, and larva. Plus bees galore. I have found only one queen cell. Now what happened to the marked queens? 😂 lol.
Could it be that there were possibly two queens in sone of these hives going into winter with the unmarked queens going unnoticed, and the bees knocked off the old queens sometime between late fall and late winter? I have heard of hives with two queens. Any ideas?