Topic for Wally, and anyone else maintaining survivor bees

[Ron Young]

Ok Wally,

I know that you have the one hive that is over above the garden. I know that this hive has not been treated for mites, and has survived for many years.

1. What is their temperment like, having been around raising their
own queens for many year?

2. How do you manage them when they get "HOT"?

3. Would you ever consider requeening them? (I am 100% sure
I know the answer to this)

Guess you can tell by this thread, My bees are getting to the point that I would consider them to be HOT!

[Wally]

They are docile when the weather is nice. They have a little more temper than the average hive when the weather is not just right. For the survival rate, and the production difference, I would not change them for any amount of money. I have to don my veil with them every 4 to 6 times I go into them. I can still work them without veil and in short sleeves most trips into them.

>>>Would you ever consider requeening them<<<

Sure, I do regularly... From the same hive.
I may consider changing genetics for, say, 25 million. Probably not for any less.

[Ron Young]

i took two stings today, and I had not even as much as removed a lid. Lots of flying activity, and noisy buzz. I walked out to see how they were doing and took a slight sting to the arm and on square on the forhead.

I DO NOT KNOW WHAT THE HECK IS WRONG WITH MY BEES!!!!

[Wally]

You better check for queenlessness. It don't sound like a content hive.

[Ron Young]

The stings came from the hive that had the three supers on it. The other hive seems to have a bit nicer temperment now. I will check on it today, I hope.

[Ron Young]

Wally,

Your knowledge is unreal!! I went into the hive today, and sure enough they were queenless. I can't understand it. This hive in late March had brood, open and capped, in both deep hive bodies and a small crescent inthe super that I left on over the winter. Ther is no sign of a queen at all now.

The other hive however, is queen right. I took two frames of open brood, "eggs", and some capped brood and gave it to the queenless hive.

I hope to find a queen cell by next Saturday. Will that be long enough for them to find an egg, start and cap a queen cell??

I will keep you posted.

You do amaze me with you knowledge!!!

[Wally]

I guess we all have to get lucky now and then.

In 48 hours, they will have started queen cells, but you may or may not recognize them that early. Next Sat. they will be at 12 to 14 days, which means fully drawn and capped.

[Ron Young]

Is that 12-14 days from when the egg was layed?

Ok, now the big question. Should I have recognized this sooner? (With my minimal years of experience)

I feel kind of bad, especially now that I am certified as a beekeeper. I live here and see these bees daily almost. I just thought that they were heavily populated and making a lot of noise.

Education, that is what it is! I still can't believe that a hive that had eggs, open brood, and capped brood in two deeps and one medium on 24-27 frames in late March, is queenless now!!!

If they ended up queenless, having not started and finished a queen cell when they had a chance, will they start one now???? I hope so!!

How long will it be before I will see new bees emerging? How weak will this hive get in the mean-time?

Am I right?
Queen Cell

Egg hatching 3 days
Cell Capped 8 days
Emerges 16 days

Mating Flight, 17-20 days

Laying 21-24 days

New brood hatching 42 + days

[Wally]

Check the frame you added tomorrow, Sat., and tell me what you find. Look good, as they will try to cover queen cells and keep them warm.

[Ron Young]

I think we need a new Topic Header, "Beekeeper Frustrations".

In looking back at my math, I am off by three days, I think. When I gave the two frames of eggs and brood to the queenless hive, I did not take into acount that there were probably three day old eggs on the frame. So, I should have a capped queen cell in five days from the day I gave the frames to them.

Frames with eggs added on Thursday 22nd of May

That would be on Tuesday the 27th of May, this coming week.

A new queen should emerge on Wednesday the 4th or Thursday the 5th of June.

New Queen Laying eggs on Tuesday the 9th or Wednesday the 10th of June

With New Brood emerging on or about July 1.

Anyone wishing to check my figures please chime in.

One more year like this, and I may well be known as a former beekeeper.

[Ron Young]

Ok,

Today is day five from the day I gave the queenless hive two frames of eggs and brood.

I have one queen cell capped. I did see two others started. Assuming that there were eggs on the two frames that were layed the day I gave them to the queenless hive, then this would only be day five for them, three more daysbefore they cap.

Should I rely on one queen cell, or re-queen?

[Wally]

They did not use the eggs you gave them, but larva that had just hatched. The reason for adding eggs is, you can't tell a day old larva from a 4 day larva. They can. They used a larva not more than 3 days old. Add 5 to that, and you have a capped queen cell. It is going fine, just relax.

[Ron Young]

Ok, I guess you have figured it out by now Wally, Relaxing is a bit difficult for me!!

[Wally]

Ron, a friend brought a half gallon of """Spring Water"""" to me the other day. Maybe you ought to give it a try. Mighty relaxing, it is.

[Ron Young]

I bet it is. So they may still be working on additional queen cells? I saw two cups, but did not see anything in them. I did not spend a lot of time looking though. The one queen cell was not very pretty. If weather premits, I will look again on Saturday. That will be 9 days from the day I gave them the frames.

[Ron Young]

Ok,

No additonal queen cells. Just the one that was capped on Tuesday of last week. That queen cell should hatch sometime between Wednesday and Saturday of this week, and should be laying by next Wednesday through Saturday?

I hope that she hatches, mates, and starts laying without getting killed. I have a feeling that I should have a back-up plan.

"BEE'S"

[Ron Young]

I have a fair number of drones around the hive, and inthe grass around it. I am guessing that the queen is or has hatched. I will give her a week and go in and see if I can find any eggs?

[drewgrim]

what do the queen cells look like after the queen hatches? i know she kills the other cells, but how does she rip them open or is there anyway to tell? what happens if you introduce a queen into the hive with queen cells?

i thought that i had a queen in my one hive, but it turns out that she is gone, that explains that swarm...haha. good news is that there are a lot of queen cells. so if my calculations are correct i should have less than 20 days until i see eggs, is that right?