Help Queen is gone

[weedstinger]

Checked hives today. Both have very little honey. No larvae or eggs in one hive. There is a queen cell about midway on one of the frames. Should I requeen or let the queen cell develop? Also should I put the top feeders back on? Thanks

[Wally]

Is there capped brood? If not, the queen cell is a dud. If you have 7 or more frames covered in bees, buy a queen, if there is a good bit of capped cells. If no capped brood and less than 7 frames covered with bees, combine the hive with the stronger hive and feed it.

[donwal]

Instead of using hive top feeders this time of the year this is what I did...

Robbing started at my hives first week of June. Nectar/Honey stores in hives is low. I decided to set-up open feeding stations in several places around in my yard. All robbing at the hive stopped in a couple of days. This video was taken on Saturday, June 11th. First part of the video taken at 10:30 am when I set the jars out. Second part of the video taken at 7:00 pm. I had set out 4 quart jars and 1 1/2 gallon jar. All jars were almost empty, all jars were empty the next morning. Took a peak under one of the hives inner covers today, found the top super all most full and could hardly lift the back of the hive.

https://youtu.be/beXYTiW4ucc

When my hives have lost their queen, I let them raise their own queen. But with only one queen cell you will want to keep an eye on the hive to make sure she emerges, mates properly and makes it back to the hive. If your other hive is doing well, I would take a frame with mostly eggs from that hive and give it to the queenless hive (careful not to move your queen). If you don't see any signs that she is laying within in two to three weeks may want to purchase a mated queen.

Wally's advice, is always the best!

[weedstinger]

Bought a queen today. Went to put her in the hive and the new queen has emerged. What should I do? Put the new queen in anyway?

[Jacobs]

One option would be buy nuc equipment and take a couple of frames of brood/nurse bees and a feed frame, and a couple of misc frames from your good hive and introduce the bought queen to the nuc like you would a package. This would give you a back up queen if your newly emerged one does not get successfully mated. You will need to feed the nuc and take steps to prevent it being robbed out. This was the subject of last night's GCBA speaker.

Another option is to pinch the newly emerged queen and introduce the purchased queen.

Another option is to try and sell the new queen and keep an eye on the newly emerged queen.

You have several options. I am sure someone else can come up with more.