Hives not accepting queens?

[IndianaHoney]

I have a rather weird problem, that may not be such a problem. I have made a few splits this year. Each split has been given a caged queen, and I left the cap on the queen cage because I supervise all queen releases.

Anyway, many of my splits have refused to accept the queen even after leaving her caged for a week. Some have accepted the queen. What I noticed is that after 4 days I check the cage to see if the bees are biting the cage or feeding the queen. If they are feeding her, I let her out. However, about half of the splits refuse to accept the queen. So I dig into the hive and find a queen cell everytime. These splits did not have queen cells prior to the split, because I check every frame for queen cells when making the splits. And I give them a caged queen when I make the split, I do not wait a day. Oh ya, each time I find a queen cell, the bees are feeding it, and there is a larve present, so its not empty.

These queens are russian, and the hives that I made the splits from are either Carni, or Buckfast (what is called Buckfast anyway).

So each time that I find queen cells, I just take the queen out, and split another hive. But I can't seem to use up all the queens I have, because they keep making their own!

What would you do if this was happening to you? Destory the queen cell, or remove the caged queen and use her somewhere else?

[NeilV]

Idianahoney,

If misery loves company, I'm company. I am having a similar situation introducing Russian queens right now. If anybody has answers, see my thread about Adding Queens to Nucs.

Ndvan

[timgoodin]

I believe there was an article in Bee Culture last year that seemed to indicate that it can be difficult to get some hives to accept Russian Queens. (Example a hive of Italians accepting a Russian Queen). I started a couple of nucs last year and put a very minimal number of nurse bees into the nuc box to attend the queen then added brood as it began to hatch from other hives. Tim

[Michael Bush]

http://www.bushfarms.com/beesfaqs.htm#pushincage
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesdoolittle.htm#ValuableQueen

[IndianaHoney]

Thanks MB, I think I'll use the push in cage from now on. My guess is that by having emerging bees, she will be accepted better?

[Michael Bush]

>My guess is that by having emerging bees, she will be accepted better?

It's a combination of that and that she can lay. A laying queen is always better accepted than a caged one.