Piping queen comunicating about swarming?

[JoeMcc]

I went out to a hive last night and heard the queen piping like mad. So I tore into it. Sure enough there are swarm cells. So, do queens pipe back and forth to communicate when to swarm? I'm thinking that the old queen will leave when the capped queens pipe back to avoid confrontation. Am I right?

JoeMcc

[denny]

There's a little something about piping on this webpage...
http://www.kentbee.com:80/swarm/swarming.html

Scroll down to section titled "Timetable for parent hive or nest"

You can click on the "S" icon on the webpage within these paragraphs to hear an audio file of queens piping....


Newly emerged virgin queens seek each other out and fight to the death. They also attempt to bite into still sealed cells to sting the occupant. They signal their presence to each other by making a sound called 'piping'.

They make the sound by pressing themselves against the comb and vibrating their flight muscles without moving their wings. Other queens respond, including those still in their cells which make a lower pitched sound called 'quacking'. If you hear these sounds from one of your hives, it is likely the prime swarm has gone and issue of a cast is imminent.

[JoeMcc]

There's a little something about piping on this webpage...
http://www.kentbee.com:80/swarm/swarming.html

Scroll down to section titled "Timetable for parent hive or nest"

You can click on the "S" icon on the webpage within these paragraphs to hear an audio file of queens piping....

Interesting....

The piping was being done by the mother who had not left the hive yet. The queen cells had only queen pupae. Wondering if she was waiting for some "Quacking" so she would know the age of the pupae. I know if i would have to fight to death and I heard the enemy quacking... I would flee too!

:)

JoeMcc

[Tom G. Laury]

The old timers would walk the sets of bees in the evening during swarm season listening for piping and tooting, marking lids.
Next day they came in and cut or used cells for nucs, splits, etc.
The cells were mature & ready to go.

[acb's]

If you'd like to see a queen piping, check out The "Piping Queens After a Swarm" video I took last year in a hive right after it put out a small swarm I managed to catch. The quacking queen was silent as the piper approached and stopped to pipe on the cell she was in. I'd call that survival, but you can draw your own conclusions.

http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=acbees&p=r

Arvin

[JoeMcc]

If you'd like to see a queen piping, check out The "Piping Queens After a Swarm" video I took last year in a hive right after it put out a small swarm I managed to catch. The quacking queen was silent as the piper approached and stopped to pipe on the cell she was in. I'd call that survival, but you can draw your own conclusions.

http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=acbees&p=r

Arvin

Great video! I watched that a while back. That's where I learned the term piping.

JoeMcc