new package supercedere

[r allston]

placed new package on 5-22, on 5-31 opened hive to find queen laying and all well except 2 queen cells on bottom of frame 3 cells still open. opened hive today to find queen eggs, brood and capped brood, but 1 capped queen cell on top right 5th frame. my question even though all looks good to me I guess thy dont like the package queen and plan to supercede her?http://i650.photobucket.com/albums/uu227/rallston/DSC_0079-1.jpg

[r allston]

and yes this hive is in about 4" of standing water due to all of the recent rain no ants to worry about though.

[BEES4U]

Nice pond.
What kind of critters live in it?
Queen supercedure is one of the biggest problems in bee management.
Sometimes we blame the queen breeder and the local conditions.
And, the queen breeder blames the new owner.
Sometimes the queen caging crew cages a poor queen and you get stuck with her.
If the bees are h--- bent on superceding you might consider letting them.
I cage out the mated queen onley when I see a good brood pattern
It's more expensive to sell older mated queens.
But, they are worth it for productivity.
The age of the larvae when it is grafted is one of the first things that can cause poor queens.
Instead of getting a queen you get a mesomorph which is between a worker and a queen.
Ernie

[r allston]

I am new to all of this but am wondering if the high rate of supercedure for package bees of late, how much has to do with the marking of the queen? do the bees look at this green dot and say thats the biggest mite I've ever seen shes out!?http://i650.photobucket.com/albums/uu227/rallston/DSC_0082-1.jpg

[tigger]

A few thoughts from a neophite:

Seems to me it's pretty dark in hives when we aren't messing with them. I doubt marking has much, if anything, to do with it.

As much as she may be accepted initially, the queen that comes with a package is foreign to the rest of the hive. Unless she lays like gangbusters (and even then) it's not surprising to me that they would replace her with one they raised.

Further, their "aim" isn't getting their population numerous enough to make surplus honey. It's getting it numerous enough to put up enough stores for the winter, so that, often, they can build up the following spring, and send the queen on her way. If their instincts tell them that raising another queen will better accomplish this, I figure they know best.

[r allston]

I understand that its dark in there but they also reject damaged queens [i.e. broken wings] and from what I understand queen rejection has gone way up since v-mite was introduced. Oh well I'm sure the bees are smarter than me and will soon have a new unmarked queen