queen still in cage

[tbb39]

I made a split Sunday with capped brood and a frame of honey, now its Friday and the bees still have not released the queen. should pull the bottom cork off or wait until they do it. the cage is surrounded with bees so it hard to tell her condition.

[jpitz31]

Go to the store and buy yourself a small bag of marshmallows. Take a small knife and dig out the cork. Place a small piece of marshmallow in the hole and place the queen cage back in the hive and leave it undistributed for another week.

In a weeks time the queen should be accepted by the hive and released.

Thanks

Joe

[Countryboy]

After 5 days, the bees have had plenty of time to accept the queen. I'd just open up the cage and do a direct release. It helps to shake off the bulk of the bees first before trying to open the cage - less chance of pinching one and getting stung.

(What do you mean by bottom cork? You did remove the cork covering the candy end when you installed the queen cage, didn't you?)

BTW, bees will NOT remove a cork in a queen cage, so you should never wait on the bees to remove the cork.

[BEES4U]

I have seen quite a few packages where the bees chewed out the cork when it was placed sideways in a Calif. Mini cage!
Ernie

[tbb39]

im going to check today and see how fare they ate down on the candy. how long should i wait until i do a direct release.

[BEES4U]

Sometimes the candy can be on the dry side.
You could run a nail down the center of the candy so that there is a tunnel for the bees to use to widen and release the queen.
Ernie

[bnatural]

You could run a nail down the center of the candy so that there is a tunnel for the bees to use to widen and release the queen.
Ernie

That's what I've always done, when I introduce a queen cage. I can only remember a couple of times, when the bees did not release the queen (accepted) by the time I checked several days later.

Bill

[MapMan]

Oops - you should have removed the cork when placing the cage... making certain that there was enough candy in the hole so the queen could acclimate to the workers, and vice versa. If no candy, just a smidgen of marshmallow would work. Now, I'd remove several frames from the center of the hive, place the queen cage low within the hive, and carefully remove the staple. Otherwise, the queen might get away from you - they are very quick to want to get out of confinement!

I wasn't careful one time, and the queen flew - she circled the hive several times - I stood very still and watched in amazement (all the while wondering about my stupidity) when all of a sudden she dropped down onto the top of the frames, and scurried into the hive. Whew! What a relief. You don't want to do what I did - they don't always fly back.


MM