hive likely to swarm?

[bcford]

Seems the longer I keep bees, the less I know.

Today I checked on of my hives, and it's population is strong. In fact I found 10 - 12 queen cells in there, but I did not have time to search out the queen today. My question: I have a queen to replace this queen which I think is genetically prone to swarm since this one was a swarm last spring. If I cut out those cells, find the queen, and replace it with a queen I have on hand, is this likely to prevent their swarming or is it too late to prevent it?

I appreciate any thoughts, information, or opinions.

[Charlie B]

All queens are genetically prone to swarm. It's too late to prevent this hive from swarming. I would find the queen, remove her with half the hive to another location. This would simulate a swarm. Otherwise you'd have to get them down from a nearby tree limb.

Then, I would do additional splits/nucs adding one of those valuable queen cells to each split and leave two or three for the parent colony. Use your new queen to replace the old lady if you want but your new queen will swarm too if the conditions are right.