[bob128]

My biggest hive swarmed 2 days ago. I caught and rehived the swarm. A couple of weeks ago I made a split to reduce congestion in the hive and they made an emergency queen. The queen is now mated and laying. I have more hives than I want so I am not interested in any splits, but would like to keep the hive producing. I wonder if I should remove any queen cells and add the new queen. Is there a waiting period or is it ok to add the new queen now? I have read that you can recombine a swarmed hive later but have not found exactly how to do this with supers on etc. Feedback on any of this appreciated.

 

[bob128]

So, you made a split with the original queen. The hive made an emergency queen which was mated and then promptly swarmed, and you hived the swarm. The original hive is queenless but has cells started. Yes? If so, you can destroy the started cells and then give the hive a few more days and then look again for cells. It here are no cells and no small larvae, you can do the old newspaper combine to reunite the hives. You may need to add another box , and even then, there is a chance they will swarm again. I would offer the swarm you just caught to a beek that is not as fortunate after I was sure my newest queen (the one that is still a cell) had made it back.

No. Earlier in the summer the hive was crowded and I removed 3 frames and bees from the brood boxes and put them in a resource hive. (To try and prevent a swarm). That bunch created a queen. The original hive remained queen right and heavily populated. Saturday the original hive finally swarmed (large swarm with queen I assume) which I was fortunate enough to recapture and place in another hive. Now the original hive is without a queen and half it's population. I am thinking of putting the young queen (from the frames I removed earlier) in the original hive (which just swarmed) to avoid waiting weeks until they create a queen, she mates, returns and begins to lay eggs etc.

For clarity, I basically want to remove any queen cells and add a new queen to a swarmed hive and have it producing as quick as possible. Should I add the queen ASAP?

Recombining the swarm with the original was just a thought for after swarm season.