[copibees]

I was wondering if worker bees toot?
I am having trouble finding my queen but i can hear a bee tooting, do you think that is her

 

[RayMarler]

Yep, follow the toot, that will be the queen. I've never heard workers or nurses toot.

 

[sqkcrk]

Oh, I thought your meant something else.

Could be.

 

[mppatriots]

If you are referring to piping, not sure what tooting is, but piping is often made by a virgin queen. The problem here is that the virgin queen is not much different than a typical bee so she is hard to spot. Once she mates she will elongate and look like a typical queen.

 

[oldfordguy]

Look for the one saying "pull my finger"

 

[Graperunner]

Yep, follow the toot, that will be the queen. I've never heard workers or nurses toot.

Ray

Are you saying queens will pipe after they are out of there cell?

Paul

 

[Bees of SC]

Virgin queens will pipe or toot looking for other queens to fight for the hive..

 

[sqkcrk]

They're known to do that when there is something to pipe about. There are some times when there are other queens in their hive.

 

[mppatriots]

I've read that they pipe when they are about to emerge as well. I thought that one of my cells was piping but it looks like it was more a case of an emerged queen getting ready to tear down the cells.

 

[seapro220]

I have a friend in Lexington that experienced a 'piping' noise twice within his hives this year. Both times were experienced while he was looking at capped queen cells whenever they were about to open. He didn't know what that strange noise was - but as he uncapped the queen cell - he discovered it. after the queen was met and fed - she continued this for a few minutes while she was running around the hive. I think it's their way of 'announcing' their arrivals.

I've never experienced this personally though.

Was amused at the title also ...

 

[waynesgarden]

Look for the one saying "pull my finger"

That's way too funny.

Wayne

 

[Michael Bush]

I have heard workers do a very soft imitation of a queen piping. A queen piping is very loud and distinct. When I've heard something similar from workers it sounds faint and far away and I never seem to be able to find that worker...

 

[jdmidwest]

Can't we say fart on here? I think we are all adults.

 

[Bees of SC]

Why would we want to. We are adult learning about bees.

 

[frazzledfozzle]

Ive seen and heard workers "piping" and its indistinguishable from a queen. I saw the bee that was doing it and it was very agitated and fast on the comb darting here and there . It would stop and put her bum in the air and vibrate her wings really fast which made the piping sound.

I posted about this on our New Zealand beekeeping website

http://www.nzbees.net/forum/threads/wierd-behaviour.3608/#post-50415

And this was the answer i got.

http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00265-002-0567-y?no-access=true

 

[Jackam]

Can't we say fart on here? I think we are all adults.

Then we should speak like adults and not 12 year olds.

 

[Michael Bush]

>I saw the bee that was doing it ...

Cool that you got to see it. I've only heard it from somewhere in the hive and I knew (at least by the time I was done) that there were no queen cells and the queen was in a different box, but I could never find them and it wasn't as distinct as when I've heard queens doing it.

 

[estreya]

It's so encouraging to read this thread tonight! During today's inspection, i heard a faint "quacking duck" sound coming from one of the hives. Could this have been a worker bee? Why would she have made that noise? Was it a sign of distress?

I was under the impression (apparently the misimpression) that only queens and/or virgin queens could pipe. But i was so certain there was just one queen in the hive. My husband and i inspect every two weeks, and while we saw two queen cups VERY early on in the Spring, they were never laid in and were quickly torn down. Just now, i poured over our inspection photographs to see if i might have missed any elongated peanut shaped cells (though i couldn't fathom how i might have missed something so obvious). Nothing. So i was really perplexed! Well, i still am, really.

I have so much to learn (about beekeeping, among other things) ...

PS: A Google search revealed it may be a forage-related communication, or a signal of hive disturbance (the latter of which makes perfect sense since today was the first time we sugar dusted the hives - quite an experience for us, and apparently for the bees as well).

 

[frazzledfozzle]

>I saw the bee that was doing it ...

Cool that you got to see it. I've only heard it from somewhere in the hive and I knew (at least by the time I was done) that there were no queen cells and the queen was in a different box, but I could never find them and it wasn't as distinct as when I've heard queens doing it.

The only reason I saw it was because i was caging queens and the bee that was making the sound was on the frame i was looking at .

It was very weird and have seen it only once since.