I found capped queen cells in my strongest overwintered colony yesterday. To my untrained eye they looked like swarm cells, about one per frame.
Then I spotted this queen. And I wondered, is this my overwintered queen? If so, has she slimmed down for swarming, or is she still laying?
And if not, is this a virgin from one of the cells, getting ready for her mating flight?
For context, this colony swarmed and requeened itself mis-summer last year. I believe, with low confidence, that they have not already swarmed this year, but it's hard to be sure.
I was low on equipment and don't want increase, so here's what I ended up doing:
Before:
Super
QX
Brood box 2
Brood box 1
Lower entrance
After:
Upper entrance
Brood box 2 with queen, 2 old brood frames replaced with undrawn frames
QX
Super
QX
New brood box with 8 new undrawn frames and the 2 brood frames taken from Brood box 2
Brood box 1
Lower entrance
I guess I'm hoping that the bottom colony won't swarm because they're queenless, and the top colony won't swarm because they sort of feel like they already swarmed. And if one of them does swarm, I'm hoping fewer bees leave with that swarm. Was this a reasonable thing to do? What would you recommend doing differently? Note that I have no empty drawn frames, and no space for another stack of boxes.
Thanks for any tips!
Then I spotted this queen. And I wondered, is this my overwintered queen? If so, has she slimmed down for swarming, or is she still laying?
And if not, is this a virgin from one of the cells, getting ready for her mating flight?


For context, this colony swarmed and requeened itself mis-summer last year. I believe, with low confidence, that they have not already swarmed this year, but it's hard to be sure.
I was low on equipment and don't want increase, so here's what I ended up doing:
Before:
Super
QX
Brood box 2
Brood box 1
Lower entrance
After:
Upper entrance
Brood box 2 with queen, 2 old brood frames replaced with undrawn frames
QX
Super
QX
New brood box with 8 new undrawn frames and the 2 brood frames taken from Brood box 2
Brood box 1
Lower entrance
I guess I'm hoping that the bottom colony won't swarm because they're queenless, and the top colony won't swarm because they sort of feel like they already swarmed. And if one of them does swarm, I'm hoping fewer bees leave with that swarm. Was this a reasonable thing to do? What would you recommend doing differently? Note that I have no empty drawn frames, and no space for another stack of boxes.
Thanks for any tips!