I have a hive that is a swarm that I'd caught a couple of months ago. Hive is doing very well in two deeps. Yesterday I took a look at it and saw what I believe are swarm cells at the bottom of a couple of frames in the top deep, though the cells weren't hanging off the bottom of the frames but rather are within the lower couple inches of the frame. All are uncapped and appear to only have royal jelly in them rather than larvae. Clearly cells, not just cups. Meanwhile the queen was happily marching around them laying eggs in open cells.
I left the cells alone but opened up the nest by adding a few frames of comb (drawn and undrawn). Also added a honey super as the flow is on.
I don't need another hive and would prefer to stop them from swarming, but understand that's very hard to do. My thinking is to watch the cells and see if they are capped. By "bee math" I should have at least 5 days till they're capped, then 8 more (13 total) before they hatch. I understand hives tend to swarm the day before cells hatch, so if I check them in say 10 days and there is a bunch of capped cells I'd then split the existing queen and a couple more frames into a nuc.
Sound like a good plan? I thought about destroying the swarm cells but figured better not to.
I left the cells alone but opened up the nest by adding a few frames of comb (drawn and undrawn). Also added a honey super as the flow is on.
I don't need another hive and would prefer to stop them from swarming, but understand that's very hard to do. My thinking is to watch the cells and see if they are capped. By "bee math" I should have at least 5 days till they're capped, then 8 more (13 total) before they hatch. I understand hives tend to swarm the day before cells hatch, so if I check them in say 10 days and there is a bunch of capped cells I'd then split the existing queen and a couple more frames into a nuc.
Sound like a good plan? I thought about destroying the swarm cells but figured better not to.