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I did a extensive examination of a hive that I thought had swarmed. My hive has two deeps for brood and one shallow super with a queen excluder. In inspection there were only a few above the excluder, so I removed and left the super. The hive had definately swarmed about half as many bees as prior. In examination there were some questions that arose. There seemed to be a large ratio of drones to worker bees, maybe 2:1, is this normal after a swarm? I did not see a queen but then again I did not examine all the frames. But there were MANY queen cells, peanut shaped. As many as 3-4 per frame and each frame seemed to have atleast one. Is this a sign that the hive is now queenless and they are waiting for one to emerge? After one emerges will they tear down the other cells? I believed they swarmed due to ventilation and crowding issues. The hive since the swarm has the super on it and plenty of ventilation, so they should not have a desire to swarm again. It almost appears like they are using the uppper brood box as a super, it has mostly capped honey. Any thoughts?
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J.J.
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J.J.