[Estes family farms]

Got a question for you. I made some splits by moving brood up above a excluder. Went back the next day pull the box above excluder w/brood and moved to a new yard. Two days later I added a caged queen today when I went to remove the queen cages and inspect for the mated queens I found some of the splits had the queen laying in them and capped queens cells that wasn't there when I originally move the
brood above the excluder. Couple questions.
1) do I remove the mated queen and let the queens cells hatch out?
2) do cut out all the queen cells and leave mated queen?
3) leave it like it is???
There small splits most are only five frames. I notice in some of the splits the new queen had destroyed the present queen cells. But some has not.

 

[RayMarler]

When virgins emerge they kill queens. If they don't kill the older queens, then the hive/nuc swarms and the established queen usually leaves with the swarm. If you want to save your introduced queens, then destroy all the queen cells.

You left the boxes queenless for 2 days before introducing queens. By that time, the existing bees had already started queen cells. I myself try to never let a box be left queenless more than one day, and usually just ten minutes to a few hours, when introducing queens. The bees know within ten minutes that they are queenless when you remove a queen. Within 20 minutes to an hour or two they start roaring. When they are roaring, they will accept a queen introduced with great passion and fanfare. They instantly calm and mellow out.

 

[Estes family farms]

Ray marler. Thanks for the info. Also thought about making more splits off the new queen cells. And from now ill place mated caged queens directly after I get all splits to new yard.

 

[RayMarler]

Sure, I like that idea, make more splits! Good luck to you.