[KeithC]

so I purchased two single hives 5 days ago. opened them up on the 4th day. one of the hives has 5 or so supersedure cells on the 4th frame in from one side. the next 3 frames had some caped brood (not much) and spotted, hardly any larva. plenty of honey and pollen on the rest of the frames.

im not sure what i should do? should i let them bee? and requeen in the spring? or should i try to find a queen and requeen now?

all comments welcome
and thanks in advance


Keith

 

[Pete0]

IMO some depends on the history of the colony. If it was a good producer, nice bees, not much overwintering concerns in FL but still a thought. Anyway, these supercedure cells are going to maintain the genetics of the original queen. If she was good you can pretty much expect her daughter to be good. Maybe the original queen was damage/killed in transport. Anyway, you could wait 16 days and see if any of the cells hatch, then wait another 10-15 days or so and see what developes. If you don't like what you see, requeen.

Hope this helps,

Pete0
Bena, VA

 

[KeithC]

THX PeteO

i have other hives i started earlier in the year and thay had some droons flying around. now i dont see any droons. so the new queen will find some on her travels? or stay unbread tell there are some droons?

thanks again


Keith

 

[Pete0]

The best that I know the queen will go on mating flights about 5 days after emergence and start laying maybe 5 days after that. She'll mate with 5-40 drones this one time in her life. To my knowledge if she doesn't get mated on those flights she'll return to the hive and become a drone layer. I don't think she can just hang around and every month or so go out trying to mate.


Pete0
Bena, VA

 

[NasalSponge]

I would say your main concern being in Fl is AHB drones getting to her. Fl has a "best practices" for beekeeping to reduce problems with AHB, you may want to get your hands on a copy and look it over.

 

[fish_stix]

AHB are actually of very little concern down here. Like everything else in beekeeping it's been totally blown out of proportion by the news and media. We do have them but not in any numbers. My son and I continue to raise our own queens like always and have never had a problem with AHB. FL Best Practices calls for requeening annually with European queens and if catching swarms requeen immediately with European queens.
Now, to answer the original poster; if they have cells let the bees make their own queen. After the new queen is showing her stuff then make a decision whether to requeen or not. Bees know some stuff about raising queens and most times get it done very well without our help.

 

[KeithC]

thanks for all the help
i am letting them do there stuff and time will tell me what i should do


Keith