[mxr618]

Three weeks ago split nucs out of two rocking hives. I wasn't able to make it back to the farm until today.

The nucs all have high populations of foragers who are actively storing nectar....and that's it. No brood, no eggs, some pollen. I had hoped the workers would raise queens but thorough inspection of each five frame nuc shows now queens, no queen cells, and no evidence of egg laying.

So if I play it right and can get queens shipped ASAP they should be there the 18th / 19th.

No swarm cells, which would have been cool.

So who would anybody recommend as a supplier for immediate shipment of three queens?

Thanks for all your help!

 

[honeybeekeeper]

There is Walter T. Kelleys in Clarkson Ky!

http://www.kelleybees.com/education/

https://products.kelleybees.com/wtkprod/default.aspx

 

[Beeslave]

You may have virgins. Did you shake the bees off the comb that had your brood and inspect closely? The bees will chew down emergency cells after the queens hatch sometime. How many days exactly after you made the splits? The weather for mating flights the last week in your area was terrible so it is possible in another week you could have laying queens in there.

 

[Brent Bean]

Take a frame of larva from the other hive and swap it with split, check back in a few days to see if they have started to draw queen cells. Make sure you have larva of the right age one to three days old. in the mean time you can try and order a queen.
I have ran into the same situation the second shot of larva worked well and saved me from scrounging for a replacement queen.

 

[megank]

give it a little longer as three weeks is the absolute minimum for walk away splits

Figure one to two days for splits to figure they are queenless and begin making a new queen

11 days to make a new queen from larvae...at a minimum

5 to 8 days for virgin to mature enough for mating flights

a day or two of acutal mating flights

2 days waiting for ovaries to crank out mature eqqs

throw in at least a couple of days for good measure..rain cold temps preventing queens to fly etc and you're looking at a period longer than three weeks.

 

[Michael Bush]

I don't expect to see a new queen laying until a month after the split. That would be typical.