> I have been told that once a hive has gone to the laying worker stage
> that the bees willnot except a new Queen and is best to join that hive
> with another. However if your hive raised a queen then it didn't (go
> worker).
> I recently learned that it might have been best to add the young brood
> to give them something to do and then order and install a new queen.The
> brood would also help
> with population. Sound like a confused queen that may need some
> psychotherapy
 
I think you're right. Today I decided to watch the queen carefully to
see if I could catch her laying multiple eggs. What I found was that she
laid normally for a while and then took a walk. While walking around
and without putting her rear into a cell, she dropped an egg. It seemed
almost accidental. If she's dropping accidental eggs here and there,
this would explain the multiple egg cells to some extent. What it doesn't
easily explain is how the dropped eggs go into cells and not down on the
floor. When I was watching her, I held the frame parallel to the
ground so when she dropped the egg, it went down into a cell. However, in
normal operation, the cells are not beneath her.
 
What happens to cells with multiple eggs? Does a worker clean
out the extras? Does the queen go back and notice her mistake? Do
multiple larvae fight it out?
 
 
Conrad Sigona
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