Aaron Morris wrote:
> ... many times I come across hives with sealed swarm cells
> (some with quite developed queens) which have not yet swarmed, the original
> queen is still present.

I have made the same experience. And also in the other direction:
Once an (overcrowded) nucleus colony (about 3000 workers) swarmed
(it was my mistake to fill in too much bees at the beginning).
I was not so much surprised that it happened but when. I examined the
nucleus hive and found that the oldest worker larvae were just about
2 days old, so the queen has just been laying eggs for about 5 days.
Additionally, I found 4 swarm cells with eggs in them! No older
queen larvae nor pupae. I also was impressed by the low number of
workers that remained in the nucleus hive, they were only about 100!
Probably this remaining 'colony' would never have made it.

(I got the swarm and put it back. But I took away half of the workers
and the queen cells)

Michael Haberl
Germany, 51n 9w
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