Interesting read......


This last week I was working thru 300 hives that had swarmed already and were in various stages of re queening.  Lots and lots of virgins just hatching in hives that already had virgins,  several with multiple virgins in the hive together,  and a lot of them where the new queen had killed the queens in other cells.  
 The thing I found quite fascinating was that ZERO hives with capped queen cells had the old queen still in them. I didn't think the swarmed until virgins were about to hatch or just hatching.  Apparently that’s not correct! First time letting a lot of hives get ahead of us.

Huge variation!  Managed to put over 200 virgins in mating nucs. Downside is the ones we did last Monday or so should be ready to mate,  and the weather is horrible.  


The absolute best way to requeen if you can't find the old queen is a ready to hatch sell placed in the honey supers.   The average is about 85% success in superseding the old queen, and no swarms.

Charles

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