"Your new queen is probably just on the verge of making herself known.  I've had similar cases where I've given up on a colony, then come back a week
later and found a couple frames of brood."
  
 
  I would concur, having had the same experience.  Sometimes I've gone ahead and put in a frame of fresh eggs/larvae from another hive.  Later inspections reveal no queen cells from fresh larvae made on this newly introduced frame, much to my disappointment.  Then on my next inspection, lots of fresh eggs and new larvae, and then I start adding up the days and conclude the new queen was always there.
   
  This is also true when introducing queen cells into nucs.  There is a gap of time between her emergence and her first eggs laid.  She needs time to mature and mate.  My heart has sunk many times when I looked in my mating nucs only to find no eggs and no queen.  Since I know the queen cell was there, my only conclusion is that she got lost or eaten on her mating flight.  Then, about the time I want to insert a frame of fresh eggs/larvae from another hive, BAM!  I've got eggs and larvae from a resident queen!
   
  I find it amazing they do so well despite our incompetence and interference.  Patience is perhaps the greatest of virtues needed to be a successful beekeeper.
   
  Grant
  Jackson, MO

   
  
 

 		
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