Hi Paul and greetings Wolfgang - how are you doing
 
 
> It is the age of the queen cell that intrigues me. If my calculation is
> correct then they must have developed the queen cell over the last 9-15
> days. Now, unless I have done something stupid, I do not see where they
> could have obtained a fertilised egg. I thought that workers were not
> capable of laying fertilised eggs and could only become drone-layers.
> Are you saying that workers from A.m capensis can produce fertilised
> eggs? If this is so, how are we to be able to find the queen amongst all
> of the other workers in a fully stocked hive in order to mark her?
 
With regards to the "stealing eggs" story let me first admit to a
huge amount of scepticism. Some points about the story that might
have relevance:
 
(1) the fact that there is a sealed queen cell does not necessarily
mean that there is a queen larva inside; it might be a drone larva
or nothing - it is not uncommon
 
(2) critical information that is missing is, are there other eggs
laid in the nuc?; are they singly in cells or multiple?; are they in
worker cells or drone cells or both? If there are other eggs present
then either there are laying workers active, or there is a queen in
the colony that the workers are unhappy with
 
(3) is it not possible that a small after-swarm moved into the nuc;
the queen might have "got lost" in the turmoil
 
Last comment: if it is capensis, then it will be very noticeable, and
where it came from will be of some importance; also, you will have a
not inconsiderable problem
 
regards
 
Mike Allsopp
Stellenbosch, South Africa
 
 
 
 
 
Mike Allsopp                            tel    (27)(21) 887-4690
Honeybee Research Section               fax    (27)(21) 883-3285
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