Having used Queen cells as a source of required queens in the past and 
suffered from lack of mated individuals, I wonder what causes the loss 
to occur.

Age of cell.
Transport conditions.
Cell rejection.
Emerged queen rejection.
Failure to mate.
Non return to home colony are factors to take into account.

Some cases show that a queen never emerges - and when opened, a stunted 
object is present.
Presuming that the pupa was dead on insertion into the colony, I wonder 
if queen cell providers routinely try to ensure that cells are viable at 
point of delivery by candling the cells.

Any comment?

Peter

****************************************************
* General Information About BEE-L is available at: *
* http://www.honeybeeworld.com/bee-l/default.htm   *
****************************************************