When I manually released my new carniolan queen into the hive (of
Italians) they balled the queen.  I received the new queen on Friday.  Prior
to placing the caged queen in the hive I dispatched the old, marked, queen
and transferred the new queen (attendants removed) to an introduction cage
which has mesh on all four sides.  I then placed the caged queen in the
middle of the brood nest.  Yesterday (three days later) I manually released
her onto a frame and watched the situation for about five minutes.
Everything seemed OK, the bees started feeding her, etc., but I noticed she
seemed a little nervous - moving quickly on the comb and hiding at the
bottom of the frame (unlike the other queens released that day).  I also
noticed a couple of bees sort of gripped the queens abdomen with their front
legs and waggled their abdomens.  Then after a short while - a couple of
minutes - some bees ganged up on her and started trying to sting her.  The
ball with her in the middle fell to the bottom board, by the time I got
enough frames removed to get to the ball and get the bees off her the damage
was done.  Just as a note, just prior to the bees balling the queen, I
noticed some of the workers attempting to sting each other.  I am sure that
there was no other queen in the hive.  What could I have done differently
other than pray God save the queen?

Ron Nixon

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