The references I have read regarding the number of days to laying
were about commercial queen breeders. Maybe they just don't have
the time to wait another week and want to get on with it so they
cut off at 14 days. The 14-day cutoff may be economically based.
 
After two weeks of waiting for my swarm-cell queens to lay,
I figured they weren't going to lay, or be poor queens, so I ordered
queens for those hives. By the time the new queens arrived, the natural
ones had started laying, right at 21 days. (I made splits with the
commercial queens.)
 
So far the 21-day queens are doing fine. One is in my strongest
hive (out of 8).  The other was in my observation hive, which got
too strong (even after removing frames of brood) and recently has
been moved to a hive body where they are expanding quickly.
 
As a beekeeper, maybe the 14-day cutoff is for insurance and profit:
If she doesn't end up laying,
then you have a hive that hasn't had a laying queen for the 16 days it took
for her to emerge plus the 21 days you waited for her to lay. Will this
hive be declining by the time you do get a good queen in it? How well does
this kind of hive (35 days without a queen) accept a new queen? How much
honey have they put up while without a queen?
 
If I were in it for the money I'd have bought queens from the start.
As a hobbyist, I have the time and interest for waiting and watching.
 
Doug
Monterey, CA
 
ps. The California queen breeders said this was a terrible year due to the
rain rain rain. My late-laying queens might have been due to late mating,
rather than due to poor genetic quality.