Alan Riach wrote:

> I'm pretty convinced that worker bees can move eggs or larva small
> distances (in their mouths ? )because I've seen brood immediately above
> the queen excluder,

Hi from Cape Town

Well here we often get asked the same question. To find brood above the QE
does not necessarily mean that you have bees carrying eggs around (how
robust are they anyway?). It definitely does not mean that here. It means
automictic teletokous parthenogenesis. Perhaps it is wider spread than just
the southern point of Africa after all.

What I'm saying is your laying workers have perhaps just learned how to
produce fertile female offspring without having mated - perhaps due to
re-constitution after meiosis.

Apparently this DOES happen in the USA, and is fairly common. References are
available.

Between hives, I have never heard, but then if you have female laying
workers developing after queen loss, this is not a necessity - laying worker
colonies simply produce their own queen from a diploid worker - layed egg.
QED. Perhaps A.m. capensis has already visited you. Not that we wish this on
you mind!

Robert Post