By sheer co-incidence, or luck, I was checking out a hive with an extremely valuable queen and found her balled; badly balled. I placed her in a cage with five young bees and removed her. She had not been injured. Notwithstanding the cause of the balling (most likely: drifting; I am busy moving colonies around the countryside) the challenge here is reintroduction. After two hours, she went back into the (roaring) hive in the cage suspended by wire between two populous brood frames. Tomorrow, I plan to place her in a 10cm by 10cm cage made from metal mosquito wire. This cage is 15mm deep; 5mm will be sunk into wax of cleaned cells, ready for eggs. She will be installed with a few young bees in the cage. The idea is that she will be more readily re-accepted by the colony if she is laying eggs. If all works out, she will be released after three to four days. Is this methodology OK? I simply CANNOT lose this queen. Barry Sergeant Kyalami South Africa