Today it was out with the old, in with the new in the wood hive with a supersedure in progress.Last year the bees in Wood decided that the old queen wasn’t right, and planned a supersedure - creating an ‘emergency’ queen cell around a freshly laid egg, while the old queen is still i the hive, and letting the new queen kill off the old one. However, their plans failed, and the old queen was still there with no sign of the new queen-to-be.
Today, I was planning a quick inspection, but it turned out to be rather longer. On the second frame, I spotted the queen, but on the third, a single emergency queen cell, with no further cells anywhere else in the hive - and it was capped over. I borrowed a nuc from Faye, and moved the old queen into this, along with some stores and drawn frame, to keep her occupied. Hopefully the new queen will hatch tomorrow, mate this week (drones were seen in other hives) and start laying fairly soon, meaning the old queen can be put to rest. If not, then the old queen is still available for replacement. I also took the chance to remove the remaining smith frame in this hive, so its all national ones now. Poly still has 2 smith frames with capped brood which I’ll remove later.
Todo
Check Wood in 2 weeks for signs of egg-laying and larvae from the new queen, and mark her if all is well. DONE - no egg-laying.
Remove smith frames from Poly and replace with nationals. DONE
Put supers on Poly, since the sycamore is about to flower, and the hive is looking quite busy.
