A New Queen has Risen – What shall we call her?

Things have been a little fraught on the bee-keeping front. The weather has been terrible for the bees. We seem to get one or two days where they can get out and fly, followed by 5-6 days of winds and rain that keeps them shut up in their hives. There just hasn’t been enough time for them to build up any stores and what little they have they use up whilst the wind and rain lashes down outside.

Quite a few people have been suffering with colonies starving and been having to feed even at this time of year. We’ve managed to lose a swarm and have had a few colonies that were in the throes of re-queening.

Todays inspection at our home apiary was fairly reassuring though.

Clettwr

This is the hive that we have lost a swarm from and there has been no sign of a queen or any eggs for a while. Last week I moved a frame with some eggs on it from another hive into this one in the hope that they could raise a queen from the eggs. It was of course possible that there was a virgin queen in the already but she hadn’t mated or hadn’t started laying. If that was the case I was hoping that the intervention and addition of some eggs wouldn’t cause any problems.

Things are still a little unresolved in this hive. Today there was still no sign of a queen and no eggs, but they had created a few queen cups albeit fairly poor looking affairs. Fingers crossed that they will raise a new queen yet.

On the plus side they have quite a bit in the way of stores, but I guess that isn;t surprising as they don’t have any brood to feed it to.

Leri

All looks good here, small amounts of stores, plenty of egss, plenty of larvae at all stages and a happy queen. This hive has been fairly well behaved so far this year. No doubt that will all change but so far so good.

Hive 5

I know, it’s not a very original name for a hive but it contains a colony produced from the parent half of an artificial swarm from Clettwr. We performed the artificial swarm on May 12th and have been waiting for the colony to re-queen ever since. FInally they have done so, today I saw a lovely looking, fat, healthy queen, loads of nice healthy looking eggs and a few very young larvae. A new queen has risen… What shall we call her?

1 Response

  1. Avatar forComment Author Anna says:

    How about Elizabeth since it’s the Jubilee this year?

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Alan Cole

Alan is a Freelance Website Designer, Sports & Exercise Science Lab Technician and full time Dad & husband with far too many hobbies: Triathlete, Swimming, Cycling, Running, MTBing, Surfing, Windsurfing, SUPing, Gardening, Photography.... The list goes on.

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