[gingerbee]

My weakest hive is trying to supercede the queen. Should I let them do this or purchase another queen?

Last time I went in them, about a week ago they had built superscedure cells in a super that was located directly over the brood box. They looked strong enough ie: bees on sufficent frames in the brood box, so I added a deep with a queen excluder on top and then the super with superscedure cells on top of that. I didn't want them brooding in the super.

They have built no wax in the extra deep. There was nothing in the queen cells they had built in the super; I removed them and examined them to be sure. Wanted to make sure queen had not wound up in that super. I inspected again today. They have not drawn any wax out in the deep I added. I did not go into the lower deep because I disturbed them last week when I did all this to check for brood, which was present. If they are tring to superscede I didn't know if it was a good idea to interrupt that process unless I decided to requeen now.

They seem to be the weakest hive, much less activity at entrance than the others and are not taking syrup.

Any suggestions please?

 

[Iddee]

If I understand you correctly, you found queen cups, not queen cells. Queen cups are empty, and they build them anytime, seems like just to practice. Queen cells have eggs and larva in them within a few hours of being started. Queen cups do not mean supercedure, nor should they raise any alarms. they are normal.

To say it is too early to build wax may or may not be true, and will not be true any day now. They won't start building it until they have most their drawn comb filled with nectar, pollen, or brood. Only when they are running out of empty cells will they start drawing comb. To make a judgment there, you need to know how many empty cells are in all boxes, including the bottom deep.

 

[gingerbee]

Thanks Iddee.

I'm glad you clarified that. I thought they were superceding, did not know about 'queen cups'.

Thanks for being quick with responses and for the help.