Jon

Supersedure

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by
Jon
, 20-07-2013 at 07:08 PM (4682 Views)
saw a classic supersedure situation today with a queen of mine in her 4th season.

This colony tried to supersede last August but I inadvertently captured the daughter in an apidea when she made a pit stop with her mating swarm on a fence post. This was apiary vicinity mating. At the time I could not work out where the stray queen had come from but I found an opened supersedure cell in this same colony the next day.
The old queen overwintered anyway but the colony started weak and has only got up to strength for July.

I hadn't looked in it for about 3 weeks.

Today I saw an open supersedure cell on the second frame I lifted out, a shallow where they had drawn drone comb below the bottom bar. The supersedure cell was at the junction of the two.

The old queen, marked and clipped was on the fifth frame and the new queen was on the last frame. She may have already been mated as she was bigger than her mother and walking more like a mated queen than a virgin.

I took an executive decision to remove the old queen as I have not taken many grafts from her and she could have been bumped off at any time. I put her in a nuc with a couple of frames of bees and brood and moved her to another apiary. I will take a few grafts next week.

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  1. gavin's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Jon
    .... she was bigger than her mother and walking more like a mated queen than a virgin.
    OK, so that Bangles song popped into my head. As did one from the Smiths. [Walk like an Egyptian; Some girls are bigger than others ... ]

    How does a mated queen walk and how does a virgin walk? A rounded, wobbling swagger versus a prance, a dash? (Wish I could stop anthropomorphising this one ... )
  2. Jon's Avatar
    There is a clear difference whether you happen to see eggs or not. The mated queen walks more slowly and purposefully whereas virgin queens just skitter about the comb.
  3. Jon's Avatar
    This is the colony which is superseding its queen.

    It is interesting as it has a 100% AMM wing morphometry plot, supersedes, and also exhibits apiary vicinity mating.
  4. Jon's Avatar
    Checked yesterday and the new queen is indeed laying.
    The old one is laying in her nuc and I took a few grafts from her.
  5. Jon's Avatar
    The nuc with the old queen has now produced 3 more supersedure cells.
    I took a couple which were easily removed to use in apideas.
  6. Jon's Avatar
    I removed 3 supersedure cells yesterday and put them in rollers and when I checked today 2 of the queens had just emerged so they are now in apideas. Nice looking virgins. Supersedure cells always produce great queens.
  7. mbc's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Jon
    I removed 3 supersedure cells yesterday and put them in rollers and when I checked today 2 of the queens had just emerged so they are now in apideas. Nice looking virgins. Supersedure cells always produce great queens.
    Always ?
  8. Jon's Avatar
    I should have said potentially great queens. They might mate badly of course. They are lovely specimens as virgins.
  9. Jon's Avatar
    Checked this one again yesterday and the old queen is still laying although the brood is getting spotty.
    A cell I left is due to have a queen emerge on Sunday or Monday. There was another cell started which was still open and I removed this one. I'll just let matters take their course now and see how long the old queen is allowed to coexist with her daughter.
  10. Jon's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Jon
    I removed 3 supersedure cells yesterday and put them in rollers and when I checked today 2 of the queens had just emerged so they are now in apideas.
    One of these is laying now.
  11. Jon's Avatar
    The daughter queen in the nuc is laying now and I could not find the old marked queen today. Might still be there, but may be time to write the obituaries. Lets hope the daughter managed to avoid yellow drones on her mating flight.