Newly hatched Q ejected from nuc

[alancooper]

A colony inspection - 20th April - showed a second year marked Queen, plenty bees. eggs sealed brood (good pattern), some sealed drone brood and plenty stores. The colony has good qualities and I had planned to rear Qs from it. Just over a week or so later a second inspection showed no eggs, some old-ish unsealed larvae, sealed brood and four sealed Q cells - no Queen (despite a second search). Thinking that something had happened to the Q I decided the best plan would be to make up an Apidea nuc and a Poly nuc, leaving 2 sealed Q cells in the colony.
Within the three or four day window that I estimated queen cells might hatch, I noticed (while on a "displacement activity" mid-day bee-hive watch) a warm dead queen on the nuc landing platform (it was light-ish brown but overnight on the kitchen table it turned dark and under a hand lens had all its "bits"). I am sure there was only one Queen cell on the introduced nuc frame and that the colony Q had not been transferred to the nuc in error.
Am I being optimistic in asking if anyone has an explanation or am I being too confident that I have not accidentally killed the colony Q or transferred her to the nuc?
Alan.

[Jon]

If your queen had an accident on 20th April during the inspection you would expect queens to be emerging from emergency queen cells 12 days later, ie 2nd May.
If you found a fully formed queen on the landing board then those dates dont stack up. There must have been queen cells started already during the inspection on 20th April.

[prakel]

A queen started from an older larvae could well be emerging on or about the tenth day (despite claims elsewhere that bees never try to rear queens from older larvae...).

[Jon]

But yesterday was 9 days and a 9 day queen, if it were even possible, would be the size of a worker.
I suspect something else must be the cause of this.

[prakel]

As it darkened overnight I'd be inclined to speculate that it wasn't fully mature -at least, I've never seen a fully mature queen darken in a noticeable way and certainly not in such a short period as 'overnight'. Probably not going to get a definite answer -the way to do that would have been to open the queen cells when found, note the stage of development and then throw them away.

[The Drone Ranger]

I have a paynes double nuc on 5 + frames of brood
There were just sealed cells and an open one on todays inspection
Possibly squeezed the queen between frames or something last inspection
Couldn't spot her but she might be there
Anyway took down all the cells and I'll have a check in a couple of days
Dependant on what I find next I can use a queen from a mininuc (I have 3 left)
It would be pointless to have let the cells get to maturity next week it just makes things harder

Well thats' my take on it I'm sure not everyone would agree

I think you will get your answer alan at the next inspection
Your queen sounds like she was removed by the bees probably dead
There might be another virgin running around
Just a guess though

[alancooper]

I inspected the colony brood frame with Q cells yesterday (30th April) - and found an open Q cell (hatched) - it looks as if I missed seeing young Q cells on 23rd April and that I had killed the colony Q at an April 13th inspection (a check on my hive notes shows that I had not recorded eggs present on the 20th April). I wonder why the dead immature nuc queen had hatched?
Thanks for the comments. I will let you know if the colony and Apidea manage to get fertile Qs established.

[The Drone Ranger]

Wouldn't worry about it Alan
The good news is the weather is improving and the new queen might get mated
The hive will be set back though and you won't know if she is mated and laying for around 3 or 4 weeks (at a guess)


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[Jon]

That makes sense then. If a virgin emerged around 25th April, she will be old enough to take mating flights from about 2nd May onwards.
The weather looks good for mating flights from mid May.

http://www.forecast.co.uk/belfast.html

Not too many drones about at the moment but should be a lot better in 2-3 weeks.

[gavin]

Seems to fit the timing. Queen accidentally killed 13 April. Emergency cells from up to 2 day larvae (3 as egg, 2 as larva). 16-5=11. 13 April +11= 24 April. Workers let first emerged queen kill her sisters around 24/26 April. Corpse soon removed and jetisoned.

Snap! (ish)