Storing Queens

[rodmaker]

    How long can i keep a queen in a queen cage? the reason i ask is i have queens coming tomorrow and the weather is not cooperating with making splits .we are getting rain right now and into tomorrows forecast .Can i keep the queens warm and with just the attendants they are shipped with or must she be hived immediately?

[Garden Hive]

Others will likely chime in...
But I have held them for several days. Yes keep them warm and touch a drop of water to the cages so that they can drink a bit. They will be more at peace in the dark.
Tim

[brooksbeefarm]

I have kept them over a week on my desk with the desk lamp on,i lay a cardboard box lid over the top of them with a pencil under it so they can get air.I take a Q-tip and soak it in water and lay it on the queen cage twice a day and put one drop of honey on the queen cage once a day, it keeps them from eating the sugar cube up and i think they would rather have it. Sometimes the weather just won't co-operate. Jack

[riverbee]

rodmaker, some good advice by jack and garden hive. the queen doesn't need to be hived immediately. i do similar as jack does with queens that can't be hived right away; warm, dark, tiny drop of water, and a very tiny drop of honey just as he says; water twice a day, very small bit of honey once a day during an extended period of time........well they have to poop sooner or later in a tiny cage, so very judicious about this, but don't want them to eat through the candy, the jz beez cages seem to hold a little more candy than the benton cages.......good luck!

[rodmaker]

  Thank you all for the help I very much appreciate all the advise given . The weather is suppose to warm up and dry out on saturday so should only have to care for them two days.

[Yankee11]

Sorry, don't mean to hijack thread but i have the same question about newly hatched queens. If I let them hatch out in a roller cage
in a incubator. If I put the honey and water on the cage. Will she feed herself and how long can I keep her that way?

[rodmaker]

   Well weather cleared and i was able to install my queens today. We worry for nothing most of the time . Thank you for all the advise will keep it in mind for the next time.

[efmesch]

   Well weather cleared and i was able to install my queens today. We worry for nothing most of the time . Thank you for all the advise will keep it in mind for the next time.

For future reference: If you place a few frames of bees in a nucleus hive (without a queen) you can keep several mated queens caged there for an extended period of time.  I once kept 4 or 5  queens in such a "queen bank" for about a month, till I was ready to use them.  If you add new bees when the population dwindles,  you could probably keep them much longer.  Just be alert to the fact that such a colony, as it weakens, might need feeding and protection against robbers.