How long before a swarm queen starts to lay?

[beeyhz]

Hello,

I caught a swarm 8 days ago from one of my hives.  I managed to get it into a 10 frame deep and currently have about 5-6 seams of bees. 

I assumed that I got the mated queen from the hive but after a week I see no evidence of eggs being layed. 

Question is:  How long before a mated swarm queen begins to lay?  I would think quite a few days as the swarm has to find a new home and draw out enough comb for her to day but that was provided for her in this case. 

After swarm or secondary swarms,  I'm assuming it would be a virgin queen from the hive that would lead the secondary swarms.  I guess in this case it is going to take 2-3 weeks to see her laying.

[Jen]

Hi Beeyhz,  One thing that took me awhile to learn about swarm queens is that once the swarm is in the hive you have provided, the bees have to start bringing in pollen and nectar to provide food for the bees and food for the babies when they hatch. What I visualize is that once they start getting going on food storage, they will tell the queen start to lay.

Wondering if you have actually seen the queen yet?

[beeyhz]

Hello Jen,

I have not seen the Queen.  I looked but that is not one of my strong skills yet.  I 'anchored' this swarm with a frame of brood and also put in a frame of honey from the hive they swarmed from.  They have a good little store going now of nectar and a little capped honey as well as pollen.  The weather here last week was....well quite Canadian with two days of almost frost.  This week looks a little more promising with with low 70's (20'sC) and sunshine so hopefully things get rolling a bit better. 

Thanks Jen, just need a little more patience then.  Wonder if I can order that from the Bee Store...lol

[Jen]

Wouldn't that be great! A bottle of patience. I've been beekeeping for 8 years now, and these last two summers have really taught me about the bee waiting game 

If I was in your shoes, I would continue to check back once a week for maybe 3 weeks, maybe even 4. In that time if nothing else, you will see queen cells being made, that alone will tell you there is no queen. And, if you don't see queen cells, it also very good time to learn how to find your queen.

[apisbees]

When bees swarm nectar and pollen are not an issue generally. Even a swarm with a mated queen will take a few days to start laying again and if you are not good at spotting eggs then it will be 4 days after she has started laying that you will see larva in the comb. You said you added a frame of brood. Was there any eggs or young day old larva on the frame. If so if they are queenless they could be raising a new queen. But if there was a virgin cause this was a cast swarm she may not yet be mated and start to lay. This can take between 10 to 15 days. If no eggs appear in the next few days adding another frame with eggs will allow the bees to raise another queen, If the queen is lost they will draw out cells, if she just hasn't started to lay yet then they will just raise the brood. Queens do get lost during mating or left or damaged during capture and giving brood will anchor the bees to the hive even if the queen was lost.

[Les]

Beeyhz, I have difficulty seeing eggs too.  A little trick I discovered is I take my iphone and video or take photos of the frame I want to pull.  I can then blow up the photo and easily see the eggs and very young larva.  I just did this for a queenless hive and when I checked a week later, I found two queen cells with larva inside.  I should also mention that I "notched" the cells where the very immature larva were present.


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