I didnt get a picture of the gold tiger striped queen but I did get several pictures of different queens today;













Can you find the tiniest queen in the above picture?



Typically.. Imported queens are Black/ Carniolan crosses or golden Italian queens. The Marked queens are my VSH Queens, and the tiger striped beauties are from cut outs, swarms or from locally bred "new" queens I have raised.
I was not specifically looking for queens today, but took pictures of a few of them as I went through the hives to insure they were still queen right and growing.
My Package queens...
Of ten packages, three superseded their queens within the first week. A couple more superseded by the third week, and one of them Simply vanished.. One of the hives I went through today had no eggs or queen that I could find... But I did find this;

So.... that will leave me with THREE of the original golden Italian queens from the packages, from a total of ten to start with..
In one of the last pictures above is the littlest queen.. I keep expecting to see her superseded, but she is still pumping out the eggs to rival any of my fat bottomed girls. She had eggs in four frames, well laid, and larger larvae and capped brood in another six frames.. She is blowing away my expectations, but I fear her time is limited unless she somehow plumps up..