Thanks Perry and Green Bee.
I had two hives, one swarmed and got away and now no queens in that hive. I'm assuming that there is at least one virgin in the hive and just needs to be mated.
My second hive the swarm I caught and also thanks to Perry pulled a nuc out with a few queen cells and created a 4 frame nuc.
So now I got a yard with two full hives with virgin queens and a nuc with a virgin queen.
Question is: How long before the queen goes out and mates and returns and starts to lay? or How long should I wait before going back into the hive to see if I got a mated laying queen? My guess now is 7-10 days? too little or too much?
thanks
Mike
ps. seen a piping queen for the first time...WAY cool