12hr delay in re-queening

[OzBuzz]

So I'm re-queening a hive - I finally found her close to nightfall and as a storm was about to roll through... Her hive was hot! So as much as I don't like killing anything i felt it my responsibility to have a hive with a good temperament. So after the deed I placed her on the top bar of the frames so the other bees know... Is it likely to be a problem if I can't install the new queen until the morning ~12hrs?

[BabcockFarms]

Absolutely not a problem as long as they can attend her. I would wait until they accept her before releasing her. This can take several days, and if you don't wait until they do, they could kill the new queen.

You can tell when they have accepted her as the workers won't be biting at the cage and will brush off fairly easily with your finger.

There is no certain time frame for them to accept her, you have to see if they have.

[OzBuzz]

Thanks for the reply Babcock - I mean will it be too late to introduce the queen cage after 12hrs! Would they convert an egg to a queen in that time or will they not do it coz its night time.  I'll let the workers chew through the candy - I don't ever intervene until after about 7 days and I lay a tissue down on top of the frames then the cage mesh down on the tissue - works for me... I do it over a gap in the frames so, after they chew the tissue away, they attend to her through the wire...

[BabcockFarms]

I doubt they will start creating queen cells in 12 hours. In fact I believe it is beneficial to leave the hive queen-less for a period of time. They seem to accept her better if they are queenless for 8 hours or better. If new queen cells are created the new queen should destroy the cells.

[Finski]

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Quite sure system in requeening is that when hive caps its emercengy cells, then they accept very easily what ever queen.
It takes 5 days to cap emercengy cells.

Hives accept just emerged new queen, but mostly it diappperas during two days.

[Finski]

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Age of mated queen affects much. If the queen has layed 3 weeks, hive normally accept at once the new queen if weathers are good. But if you try to give a queen which have started to lay one week ago, workers are very hostile against the queen.


To join mating nuc and a bigger hive in bad conditions


I have got good results when I put a box between nuc and hive and box is full of extracted combs.
Workers pay all attention to cleaning honey from cells.