TINY Emergency Queen

[montauk170]

During last week's inspection we saw the emergency queen cell capped and this weekend it was time to find our new virgin queen. It was hard to find her but finally did. She is TINY!!!! Knew it was her due to a sharper rear end and the way she darted around the comb running away from us.

Give her a chance or pinch her?

[lenape13]

I'd give her a chance.  She may surprise you.

[Culley]

They get bigger after mating and growing a bit. Is it a strong colony?

[bassman1977]

I echo the above.  Give her a chance.

[Michael Bush]

All virgin queens are small until they start to lay.

[BjornBee]

I had some this year that were very small. I said to myself I would come back later pinch them and put in new cells. But a few weeks later after not getting around to it, they were normal size and laying up a storm.

Funny how small feral queens are deemed GOLD! But a small one found in a hive is considered crap many times.  :roll:

[montauk170]

Cool, will give her a chance. Hopefully there are some drones around for her to mate with. The other two hives next to it does not seem to have any drones at all.

[tecumseh]

yep thats about how they look prior to mating and laying up some brood.  you must have quite good eyes since most folks would never see la difference.

I would suspect that you should have drones in the los altos area all year long given the moderate temperature and constant availability of flowers.

[BjornBee]

Cool, will give her a chance. Hopefully there are some drones around for her to mate with. The other two hives next to it does not seem to have any drones at all.

You only need one.... ;)

[tecumseh]

I don't think Bjorn that 1 would get the job done, although the exact number has always been in dispute  and subject to inflationary pressure over the years.  I think the current understanding is it requires something like 12 to 20 drones to get the job done.

I suspect (by casual observation) there are more bees in little white boxes tuck away here and there in the Los Altos area than most folks might think.

[BjornBee]

One drone gives more sperm than the queen has the ability to lay eggs.

Queens mate with many drones for genetic diversity, hybrid vigor, and other factors.

Sorry Tec, one will get the job done. It may not be the ideal situation, but she can be a good queen and lay for years. Just perhaps with an increase in being affected by disease differently than a queen with sperm of different genetic makeup.

One drone can give off as many as 7 to 11 million sperm.

Some researchers looking to write a paper and establish a "standard" for a good mated commercial queen suggests a queen should have at least 45 million sperm. But fact is, queens will not use 11 million sperm, let alone 45 million. The 45 million was just a determining factor in knowing if the queen was mated with multiple drones, so buyers and breeders would know if the queen was "properly mated" with multiple drones. Far different than perhaps a backyard beekeeper needing a mated queen to keep his hive alive. Or my passing comment suggesting one will do.

But your queen operates with 11 million sperm just fine....

[tecumseh]

bjorn writes:
Sorry Tec, one will get the job done. It may not be the ideal situation, but she can be a good queen and lay for years.

tecumseh:
I guess the larger question Bjorn is for how long.  sometime and in some place an less than perfect fix works fine and in other place certainly will lead to failure.

I have had queens mated here in mid December when there are few drones in hives.  almost without exception these queens do not lay for long... most will last till spring arrive, but some do not.  The question of diversity in sex alleles from the male and female side of the mating should suggest that multiple mating is much more important than sheer number of sperm available from one drone or how many individual sperm are required during the life of one queen.

as I previously suggest given the stated location of the person asking the question I suspect this question is pretty much mute anyway.. 

[BjornBee]

I think the failure of a queen mated in December, may have more to do with old drones on their last leg, not getting the job done. Drones may be mating, but the best drones in their peak, may of been passed by.  Which is drastically different than the point I am making.

I have had late season queen also fail, as well as a/a queens, and a whole bunch in the middle of the summer. I think that memories of the few bad queens mated in winter, probably are best recalled in a timely manner, to bolster a particular point, when convenient enough to remember it that way. Maybe that is what is happening here.

Late season drones, or poorly raised "emergency queens", make for a crappy short laying queen. But it was not for the lack of sperm or some idea that the queen did not mate enough. If your raising queens in December, or having your bees raise queens in December, you or the bees are at fault. But it is convenient to blame it on the number of drones mating. I suspect crappy queens, or crappy drones at a bad time of the year....not due to the sole reasoning of number of partners.  

I've heard many beekeepers claim a "poorly mated" queen, which they are indicating a mating with too few drones. And that is not correct. The queen may not be good, the drones could of been old or passed their prime (Old drones do not win mating wars...drones in prime do. Take away the primed drones and the lesser quality older drones are now mating)

But the point is...one good drone leaves enough sperm for a queens lifetime. And if you have a bad mated queen, whether in summer or winter, other factors are at play.

[Cascadebee]

If single matings were sufficient, I think healthy hives would not invest so heavily in drones.  The fact is that mating on the wing is very hazardous, and an activity that is probably interrupted frequently.  Males greatly outnumber queens which means they are in heavy competition to mate.  Artificially inseminating a queen from a single drone may work fine, but this has little bearing on what happens in nature where males may attempt to interfere with each other, cutting sperm transfer short.  Not to mention pressure from predators.

[montauk170]

The hive this new virgin queen is at, has two other hives right next to it, both seem to be without drones.
I have another hive in a different location where they are kicking out young drones. Should I capture some of those drones and dump them in front of the virgin queen hive?
Would that work?

I also know there's a feral hive in someone's wall less than 1 mile away. I've seen those bees frequent my yard before I had my hives. Hope that one will produce some drones.

[rdy-b]

one thing to think about is the fact that- multiple matings gives the colony a vast sub set of sisters and half sisters-this is important because one sub set may poses hygienic traits-another may be mite tolerant-another may have disease resistance and so on-it is this diversity that enables the colony to overcome stresses and hard ships that make easy prey of
substandard progeny-RDY-B

[Kathyp]

montauk170, i suspect she is mated.  you probably wouldn't have seen her if she were not.  you may have caught her right after  her mating flight before she has fattened up.  

catching drones will not help.  she flies out to mate and the drones that you dump in the area either wouldn't stay around or would be kicked out of the hives anyway.  let nature take it's course.  check for eggs from time to time and see what happens.

additional thought:   more than one open queen cell.  you  may have more than one in there at the moment. 

[BjornBee]

one thing to think about is the fact that- multiple matings gives the colony a vast sub set of sisters and half sisters-this is important because one sub set may poses hygienic traits-another may be mite tolerant-another may have disease resistance and so on-it is this diversity that enables the colony to overcome stresses and hard ships that make easy prey of
substandard progeny-RDY-B

Right on point. There are reasons for multiple matings. But it is not due to a lack of sperm.