Today was filled with a few new experiences and a new mystery. To me, that is about as good as it gets.(In the center of this photo at right is a picture of what seems to be a new Italian queen. A VIRGIN queen, which may have been created by the bees to replace the original queen which may have been lost or killed.)
I am grateful to Jim Moscatel, a great friend of mine, who donned a veil and became today's 'beetographer' while I worked the hive with friend and fellow bee keeper, Michael Keene, whose help I am also very grateful to have had today.
Last week, the order of business was to see how much comb the Russian bees had built. The measure was 5.5 out of 10 total frames. This was 1/2 frame shy of the minimum of 6 frames needed to trigger the addition of a 2nd 'deep super' (bee box). It was also found that the Russian queen was alive, evidenced by the presence of eggs in the otherwise empty cells.
This week, the Russian queen was still laying eggs, and 7 out of 10 frames were fully built out with comb. The queen was observed to still be laying eggs. There were bees in all stages of growth, and an additional deep super was added. In order to encourage the bees to move upward into the new super and build comb on those new frames, a presently used frame from the bottom super (with bees, honey, pollen, and nectar) was added to the new box before placing it on top of the first. The frames in the new super were also sprayed with sugar water to further encourage the bees. The Russian hive is doing WONDERFULLY.
In the Italian hive last week presented a number of concerns. First of all, there were no empty comb cells on any frame. They were all filled with brood, honey, pollen, and nectar. There were no eggs, no larvae, and no queen to be found. Not knowing whether the queen was gone, or simply unable to lay eggs due to a lack of space, I closed the hive in anticipation of waiting one full week prior to rechecking. At this point, I assumed that there would be empty cells, and that a mated and healthy queen would resume laying eggs, or there would be evidence of a problem. Unfortunately, what I found today WAS evidence of a problem.
What I found were 'supercedure' cells, which are created by the bees to replace a missing or faulty queen. In the center of this photo, you can see a bee with her head inside a supercedure cell that had previously hatched. I think that the queen in the photo at the top of this blog, may have been hatched from this cell. I belive this to be the case because the were approx 8 supercedure cells (7 of which were not yet open), and many empty 'standard' cells without eggs or larvea. This tells me that it is likely that the original queen is dead and or not laying eggs and that the observed queen is a likely a virgin queen who has not yet taken her mating flight yet. Before I can determine that, I have the following questions that I need answered:
- Can a queen be created from a frame of capped brood?
- At what age does the queen make her mating flights?
As I recall, last week I was unable to find any larvae or eggs, so how was a queen created? Looks like I will have my head burried in reference books tonight to get the answers. I am, after all, a newbie beekeeper.
Finally, the new mystery the presented itself today. While closing the Italian hive, many bees stood at the entrance to the inner cover and began fanning. Fanning is typically for orientation of 
the colony. The only time I have seen fanning prior to this was at the ENTRANCE of a hive, when hiving a new package of bees into a hive. What was the reason that they fanned at the top of the hive, when bees were not coming or going from that location? I am grateful to have this new mystery to uncover, and other answers to seek.
