Tuesday 19th September 2017
We looked at the cast swarm nuc again today. It now contains capped brood, but the caps are rather prominent and domed and the pattern is very patchy.
Despite the fact that we saw the queen in this colony only a few weeks ago, it seems that either she hasn't mated properly or she has disappeared and we now have at least 1 laying worker, maybe more.
At this stage of September when we are already feeding for the winter, we are reluctant to unite this with one of the queen-right colonies in case the laying workers kill the queen they are united with. So, this nuc will have to take its chances. We will still feed it and then if it survives the winter we can attempt re-queening in the spring.
