Trouble in paradise...

We visited the ladies today, and got an unexpected surprise. The frames were full of wax,which were full with capped brood and honey- but the bees were also busy building a supersedure cell. That means the girls are not happy with the current queen, so they try to turn a larvae into a new queen. They build a cone shaped comb for the larvae, and feed it special secreted juice called 'royal jelly', which somehow turns a regular larvae into a queen. If given the chance to pupate to full grown bee, she would emerge a new queen, and half of the colony of bees would split from the other half, leave the hive with the old queen, and we would be tremendously set back in our progress. We removed the supersedure cell, and wondered why they were not happy. Too many bees- not enough space? Queen not producing enough eggs to fill the wax comb? What? So, we decided that maybe they were not happy with their food. We mixed a new gallon of sugar water, replaced it, and crossed our fingers. We shall see...