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👑 Queen Management

🎯 Purpose​

Track your queen's lifecycle, breeding information, and location history to monitor colony reproductive health and make informed decisions about requeening or breeding programs.

🎭 User Story​

  • As a beekeeper managing multiple colonies
  • I want to track which frames have queens and monitor their lifecycle status
  • So that I can quickly diagnose reproductive issues and maintain healthy colonies

🚀 Key Benefits​

  • Lifecycle Tracking: Monitor your queen's stage from virgin to laying to old & infertile
  • Breeding Records: Document queen race, year, and genetics for lineage tracking
  • Location History: Remember which frames your queen prefers over time
  • Health Diagnosis: Understand if missing brood is due to queenless colony or unmated queen
  • Timeline View: See when your queen was last spotted and track status changes
  • Breeding Planning: Track queen ages across your apiary to plan replacements

💡 Use Cases​

Track Queen Age Mark your queen with year color and record it in the app. Get reminders when queens reach 2-3 years old and may need replacement.

Diagnose Reproductive Issues No brood in your hive? Check queen status: if marked as "virgin" or "mating", she may not be laying yet. If status is "old & infertile", time to requeen.

Breeding Program Management Track which hives have queens from your best colonies. Record queen genetics and race to maintain desirable traits across your operation.

Post-Split Queen Tracking After splitting a hive, track which colony got the original queen and monitor the other for new queen emergence and mating flights.

🎓 How to Use​

  1. Mark queen location - When you spot your queen on a frame, mark that frame in the app
  2. Set lifecycle stage - Update status: queen cup → virgin → mating → laying → old & infertile
  3. Record breeding info - Add queen race, year marked, and genetics if known
  4. Track over time - Timeline shows queen sightings and status changes
  5. Plan replacements - View all queens in your apiary sorted by age

👑 Queen Lifecycle Stages​

  • Queen Cup - Colony is raising a new queen
  • Virgin - New queen emerged but not yet mated (7-14 days)
  • Mating - Queen is on mating flights (1-2 weeks)
  • Laying - Actively laying eggs (1-3 years typical lifespan)
  • Old & Infertile - Reduced laying or drone-laying queen (time to replace)

🎨 Queen Marking by Year​

  • White - 2021, 2026
  • Yellow - 2022, 2027
  • Red - 2023, 2028
  • Green - 2024, 2029
  • Blue - 2025, 2030

🔍 Integration with Detection​

Works with automated queen detection - when AI finds a queen in your photo, you'll see a suggestion to mark that frame. You can confirm or override AI detections.

Last Updated: December 5, 2025