livestock.

Honey bee settles on a fiddleneck. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Honey bee settles on a fiddleneck. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

A taste of nectar--honey bee on a fiddleneck. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

A taste of nectar--honey bee on a fiddleneck. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

When it rains, the virgin queens and drones don't fly out to mate. During her maiden flight, each virgin queen will mate with 12 to 25 drones, and then she'll return to her hive, where she will spend the rest of her life laying eggs. She'll lay about 1000 eggs a day during the busy season, or about 2000 eggs a day during peak season.

Rain stops the mating. So do cold temperatures. The thermometer has to read at least 70 degrees for the matingflights. Otherwise, it's a no-go. A no-fly day.

The process from egg to larva to pupa to adult is almost miraculous. It involves using a grafting tool to remove the tiny, almost microscopic egg from the comb and transferring it to a queen cup. From there, it's back into the hive where the worker bees tend to the queen cells, feeding them royal jelly.

This month, however, proved to be one of the most rainy months on record. It rained nearly every day.

Many of the queens-to-be won't be.

Egg

TINY EGG, a future honey bee queen, is moved from a comb to a queen cell cup at the Strachan Apiaries in Yuba City. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

CLOSE-UP PHOTO shows queen cells. They're being held here by Susan Cobey, bee breeder-geneticist at