'Alo, 'Alo, 'Alo, What's Goin' on 'Ere Then?

I arrived at the apiary this afternoon to this rather worrying sight. It wasn’t anything I had ever seen before so it took a little while for the penny to drop. Once I had remembered that I had removed the queen from this colony a few weeks ago as part of the swarm prevention process, it was what ‘Arold Steptoe would have referred to as, “the science of the bleedin’ obvious.” The extra confirmed my diagnosis. By removing the queen (she’s alive and well and living in the hive next door) the colony is forced to make a replacement from a young larva by feeding it royal jelly and, one of my tasks today was to have been to check if the new monarch had started laying eggs yet.
I didn’t bother to check as she was out on the razzle, playing fast and loose with all of the male talent in the area; a sort of willing subject of a gang bang session. Current research suggests that she may mate with up to 50 drones in the course of a half-hour flight; if she’s off form, it may take a second trip to complete the process. (Do the arithmetic, she's a fast worker.)
The bees are the reception committee awaiting her return home. Those in the extra are exposing scent glands on their bums (the bright spots) and flapping their wings madly to send pheromones far and wide to guide Her Ladyship safely home. When I visit next week, there should be plenty of eggs, up to half a dozen to a cell. New queens have difficulty controlling their new found ovipositors well enough to put a single egg in each cell; in the meantime, the loyal workers will follow her to tidy up the chaos she leaves as she passes by.