Determining Queen Status

Queen status refers to the health and presence of a queen bee in an inspected colony. This is determined by physically spotting the queen, signs of her presence, or lack thereof. Use the table below to accurately record the queen status in your colonies.

Abbreviation ​	Queen Status ​	Observations
QS	Queen Seen	Queen seen while sampling. ​If seen marked with a color: QS-[W, B, G, etc)] ​
QR ​	Queen Right	Queen was not seen, but eggs or young brood are present
QNS	Queen Not Seen	Queen, eggs and young brood not seen, but appears queen right
VQ	Virgin Queen	Virgin queen seen or recently emerged queen cell indicating VQ is present
DL	Drone Layer	Lots of drone brood present, oftentimes laid in worker cells
QL	Queenless	Queen not seen, no eggs or young brood present, colony may be more defensive, “runny” bees
LW	Laying Worker ​	Colony is hopelessly queenless and has developed laying worker(s), multiple eggs per cell, often on the side walls, all drone brood
QS-M[letter of color]	Queen Seen - Marked ​	Queen was seen and you marked her during this visit. (ex: QS-MB, if seen and marked Blue)

This video we created for the Bee Informed Partnership Sentinel Apiary Program in 2021 highlights how to determine your queen status and notate your findings.