When you buy packaged bees by mail, the queen arrives in her own cage. Here's what a queen cage looks like, courtesy of beegirl211 on Flickr:
...which brings us to today's Viewer Mail:
I am a lay bee keeper and have just installed a package of bees in a hive, I looked in the queen wooden block with candy plug and they all looked the same to me, I did not recognize the queen and have some doubts, my question; what are the signs that I should look for that the queen is actually present well and active, and how long after hiving should the signs appear.
Thank you so much
Dempsey
Here's Kirkobeeo's answer: