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Author Topic: Queen Rearing  (Read 65607 times)

Offline danno1800

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Nicot
« Reply #20 on: August 03, 2006, 12:13:32 pm »
I have raised queens several times using the Nicot system. I have never used the Jenter system. I have found the Nicot system very easy to use with one caveat: if you use it during a strong honey flow, the workers will store some honey in the plastic cells. They are DIFFICULT to clean out if they are stuffed with unripened honey. Other than that, they work very well. I hope this helps you decide. I strongly encourage you to try raising some queens.

Offline CWBees

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #21 on: August 12, 2007, 10:47:20 pm »
I have used the Nicot system. Today I tried grafting and will have to see how it goes.
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A swarm in July isn't worth a fly.

Offline bolkar

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #22 on: May 13, 2009, 09:25:56 am »
hello i am bolkar  i living turkey

i read this page nicot system and i don't know this system

please tell me  this system and details...

Offline Robo

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #23 on: May 13, 2009, 09:48:44 am »
hello i am bolkar  i living turkey

i read this page nicot system and i don't know this system

please tell me  this system and details...

Details here -> http://www.betterbee.com/products.asp?dept=631
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Offline bolkar

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #24 on: May 13, 2009, 10:09:57 am »
thanks a lot...

Offline Acebird

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #25 on: January 14, 2011, 02:41:57 pm »
Does it make any sense to raise your own queens if you only intend to have a couple of hives?
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Offline Michael Bush

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #26 on: January 15, 2011, 12:38:10 am »
>Does it make any sense to raise your own queens if you only intend to have a couple of hives?

Why rear your own queens?
o  Cost. A typical queen costs the beekeeper about $20 counting shipping and may cost considerably more.

o  Time. In an emergency you order a queen and it takes several days to make arrangements and get the queen. Often you need a queen yesterday. If you have some in mating nucs, on hand, then you already have a queen.

o  Availability. Often when you need a queen there are none available from suppliers. Again, if you have one on hand availability is not a problem.

o  AHB. Southern raised queens are more and more from Africanized Honey Bee areas. In order to keep AHB out of the North we should stop importing queens from those areas.

o  Acclimatized bees. It's unreasonable to expect bees bred in the deep South to winter well in the far North. Local feral stock is acclimatized to our local climate. Even breeding from commercial stock, you can breed from the ones that winter well here.

o  Mite and disease resistance. Tracheal mite resistance is an easy trait to breed for. Just don't treat and you'll get resistant bees. Hygienic behavior, which is helpful to avoid AFB (American Foulbrood) and other brood diseases as well as Varroa mite problems, is also easy to breed for by testing for hygienic behavior in our breeder queens. And yet hardly any queen breeders are breeding for these traits. The genetics of our queens if far too important to be left to people who don't have a stake in their success. People selling queens and bees actually make more money selling replacement queens and bees when the bees fail. Now I'm not saying they are purposely trying to raise queens that fail, but I am saying they have no financial incentive to produce queens that don't. Basically to cash in on the benefits of not treating, you need to be rearing your own queens.

o  Quality. Nothing is more important to success in beekeeping than the queen. The quality of your queens can often surpass that of a queen breeder. You have the time to spend to do things that a commercial breeder cannot afford to do. For instance, research has shown that a queen that is allowed to lay up until it's 21 days will be a better queen with better developed ovarioles than one that is banked sooner. A longer wait will help even more, but that first 21 days is much more critical. A commercial queen producer typically looks for eggs at two weeks and if there are any it is banked and eventually shipped. You can let yours develop better by spending more time.

http://bushfarms.com/beesqueenrearing.htm

If you just want to rear a few, here's a simple plan:


http://bushfarms.com/beesafewgoodqueens.htm
My website:  bushfarms.com/bees.htm en espanol: bushfarms.com/es_bees.htm  auf deutsche: bushfarms.com/de_bees.htm  em portugues:  bushfarms.com/pt_bees.htm
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Offline Acebird

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #27 on: January 15, 2011, 10:19:31 am »
Quote
If you just want to rear a few, here's a simple plan:

Thank you, thank you, thank you, this is more like it for the jamoke that really doesn’t know what he is doing.

In my mind what I am seeing is these mating nucs are just miniature hives.  There are two things that I don’t comprehend about this process:

1. What encourages the queen to go back to this little hive and start laying eggs after going off tramping in the woods on her maiden flight with the neighborhood boys?
2. How long can she stay in this mating nuc before she says, the heck with this I want a bigger house with a new front porch and off she goes.

If I had two hives to start with am I not going to end up with six hives when all is said and done?  I think six hives will raise attention in our little oasis and send up a red flag that bans us from having any hives.  I don’t want to go there.
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Offline Michael Bush

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #28 on: January 15, 2011, 11:35:40 pm »
>1. What encourages the queen to go back to this little hive and start laying eggs after going off tramping in the woods on her maiden flight with the neighborhood boys?

Instinct.

>2. How long can she stay in this mating nuc before she says, the heck with this I want a bigger house with a new front porch and off she goes.

Until it gets crowded and they start to backfill the brood cells with honey.  A turnover of brood is 21 days, so it will take at least that long or longer AFTER she starts laying which is usually two weeks after she emerges.

>If I had two hives to start with am I not going to end up with six hives when all is said and done?

Or two hives and four or so nucs.

>  I think six hives will raise attention in our little oasis and send up a red flag that bans us from having any hives.  I don’t want to go there.

Having spare queens in nucs is a plus.  You can always pick a young prolific queen and keep her and remove an old one and combine as many as you like.  Good times to combine are just before the flow (so they have more bees) and going into winter to boost a smaller hive.
My website:  bushfarms.com/bees.htm en espanol: bushfarms.com/es_bees.htm  auf deutsche: bushfarms.com/de_bees.htm  em portugues:  bushfarms.com/pt_bees.htm
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Offline Acebird

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #29 on: January 16, 2011, 09:35:23 am »
Michael, I did a lot of reading on your site which I think will be very helpful to me in the future.  It has great organization making it easy to find something you are looking for.  Thanks.

I got to tell you this story.  Last year as a new beek we had a lot of mishaps with our first hive.  Not knowing that you can’t move a hive a short distance we nearly had a catastrophe.  Now thinking about that and creating these nucs within the same bee yard as the hive why don’t the bees that go along with the brood that you pull from the hive just go back to the original hive when they come back from the field?

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Offline Michael Bush

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #30 on: January 16, 2011, 09:48:00 am »
My mating nucs are a frame of brood with bees, a frame of honey with bees and maybe the bees shaken off another frame of brood.  The brood anchors them pretty well and the extra shake of bees is enough to make up for what returns to the old hive.
My website:  bushfarms.com/bees.htm en espanol: bushfarms.com/es_bees.htm  auf deutsche: bushfarms.com/de_bees.htm  em portugues:  bushfarms.com/pt_bees.htm
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Offline BBees

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #31 on: January 16, 2011, 12:01:05 pm »
Hi Ace,
>Now thinking about that and creating these nucs within the same bee yard as the hive why don’t the bees that go along with the brood that you pull from the hive just go back to the original hive when they come back from the field?<

Those that forage do.

During the first 3 weeks of a worker bee's life she's a "house" bee, staying in the hive. Roughly, the first week is spent as a nurse bee. That's when her hypopharyngeal glands are developed allowing her to produce that all important royal jelly and feed the queen and larva. The second week is when she's capable of producing wax and building comb. The third week is when the poison glands develop and her main duty is being a guard bee. Basically,  during her first three weeks of life, she'll stay with the brood and won't fly away. After that first three weeks, her wing muscles are developed enough, she gets her pilots license and assumes her next role as a foraging bee, flying out of the hive and returning to her original hive location with her load of nectar, pollen, water, or propolis.

That being said, when we try to rear queens, it's really important to transfer frames with very young bees to our nucs with the capacity to feed and fill the queen cells with royal jelly.

In setting up nucs in the same bee yard as the donor hive, since these 0-3 week old bees don't really fly off to forage, these non-flying bees stay where you put the frames or where you shake them (in the nuc.) The older, foraging bees, will fly out to forage and return to the original location of the donor hive, (unless this nuc is moved a couple of miles so they can't "find" the original donor hive location.)

We can use this behavior of foragers returning to the location of the donor hive to our advantage if we move the donor hive from the original hive stand and place the nuc on the original hive stand. It really boosts the population of bees in that nuc as those foragers return to that original donor hive location. Can also be used for other methods of strengthening weak hives, splits, divides, and making increase because foragers returning to the original location (whether it's their original hive or not) with a load of nectar or pollen are usually welcomed without fighting.

Sorry if it's a bit long winded, but hope this helps. Winter bee biology is a little different, best left for another thread.
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Offline Acebird

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #32 on: January 16, 2011, 02:02:46 pm »
This is absolutely great info.

Is it a correct assumption that if a brood frame is covered with bees these bees will be the nurse bees or will it be a mix of bees?

What would the acceptable distance be between the nuc hive and the original hive if they were placed in the same yard?  I don't think the wife is going to be agreeable to moving the original hive.  We both don't feel comfortable about bringing the trap out bees from the barn in Vernon to our bee yard just yet if they should survive the winter.

BBees, Maybe you could help me with the trap out in Vernon seeing as how we are close?
« Last Edit: January 16, 2011, 02:30:46 pm by Acebird »
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Offline BBees

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #33 on: January 16, 2011, 11:33:02 pm »
>Is it a correct assumption that if a brood frame is covered with bees these bees will be the nurse bees or will it be a mix of bees?<

The more open brood, the more nurse bees.

>What would the acceptable distance be between the nuc hive and the original hive if they were placed in the same yard?<

Depends on the purpose of the nuc and if you want the foragers to stay with the nuc.

>Maybe you could help me with the trap out in Vernon seeing as how we are close?<

Sure, just wait until you can steal a frame of eggs from your hive at home to assure success. Read the following link if you haven't already on trap-outs;   

http://forum.beemaster.com/index.php/topic,20301.0.html
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Offline Michael Bush

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #34 on: January 17, 2011, 12:09:18 am »
>Is it a correct assumption that if a brood frame is covered with bees these bees will be the nurse bees or will it be a mix of bees?

Mostly nurse bees.  Always a mix.  When doing a split I always figure I want to shake in bees from brood frames until I have twice as many bees as I want and half will return.

>What would the acceptable distance be between the nuc hive and the original hive if they were placed in the same yard?

Minimum of on inch... ;)  I usually have them right next to the original hive.  Distance is irrelevant unless you get at least a mile away or more.
My website:  bushfarms.com/bees.htm en espanol: bushfarms.com/es_bees.htm  auf deutsche: bushfarms.com/de_bees.htm  em portugues:  bushfarms.com/pt_bees.htm
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Offline Acebird

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #35 on: January 17, 2011, 09:04:52 am »
Quote
The more open brood, the more nurse bees.

Ah, that's the ticket, open brood.  I didn't catch that at first.  I am assuming capped brood is not a problem or is it?

Quote
Distance is irrelevant unless you get at least a mile away or more.

That is what I was thinking but I wasn't sure.
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Offline Humanbeeing

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #36 on: February 17, 2011, 03:04:45 pm »
For a small beek, just needing a few queens, I think Donald Kuchenmeister (Fat Beeman)suggests the best method. They say swarm cells are the best, so in the spring, take a hive or two or three, condense them down into one box, feed like crazy, and when you have some nice swarm cells, cut them out, split them and add the cells to the queenless nucs or to all of them, or whatever you want to do.
 
As Lawrence John Conner says, "You only graft what you can't see." My over 50 eyeball syndrome makes me well aware of that fact, so, the Hopkins method is my numero uno plan, for the second round of queens for overwintering nucs.
HELP! I accidently used Drone eggs with the Hopkins method and I got Drag Queens!!!

Offline showme714

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #37 on: March 05, 2011, 08:39:50 pm »
Quote from: TwT
hey jerry this site has alot of info on queen rearing

http://website.lineone.net/~dave.cushman/breeding.html

AWFULL SITES! Beekeeping book is squeezed in some sencences.

The way "most do so and so" is no value, it  is not value following if you want to be good. Sorry..

I agree it is an awful site even for 2005 design standards. I'm a web designer and could hardly stand to look at much less read it with no pictures.

Offline TwT

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #38 on: March 07, 2011, 07:01:21 pm »
sorry guy's, hard to find those pretty info sites for you to read, there are many sites out there and if you stumble across one that could help other's, Please post it here! 
THAT's ME TO THE LEFT JUST 5 MONTHS FROM NOW!!!!!!!!

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Offline Humanbeeing

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Re: Queen Rearing
« Reply #39 on: March 07, 2011, 09:38:11 pm »
Just go here:

http://www.pdf-searcher.com/

And type in Grafting Larve, Queen Rearing, No Graft Queen Raising, or what ever you want to read about. You can only read so much, til you have to do it. Just do it. So what could go wrong? Every thing?...then you will know what not to do and you may accidentally rear some queens. Go for it.
HELP! I accidently used Drone eggs with the Hopkins method and I got Drag Queens!!!

 

anything