matting NUC question

[johnwratcliff]

Hey folks, I'm planning on raising a few queens next year. I have some old deeps that are not being used. I'll also have some 5 frame boxes as well. I'm going to partition them of into sections... Like a queen castle. I don't plan on making more then 100 queens. I plan on taking a few frames of brood from my nucs to fill the matting boxes. Which will be 3 frames on the queen castles and two frames on my 5 frame boxes. Are queen castles a good way to go? I don't want to used the mini nucs just because my operation is too small and I just don't want to deal with more disparate equipment. I have been reading books...brother Adam and jay smith. Watched several hours of video over the Las few months.

[Culley]

How many frames of brood will you need to take from your nucs etc?

[johnwratcliff]

I'll have to take a couple per nuc. I'm going let my nucs grow to three deeps allowing me to use the extra brood.

[BeeMaster2]

How many hives do you have?
It takes a lot of bees to make 100 mated queens.
Jim

[johnwratcliff]

I have 21 colonies. I'm not going to make 100 queens....unless something changes like i buy additional colonies. But I'm going to try to raise some for my summer splits and I'd like to requeen at the end of summer hopefully give me a strong young queen going into the winter.

[rookie2531]

Like Jim says, it takes a lot for the mated. Not so much for the virgin queens, but mating them with your regular size frames takes a lot of resources and care and feed. Once your queens are mated, if there isn't enough bees to take care of all duties, it will grow very slow because she won't lay as many as she could be if there were more bees. Plus less foragers, so you will most likely feed because flows don't last long enough. And then there is robbing and pest.

Making too many, too fast cost alot of time, energy and money, but you can do it if you are ready. 20:100 is possible, but would be too demanding for me.

Just re-read your last post. Once mated, you plan on replacing existing queens, so sounds more like maybe just doubling from 20 to go to 40 ish. Sounds much easier.

[johnwratcliff]

I'm going to split unproductive hives and replace old queens. Reality is that ill hopefully make 40-50 queens. Any more ill give to a friend or other club members

[Culley]

Good luck, let us know how you go.

[capt44]

I am starting next spring with 400 mating Nucs and I'm wondering if I am going to be able to keep up with the demand.
I'm gonna be busier'n a cat in a sand box come spring for sure.