Taylormade Queens

[skflyfish]

I just bought a couple of nucs from our local Pro Beek, who made these up during his overwintering in Florida. According to his stick pin info, they contained Taylormade Queens from BeeWeaver. He thinks they are actually from Australia. Unfortunately one of the queens was MIA, but the other one looked like a Russian queen. Very black. Not like the picture on their site.

I am wondering if anyone has any experiences with this queen from BeeWeaver? The writeup by BeeWeaver sounds pretty interesting, because of their fast build up.

I have a swarm I collected from one of his local pollination sites and he thought the queen was Australian. After appearing to be a dead out from winter, they are building up this spring at break-neck speed and are my strongest hive. Again this year they fly when the temps are in the high 30s.

Thx,

Jay

[AllenF]

I used some of their All Star queens one year.   One of the hives turned hot when they replaced one of the All Star queens.   Did fine besides that.  And the Taylormade queens are from downunder.   Now there's some shipping.  I don't know how they will far with mites though.

[skflyfish]

Thanks!

[BjornBee]

"He thinks......."

Absolutely amazing.... :roll:

So if Taylormade queens are not from Australia, what other choices did he mention. Where else are Taylormade queen's being produced?

[skflyfish]

"He thinks......."

Absolutely amazing.... :roll:

So if Taylormade queens are not from Australia, what other choices did he mention. Where else are Taylormade queen's being produced?

I am not sure what you are getting at?

Right now, with our very early spring he has been hustling like crazy to get his bees up from Florida and to his orchard contracts up here, and distributing the nucs he made up in Florida. He had truckers lined up for a normal deliver, but had to find truck 3 weeks sooner than normal. He is a heck of a nice guy, but doesn't have a lot of time to talk right now, with delivering hives at night and nucs during the day. So his mention of them being from Australia was more of a fact, but he didn't elaborate enough for me to firmly say they were from Australia. I think he found them in an add in a Bee Journal, though I don't know which one and I don't get any journals to look.

He also had some nucs made up with Kona Queens and Kona/Carniolan crosses, but I was too late to get one of those. But where the Taylormade queens come from, there is no fact on BeeWeavers site, but maybe in their add.

Hope this clears it up.

Jay

[BjornBee]

My point was it was indicated they had taylormade queens, then stated he "thought" they were from Australia.

As a side note for discussion....I'm not a fan of weak genetic stock from Australia. I'm also not a fan of a breeder or supplier being less than 100% sure of the stock origin that one is selling. ("I'm not sure the origins of the queen" is not a good trait of a quality operation selling to beginners or hobbyists) I'm also not a fan of queens or nucs coming from stressed pollination units of commercial/migratory sources. Of course I am biased as a supplier myself. But there are many things going on in the bee industry, including pesticide issues, CCD, and other items. And most I talk to realize that queens/nucs/packages are far less quality than what we were getting just a few years ago. So somewhere, something needs to be considered and something needs to change. Good quality stock, from uncontaminated hives, not used in migratory operations, may just be something to consider if we are to get better in the future. And not getting queen stock from origins where there is no mite exposure (Australia), may just be an item to consider.

My point was, if they are taylormade queens, they are from Australia. At least I'm not aware of Taylor having a operation here in the states.

[skflyfish]

And I thought that the Taylormade name was borrowing from the golf name.  :-D After more Googling I see that Warren Taylor in Australia provides the Taylormade queens, both Italian and Carniolan.

I think you make some good points. For a relative newbie like myself, I am still trying to understand all of this. In my neck of the woods (35 mile radius) there are only two pro-beeks that one can buy nucs or packages from. One sells packages he buys in Georgia and the other nucs he makes up from his pollination hives. But also, that means that we only have two experienced folks to chat with locally. While I really enjoy this forum a lot, I can't easily go to your yard and watch and learn. Or ride with you to your contracts as a way of getting some one on one time.

The pro-beek pollinator, like I said, is a really nice guy. But the way of the bee business makes one do some things l wouldn't want to do. Having your bees in an orchard while they spray chemical thinning solution is something I wouldn't do. But he has to live with it. And I agree with you, if I understand you correctly, that it is part of the overall problem with the bees.

This guy usually makes his nucs up with queens from Heitkam, except for early spring, so I was curious as to the queen's source from a swarm I collected from one of his hives. Because it built up so fast, it could have been a Taylormade queen. It did survive a Michigan winter, which is a good test. Having the hive live a couple of seasons will be another good test.

For me, I do bees cause I love working with them and learning about them. I don't want my bees to be treated, nor sent on pollination contracts or put in harms way, if I can help it. I did give him one hive to keep for the winter that were bees from the original swarm, but with a Heitkam queen. They had zero stores going into winter, so they made it by going to Florida and elsewhere. He will be giving me them back soon and I am going to quarantine them to another area and see how they do. But for the most part I feel more like a bee refuge than anything else.

Thx,

Jay

[skflyfish]

Well I found out more to this story, on another forum.

Apparently our bees often don't like accepting queens from another continent. To have good acceptance rates for Australian queens, the nucs must be made with all capped brood. If there are eggs or proper aged larva, the bees will superceed, almost immediatley, the Australian queens, and at a high rate. I talked to the beek I bought the nucs from and he wasn't aware of this anomaly. He made his nucs with frames that had capped brood, larva and eggs.

So the black queen I got was probably raised from an egg or young larva from a Carniolan frame that was put in the nuc.

So the good news is I don't have any Australian genetics to worry about. The bad news is the money the beek spent on Aussie queens was not well spent, as a lot were probably superceeded.

Jay