best mating box?

[beeboybee]

should i get lucky and get some swarms i am thinking a trying some queen rearing any recommendations on mating hives?

 

[For want of a better word]

Keilers are easy to use.

You are quite right about requeening swarms..... but you may struggle to produce quality mated queens with just one colony.
Also for the Keiler mating hive you need a lot of young brood bees... a coffee mug full for each one!

 

[fiftyjon]

Keilers are easy to use.

I find Apideas are also easy to use and I have had success with them although they can be a bit small for big hands.

 

[verney]

Keilers are easy to use.

First year I own a mating nuc so not able to compare. I went with Kielers as they can be used for overwintering queens by adding "supers". Some even overwinter without those supers but losses without seem to be bit high. Planning on trying overwinter next winter.

 

[beeboybee]

Ha my post is slightly misleading.... Swarms- I need some bees to get up and running again this year, after I lost both my colonies last winter.
Queen rearing - mating- I now plan to have more than two colonies in the future as insurance and having no bees is just plain boring I now have time to do DIY and tidying the office......

 

[itma]

Invest in some ordinary nucs first, as they are more generally usable.
/ and yes, I would suggest poly - not least for faster colony build-up.

Then build plural strong healthy colonies before thinking of deliberately producing QCs to go into Apideas.
Begin by aiming to get well on top of varroa (and any other problems) as the very first step to getting those "strong healthy colonies" for next year.

/ and then think about WHICH of your stocks you want to choose to be breeding from ...

 

[nonstandard]

I have both apideas and keiler mating hives, I didn't have any great success with either last year but it was a poor year.
I much prefer the keiler as I found the apidea a bit fiddly for my average sized hands (for a man) also the dark interior made it difficult to spot the queen at times.
I have raised and mated queens in both types but as yet have not managed to overwinter any.
I will probably be ordering more keilers soon as I have received a nicot cup kit for my birthday and will need to get all these queens mated that I'm going to raise


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Tim1606]

I found last year that whenever i wanted to pick a queen from the apideas she was nearly always on the bottom. With the size of my hands and the fact that my hand kept getting jammed in, i decided that making 40 of hivemakers nucs was the answer.
Apart from being slightly bigger the system is perfect. Picking the queens out is so much easier now for me.

 

[beeboybee]

Any pictures or plans of Hivemakers box's? I like the look of the bivo box standard frame that fold into three to fit in small nuc box

 

[theengraver]

The Bibo box frames seem a good idea but remember when the covered in bees and your looking for the queen you have to open them up crushing bees in the hinges and when your finished you have to fold them back up when your finished. and have the problem of crushing bees.

PS The Hivemaker mating nuc you asked for plans of is in fact Michael Colliers Own design

 

[derekm]

First year I own a mating nuc so not able to compare. I went with Kielers as they can be used for overwintering queens by adding "supers". Some even overwinter without those supers but losses without seem to be bit high. Planning on trying overwinter next winter.

RE Overwintering : you need to at least double the insulation on mating nucs just to get level of heat loss back to the originsl level for that type of construction.(heat loss per unit volume for same density of bees)

 

[masterBK]

If the queen isn't on the combs I don't bother trying to fish her out of the bottom of an Apidea. I remove the combs then mist the bees inside the apidea hive with water and then shake them all out into a large plastic box /washing up bowl . The queen is then more easily seen and captured for marking/putting into an introduction cage for introducing elsewhere. Combs are replaced, Apidea inverted, floor opened, bees knocked into a corner by giving the bowl a sharp thump so they can then be tipped back into the bottom of the Apidea. Floor closed and one hour later I can then introduce another queen cell.

 

[beekeeping4you]

If the queen isn't on the combs I don't bother trying to fish her out of the bottom of an Apidea. I remove the combs then mist the bees inside the apidea hive with water and then shake them all out into a large plastic box /washing up bowl . The queen is then more easily seen and captured for marking/putting into an introduction cage for introducing elsewhere. Combs are replaced, Apidea inverted, floor opened, bees knocked into a corner by giving the bowl a sharp thump so they can then be tipped back into the bottom of the Apidea. Floor closed and one hour later I can then introduce another queen cell.

Good suggestion, especially if they are slightly overcrowded, I will try that soon...

Regards
Reiner

 

[Teemore]

As with Reiner, I will be consciously using masterBK's tip this year. Another fine example of the wealth of information and common sense on this forum. (Inadvertently did this last year but hadn't really properly appreciated the benefits or thought about using it more widely: I use a plastic tub to collect bees to populate apideas etc. and had this to hand when trying to get a queen out of a mating nuc. She was on the floor and rather than faff around trying not to squash her, I tipped the whole lot into the tub where she was much easier to pick up.)

 

[Cellectronic]

Its so frustrating having more hives than bees. Good luck with your swarm catching, I have 3 bait boxes out at the mo and keeping my fingers crossed.
I lost 1 colony over winter so I have 1 left, but eager to increase.