Harvesting capped Queen cells prior to moving to an incubator

[Seán_Lad]

Hi all, I'm new to queen raring, I have a have that has managed to draw out 8 Q cells on a single frame, I was hoping to harvest once capped and move into an incubator, eggs where from a artificially mated pure AAM Queen who seems to have an excellent temperament trait and lays very well. The question is how much time do I have between delicately removing the cells from the frame and moving to an incubator, and what is the recommended temperature and humidity, I've seen very varying opinions so far regarding temp ans humidity. Any other advice is appreciated

 

[jeff33]

Might be challenging to put these in an incubator. I would rather make some mating nucs and put Qcs in each when they are a couple of days away from emerging.
I only use my incubator for grafted cells as they are in nicot cups and rollers and can be kept vertically without issues. Temp is 35c max and I can't measure humidity in mine but it must be high

 

[Swarm]

Hi all, I'm new to queen raring, I have a have that has managed to draw out 8 Q cells on a single frame, I was hoping to harvest once capped and move into an incubator, eggs where from a artificially mated pure AAM Queen who seems to have an excellent temperament trait and lays very well. The question is how much time do I have between delicately removing the cells from the frame and moving to an incubator, and what is the recommended temperature and humidity, I've seen very varying opinions so far regarding temp ans humidity. Any other advice is appreciated

Get yourself a scalpel or a very sharp pen knife, it's a delicate operation and you need to allow plenty of room around each cell. I generally have an egg box with me when harvesting cells and once done they are popped into the vehicle where it is warm before I close up the hive. Some people use mobile incubators in their vehicles to transport them from the apiary but I've never found it necessary, just don't hang about too long.
Temperature at 35 degrees and humidity around 60 but I have to admit, after some experimenting, I've had no issues with ambient humidity but a piece of damp sponge in your incubator should do the job nicely.
I carefully tidy up the cells, removing excess wax so that they fit nicely into the Nicot caps for the roller cages.
The difficulty you will find there is they have clustered the cells so probably best to forfeit some in favour of the best looking cells.
When encouraging cell building, I like to use a couple of frames with eggs and young larvae, this way the cells are more spread out and you are able to use the frames directly into mating nucs, while still having the option to harvest a few as well.

 

[Seán_Lad]

Get yourself a scalpel or a very sharp pen knife, it's a delicate operation and you need to allow plenty of room around each cell. I generally have an egg box with me when harvesting cells and once done they are popped into the vehicle where it is warm before I close up the hive. Some people use mobile incubators in their vehicles to transport them from the apiary but I've never found it necessary, just don't hang about too long.
Temperature at 35 degrees and humidity around 60 but I have to admit, after some experimenting, I've had no issues with ambient humidity but a piece of damp sponge in your incubator should do the job nicely.
I carefully tidy up the cells, removing excess wax so that they fit nicely into the Nicot caps for the roller cages.
The difficulty you will find there is they have clustered the cells so probably best to forfeit some in favour of the best looking cells.
When encouraging cell building, I like to use a couple of frames with eggs and young larvae, this way the cells are more spread out and you are able to use the frames directly into mating nucs, while still having the option to harvest a few as well.

Just to update, the incubator worked and so far 1 has emerged out of the five I was able to carefully remove from the frame, plan is to introduce her to a wee mating hive with a few bees and hopefully she gets lucky. Hopeful more may emerge!

 

[Andy]

The Apiarist made a home made incubator and I think he was looking at 90% humidity. You need less when the queens have emerged.

 

[Swarm]

Just to update, the incubator worked and so far 1 has emerged out of the five I was able to carefully remove from the frame, plan is to introduce her to a wee mating hive with a few bees and hopefully she gets lucky. Hopeful more may emerge!

That's good news.
I did a little batch of four cells recently and all four were successful, I took them to a friend's apiary on the weekend.

 

[Swarm]

The Apiarist made a home made incubator and I think he was looking at 90% humidity. You need less when the queens have emerged.

I've not bothered with the humidity setting for the last couple of years, the reading has been around forty this season.