Making Increase without Queen Cells

[idg]

Can you make increase by following an AS method, before Queen cells are present. Will the nurse bees develop a queen cell from the eggs in the brood? Will the quality of the queen be any good, or is this what they call a scrub queen?

 

[Erichalfbee]

Yes you can. You need to make sure that both splits are viable, 7 frames of brood or 5 if using a split board. The Q+ goes on the old site and the new part can go next to it. There are arguments for and against using emergency raised queens. Lots think the quality is no different.

 

[Anduril]

Speaking to a beekeeper doing one of the demonstrations at the Welsh Convention, colleague of Wally Shaw. He said new scientific research demonstrates emergency queens are very good, bees know best. Just as good as grafting if not better. Agree with above.

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

I suppose if you can see eggs (I can't see a dam thing through my veil; a problem I really need to address) you weight them to the Q- side?

 

[itma]

Can you make increase by following an AS method, before Queen cells are present. Will the nurse bees develop a queen cell from the eggs in the brood? Will the quality of the queen be any good, or is this what they call a scrub queen?

Yes.
Ignore talk about "scrub queens".
Concern yourself instead with where the drones are going to come from to mate with her.

But you do need a decently strong colony (with lots of nurse/baby bees) and a good stored supply of pollen.
The trick is to do it before the bees dictate that you do it!

 

[idg]

Yes.
Ignore talk about "scrub queens".
Concern yourself instead with where the drones are going to come from to mate with her.

But you do need a decently strong colony (with lots of nurse/baby bees) and a good stored supply of pollen.
The trick is to do it before the bees dictate that you do it!

Thanks for the advice. I have drone cells in my hive so I would think that in three weeks when a queen emerges, they will be flying. Is this not a better option than waiting for queen cells, that I might miss??

I still have to find the scarlet pimpernel though (HM)!! Ah, there's the rub!!

 

[drstitson]

"I have drone cells in my hive so I would think that in three weeks when a queen emerges, they will be flying"

you want drones from OTHER hives to be flying AND mature when virgin HM makes her mating flights.

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

"I have drone cells in my hive so I would think that in three weeks when a queen emerges, they will be flying"

you want drones from OTHER hives to be flying AND mature when virgin HM makes her mating flights.

How strongly "discouraged" is sibling mating in AM?

 

[Erichalfbee]

How strongly "discouraged" is sibling mating in AM?

Not discouraged per se, I think.
Rather, it's less likely the larger the drone congregation area where the queen flies to mate.
In prolonged bad weather Apiary Vicinity matings occur in which case it would be more likely.

 

[Hivemaker.]

In prolonged bad weather Apiary Vicinity matings occur in which case it would be more likely.

Apiary Vicinity matings also happen in prolonged perfect weather conditions for mating.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Ah.....do they? I didn't know that.
Thanks for correcting me. I shall go read up about it.

 

[jd101k2000]

Would I be correct in thinking that 'apiary matings' are more likely to result in diploid drone brood? (In other words you are more likely to get them with in-breeding.)

 

[JEP]

Yes, the more inbreeding the more diploid drone brood (although you won't see it because the workers eat the eggs). This will result in a smaller colony at the point in the season when the queen is laying as fast as she can. This is only one of the many problems of inbreeding in bees.

 

[rolande]

new scientific research demonstrates emergency queens are very good

Does anyone have a link to this research that they're able to post?

 

[JEP]

The reality is that it depends what you mean by emergency queens. Most queens reared commercially are started under emergency conditions i.e. in a queenless hive and they can also be completed under emergency conditions. This is fine as long as the colony is massive and the larvae are reared from eggs / very young larvae. If by emergency queens you mean simply splitting a hive into two (or more) parts then the queens you get will be very variable. Many of these queens will be capable of building up a colony that can gather a crop and overwinter but they will not on average be as good as queens reared by well planned queen rearing.

Having said all this on a small scale the simple splitting method provides beekeepers with control i.e. it can be done before swarming and there is little to go wrong with it. You can improve your chances by only splitting large hives to improve larval feeding and inserting eggs by the Hopkins method to ensure that queens are reared as queens right from the start.

 

[Finman]

.http://www.medwelljournals.com/fulltext/?doi=javaa.2009.1083.1085

Productivity of queen bee depends on her age, breed, breeding term, weight in emergency, age of larvae and grafting methods, number of ovariol, diameter of spermatheca, number of spermatozoa in spermatheca and if she has anatomical disorder or not (Wen and Chong, 1985). One of the most important factors, affecting queen quality is the age of larvae. According as the increase in the age of larvae grafted, a significant decrease has been observed in the body weight, the size of spermatheca diameter and the number of ovarioles in virgin queens (Woyke, 1967).

********
In all studies about emergency queens it is reported that emerged queens are
made from 3 days old larvae. Bees rear a while younger larvae but those cells will be destroyed.

The feeding time of larva if 5 days. In emergency cases feeding time is 2-3 days.

As said before, if you look yourself the capped emergency pupa, you see that there is no extra food in the cells. In normal queen cells there are extra dried food inside the cell when queen is ready.

*******
If you graft queen larvae, you will see that bees often prefer to nurse emergency cells better than grafted cells. So it is not odd that some grafted queen may be worse than emergency queen. But then we talk about missfortune in queen rearing. You graft 20 larvae and you may get 5 queens.

I tired on this game and I rear my queens in swarming cells. I change the larvae.

.

 

[rolande]

Hence my interest in a link to this 'scientific research' because without knowing how they reached their conclusions it's not possible to know the context in which it should be taken.

 

[Finman]

The reality is that it depends what you mean by emergency queens .

It is very clear what it means. The colony starts to rear new queen from worker cell and enlarge it to queen cells. According researches hatched queens are from 3 days old larvae.

Even you can change the younger larvae to emergency cells but then it is queen rearing method.

Why 3 days old larvae? Because all worker cells are feeded with royal jelly during first 3 days. To get a queen from 4 days old larva is not possible.

 

[Finman]

Hence my interest in a link to this 'scientific research' because without knowing how they reached their conclusions it's not possible to know the context in which it should be taken.

Most of beekeepers tend to say what ever and they do not change their opinions even if you put 20 researches under their nose. I have known much those guys.

.

 

[BILL.HEARD]

"I have drone cells in my hive so I would think that in three weeks when a queen emerges, they will be flying"

you want drones from OTHER hives to be flying AND mature when virgin HM makes her mating flights.

You must allow for at least two weeks for drones to become potent, that's circa 37 days from the egg stage. Drones should be seen flying for about a week before any queens emerge from cells.