Monostraining

[OXFORDBEE]

A quick question to one and all...

Has anyone tried monostraining their bees by having a large numbers of hives dotted round their mating apiary?

 

[beebreeder]

My mating apiary is just like that, but an item I was reading the other night on beesource was advocating setting up apiaries at a two to three mile radius from your queen rearing apiary as drones tend to fly out a considerable distance. This still only works if you ahve no other bees near you and in this country most of us will not have isolated apiaries.
Kev
II is the only way to guarantee

 

[OXFORDBEE]

Thanks for the reply...

I've followed the idea of having drone colonies spread out, and have 7 apiaries set up at about 1 to 2.5 miles from the proposed mating apiary site. I've got one (ideally two) more sites to find and then I think I'll have the area fairly saturated with drones. I've hoovered all the papers on congregation areas off the internet I can find for winter reading.

Sounds like I'll have to blow the dust of my II kit.....

 

[beebreeder]

As you know well thats the only way to guarantee what your new queens are, are you working with a particular strain of bee?