Beemaster's International Beekeeping Forum
BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. => Topic started by: TwT on August 29, 2004, 12:47:30 pm
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I have been thinking about buying some bees from draper's and i wanted to know if anyone here has bought any and could tell me what they think of Drapers bees , i want the Allstar, Russian, and the SMR from them (Drapers)????
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I could be wrong, but if memory serves me, I bought some queens from Draper's a few years back, and they actually came from York Bees.
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I am in Ithaca New York and have gotten Bees from Draper's this year and last year. Last year I had purchased one package and I lost my Queen early. That may have been due to my own inexperience, but I also heard it was a bad year for Queens. This year I bought 2 packages from Draper's and both are doing well, one is doing excellent. I am now a seasoned beekeeper :lol: so I get some of the credit for my increased success. One thing I made sure of this year was getting the bees to my hive ASAP. I called ahead to find out when the packages were arriving at Draper's and I was there later that day. I then took the bees DIRECTLY to my apiary and installed them into their new homes. I figure the bees were in transit not more than 48 hours. All in all I would say the people at Draper's were very helpful and I would not hesitate to buy from them again. I particularly like the fact that if you call them up, you will actually get to talk to someone named DRAPER. A family run business run by family members who have a stake in the success and reputation of the company. Good Luck. By the way, I got Italian bees and can't speak about the other varieties. tj
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Since TwT is in Georgia, I would recommend trying to find a closer supplier, since Draper does not raise their own bees, but goes South to pick them up.
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The package I bought from Draper's this spring was drop shipped from York. The timing for shipment was off by about two weeks from when they were scheduled to be delivered; when I called Draper's, they said that York had invoiced them, so the bees must have been shipped. York doesn't answer their phone, but do take email. They eventually did arrive, and I was not unhappy. They were in the mail only two days, and there were only about a dozen dead ones in the 3 lbs. package. I may, though, do it differently next spring, and pick my packages up from a more local producer, if I can find one.
-- Kris
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you just said the thing Robo, the my old beekeeping buddie told me today that i dont need to order them yankey bees lol(because of travel time down here, stress on the bees) but that i needed to go with him and about a hour drive and get me some nuc's from the people that supply Brushy mountain with there bees, so sence im doing that , im not going to start with 3 hives , im going with atlest 5 lol
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I may, though, do it differently next spring, and pick my packages up from a more local producer, if I can find one.
-- Kris
Kris,
You might want to consider doing splits from your hives, or put the word out and get some swarms if you don't have SHBs.
Buying package bees will drastically increase your chances of getting SHBs.
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I have been thinking about buying some bees from draper's and i wanted to know if anyone here has bought any and could tell me what they think of Drapers bees , i want the Allstar, Russian, and the SMR from them (Drapers)????
What is Russian bee? Does it have other name? Kaukasian or...
I hives are 50 km from Russian border, but I do not know, what is Russian. But from Google I can find that it means Primorsky bee. Many have tried Primorsky bee, but it is not sold professionally.
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here is a site that tell about the russian bees here in the USA
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/1999/990805.htm
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According to York Bee website they are closing their doors and not accepting any more orders. It appears that Draper will have to get their bees from someone else now.
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here is a site that tell about the russian bees here in the USA
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/1999/990805.htm
That is a little bit old story. I got a report from Finnish professional beekeeper in our forum. The case is not clear. One man sell Russin bees in Finland, but they are imported direct from Russia, not from USA breeding project.
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see the russian bees here in the USA came from Primorsky region of russia, and thats the bees that we call russian bees in america, yes they were in the breeding program and the program was to raise them and sell them to big time beekeepers to distribute across the USA so beekeeper like myself could have a mite resistant bee . that's the only way i can explain russian bees in the USA.
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[quote="Robo]You might want to consider doing splits from your hives, or put the word out and get some swarms if you don't have SHBs.[/quote]
I'd certainly like to split off my own hive. With having just one hive, I'm not assured that resource will be there for me after the winter. :-( Kind of a Catch-22 situation: if I don't order package bees in December/January, then if I discover my one hive didn't make it through the winter, it'll be too late to order. Because I'd like to expand my bee yard to 3-5 hives next year, two packages would give me insurance that, at the very least, I won't be stuck in the one-hive predicament next year. And if I can get one or two splits out of my existing hive, well then I'm right on goal! I'm also interested in trying my hand at comb honey, and I understand you need a strong initial colony when the flow starts in the spring. So I dunno yet, but I got some time to decide yet.
-- Kris
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Well there ya go. Take your existing colony and build it up fast in the spring by feeding it. When the flow starts, make a cut down split, and put your comb honey super on. The small split should come around pretty fast, because they will be on drawn comb, and have the laying queen.. The colony with the section super will be boiling over. After you harvest the sections, you can add regular supers back on and keep making honey. 2 birds with one stone. Making good sections is fun and challenging. Just keep an eye on them. To do it well.. you have to crowd them up and you know what bees do when they are crowded.