Beemaster's International Beekeeping Forum
BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. => Topic started by: Haddon on April 29, 2013, 06:40:21 pm
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I dont know what it is but if a hive swarms in my yard we might as well order a queen for the parent hive.
I have no clue why but queens dont make it back after mating flights.
Anyone else have this trouble anyone know what I might be doing to cause it. Maybe its just bad luck but even using queen cells to do splits I have a very low survival rate I dont go in the hives a lot.
I split my 4 hives the on 4/12 and went to check today maybe had 3 queen right they were all the splits non of the parents had queens I even combined a the 4th split with a parent looked like they balled the queen. Anyway this is not the first year I have had the trouble so if anyone has a tip or mistake I am making let me know.
I dont have to make splits for this to happen if a hive swarms and I dont know it you could call it dead most days.
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Sounds like something is catching the Queen's when on their mating flight. Unusual for it to happen each time.d2
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i have swallows that hang around my hives. they fill up on bees morning and night. have had queens lost to them. i also have robins that sit on the hives and eat bees. those i can scare off with whirly gigs :-) i'd guess it's something like that.
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>I have no clue why but queens dont make it back after mating flights.
Swallows? Dragon flies? Other predators?
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I hope yall are right that would me when I open the second yard the survival rate would be better for at least a short time.
Over all I just plan on trying to to convert most all my hive over to Italian or Russian bought queens. I am tried of mean bees and low producers so every time I get a little cash its going to kelley this year. And for someone that lives by the fact I dont buy bees thats a big step but you just cant beat a Italian for building up new hives.