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Author Topic: raising queens with small colonys ?  (Read 5260 times)

Offline Dave360

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raising queens with small colonys ?
« on: December 29, 2010, 09:55:34 pm »
I want to try raising queens this year but dont have any 4 story hives i have 10 hives going into winter most are story and 1/2  and 2 that are 2 story

i only want to raise about 15-20 queens i was wandering if it can be done with hives less than the 4 story hives i hear about

 Thanks

Offline rdy-b

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Re: raising queens with small colonys ?
« Reply #1 on: December 29, 2010, 10:25:54 pm »
  sure thing you can use five frame nuc-its all good- ;) RDY-B

Offline hardwood

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Re: raising queens with small colonys ?
« Reply #2 on: December 29, 2010, 10:29:27 pm »
Just be sure to pack your starter and/or finishers with LOTS of bees.

Scott
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Offline Michael Bush

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Offline JP

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Re: raising queens with small colonys ?
« Reply #4 on: December 30, 2010, 02:05:54 am »
You can make all the queens you want with four frame nucs jam packed with bees. That's the key, you need them jam packed and well fed, as mentioned.

Have fun!


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Offline specialkayme

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Re: raising queens with small colonys ?
« Reply #5 on: December 30, 2010, 04:58:42 am »
Just curious Dave, why do you want to make 15-20 queens if you have 10 hives? Personal growth, or are you looking to sell in the future?

Offline Dave360

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Re: raising queens with small colonys ?
« Reply #6 on: December 30, 2010, 01:56:38 pm »
so it seem the consensus is pack bees into small space like swarm box  can you let them finish cells there  or have to move to finisher hive and if so  can finisher be packed nuc and if so queen right or queenless nuc

 Thanks Dave


I want some queens for both growth and requeening and it seems interesting

 

Offline JP

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Re: raising queens with small colonys ?
« Reply #7 on: December 30, 2010, 05:03:57 pm »
It would be best to move them and a queenless set up.


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Offline fish_stix

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Re: raising queens with small colonys ?
« Reply #8 on: December 30, 2010, 09:19:49 pm »
I usually use full size 8 frame Cloake board hives for queen rearing, but towards the end of our season in Oct-Nov I started using queenless 5 frame nucs since by then we only need a few cells at a time. Pack them with as many nurse bees as you can shake in them and give them a couple frames of capped brood to keep new nurse bees coming. A full frame of pollen and a frame of honey and you're all set. The whole key to queen raising is the number of nurse bees and good nutrition, including feeding syrup while the cells are in there. I grafted 15 cells into each nuc and that seemed to be a good quantity for the hive size; obviously you can do less. We left them in the nucs for finishing and just replenished the nurse bees and capped brood often. Excellent results.  ;)

Offline BjornBee

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Re: raising queens with small colonys ?
« Reply #9 on: February 03, 2011, 03:13:56 pm »
Dave,
I think many look at the "professional" video and standard classroom taught procedures, and assume that you must have a certain busting at the seem number of bees. Which is not the case. Maybe if you a commercial guy grafting 72 cells. But for smaller amounts, it is not needed.

I use 5 over 5 nucs, and some of the best queen cells I ever got was from a huge swarm that I pulled the queen out of after 24 hours. Yes, I use the stringest colonies I can find. But I also know for a graft of 32 or 16 (That is what my bars hold - 16 per row) you can get great queens with far less than what many claim you need.
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Offline Acebird

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Re: raising queens with small colonys ?
« Reply #10 on: February 15, 2011, 04:23:00 pm »
Quote
The whole key to queen raising is the number of nurse bees and good nutrition, including feeding syrup while the cells are in there.

If you are pulling these nurse bees from the only hive you have when are you risking pulling too many from the mother hive and you end up loosing that hive?
Brian Cardinal
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Offline Michael Bush

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Re: raising queens with small colonys ?
« Reply #11 on: February 16, 2011, 07:20:35 am »
I find small nucs can raise high quality queens, even if lower quantity, as many of you have.  Just as long as they are packed with bees and there are resources coming (pollen, nectar etc.).
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