# Raising Drones for breeding



## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>The books stress that you need lots of drones. But since the drone has the same genes as his mother, it seems I should select a different hive from the graft source for the drones.

That is the theory.

>So my plan is to take the graft larva from the carni queen and put some drone comb in the best surviving Italian hive.

It's a nice plan. According to the latest studies I've seen the hives will make the same number of drones regardless. They have a desire for a certain number and will raise that many no matter what you do. You can affect the number of drone sized CELLS to a certain degree, but even that has it's tolerances. If you give a hive ALL drone comb they will rework enough to make the number of wokers they want. If you give them all worker comb they will rework enough to get the number of drones they want. That's what they did in the study I saw presented and the number of drones ends up the same.

>Since the drones from the Carni queen would be at least half brothers of the carni larva it would seem better not to encourage drones in the larva source hive.

Queens purposfully fly further to mate than the drones and seem to try not to mate with their own drones. Odds are there are feral or other bees in mating distance and the queen will find them.

>Any thoughts, am I on the right track here???

You have the right idea.


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## clintonbemrose (Oct 23, 2001)

Your plan sounds good to me the only thing that I do different is to give several hives drone comb 6 to 8 weeks before I graft so I can flood the area with mature drons
Clint


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## franc (Jan 7, 2003)

Its sounds like you'll have enough genetic diversity,Plus like what was already said the queens will also be mating with any feral drones.You could also find a location several miles away which has bees and breed a few queens there you only need to leave them there for about 10 days.


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

Getting mature drones early in the season requires feeding the drone colonies about 8 weeks in advance of the time you need them available. While its easy to get drones during the spring swarming season, getting them very early in the season requires careful preparation. The drone requires 25 days from egg to juvenile. Another 10 to 15 days are required for sexual maturity. Thats about 40 days before he is ready to mate.

Fusion


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## BerkeyDavid (Jan 29, 2004)

OK, I assume the best way to raise drones is simply drone comb foundation and hope they draw it out?


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## naturebee (Dec 25, 2004)

I wouldnt worry about sufficient drone population or inbreeding unless you are planning on a large scale commercial queen rearing operation. A fit honeybee colony (including ferals) will produce up to 5000 drones mating season (Winston, 1987), this out numbering queens naturally produced (2 to 3 per season) by far. Also, Ohio should have sufficient feral population so as to provide an abundance of unrelated genetics and prevent any harmful degree of inbreeding. 

Research as shown that fit colonies, such as found in the ferals produced males which not only out-competed males from other colonies in mating, but also were more successful in post-mating competition (Kraus, Neumann, Scharpenberg, Praagho, Moritz, 2003). So in keeping your selected best performers within a few miles of your breeding yard will permit successful mating from the fit stock you have selected and also from the genetics of the feral population.


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## GaSteve (Apr 28, 2004)

What is "post-mating competition"?


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## BerkeyDavid (Jan 29, 2004)

Joe
Intersting
I searched for Post mating competition too and couldn't find anything on it.
david


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