# Sticky  My journey towards treatment free



## squarepeg

special bees indeed tpope. thanks for starting this thread and we look forward to following your progress. good luck with the expansion and putting a little honey on the table!


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## AstroBee

tpope said:


> My research efforts lead me to this forum. Reading here informed me that I had some special bees. Survivors. I had 2 colonies living in the boxes that were left in place for over 10 years with no interaction from me.


So, now we finally know where Squarepeg's bees came from


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## stan.vick

Everyone has an opinion, here's mine. Don't rush to purchase TF bees from others, until you have checked them out closely, not saying they will lie to you, just saying one person's idea of TF may differ from another's idea of TF. You know the feral bees that found you are making it on their own, and watch them closely, you may have to treat with something like OAV once in November when they are almost broodless to keep them alive. Just because they were in your boxes for ten years does not mean they never failed, they may have failed and were repopulated by another swarm or they may have survived uninterrupted because they swarmed every year and the brood break allowed them to get ahead of the mites. I never got very good at grafting, my old eyes let me down, there are several easier ways to make queens and some produce better queens. Think about foundationless, they will make the size cell that is right for their smaller body size, and they will make a lot of drones. I grew up on a farm and have the farmer's mentality, to me they are livestock, they are not my pets, some will say I will NEVER do this or that to MY BEES, a dead TF bee is just a dead bee, so I do the least I can to them and encourage them to evolve. Good Luck with your bees, pm me if you need my help.


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## tpope

AstroBee said:


> So, now we finally know where Squarepeg's bees came from


No sir... not my bees. Although I do have to list Squarepeg as a queen supplier.


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## Nordak

Wow, tpope. You definitely got something special there. Propagate the heck out of them if you can. I look forward to following your journey.


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## Riverderwent

Your bees and their local feral cousins are a treasure. I would avoid bringing in outside genetics as much as practical at this stage.


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## 1102009

stan.vick said:


> Everyone has an opinion, here's mine.


This is the treatment free forum.


> Any post advocating the use of treatments, according to the forum definition of treatment will be considered off topic and shall be moved to another forum or deleted by a moderator, unless it is employed as part of a plan in becoming treatment free.


I think we should have a rule waiting for those who want to be tf to ask if they want to use treatments on their path or not.


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## beepro

Yeah, a dead tf bee is just a dead bee. I try to get to them before they go bye-bye.
So far all hives are still alive though they have the mites with them. Going to get the mite
biting bees for them this coming season.


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## AstroBee

SiWolKe said:


> I think we should have a rule waiting for those who want to be tf to ask if they want to use treatments on their path or not.


I think the last thing this forum needs is another rule. What would go a very long way is a good dose of tolerance from both sides.


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## stan.vick

SiWolKe said:


> This is the treatment free forum.
> 
> 
> I think we should have a rule waiting for those who want to be tf to ask if they want to use treatments on their path or not.


Sorry SiWolke, and thank you for pointing out the rules, but since the last sentence of the rule you inserted said " unless it is employed as part of a plan in becoming treatment free." I felt it was appropriate.


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## fieldsofnaturalhoney

If it ain't broke why are you trying to fix it? 
tpope,. awesome., I see some honey in your wife's future. Now here comes the hard part of management


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## Harley Craig

Riverderwent said:


> Your bees and their local feral cousins are a treasure. I would avoid bringing in outside genetics as much as practical at this stage.


this right here! If you are having trouble rasing queens from your stock, get some help with that.


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## Harley Craig

stan.vick said:


> Sorry SiWolke, and thank you for pointing out the rules, but since the last sentence of the rule you inserted said " unless it is employed as part of a plan in becoming treatment free." I felt it was appropriate.


10 yrs with no treaments and he needs a plan to become TF? I don't understand this logic?


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## lharder

Re splits. Maybe a good first step is a snelgrove board to make vertical splits. They will make a few good queen cells that you can make additional nucs with. 

I would build numbers with this stock before bringing in outside stock. Too much outside influence too early could disrupt what you have. However, you probably also have some ferals around that can stabilize things.


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## AstroBee

tpope said:


> Soo... I have begun to build an apiary from my past. I re-started in 2014 with bees that I have never treated. It's a work in progress. I have purchased queens and nucs from treatment free suppliers to augment my poor efforts at queen rearing and added splits that I have made.
> 
> I will get better at grafting this year. I intend to spread the genetics I have around my area... And make my lovely wife some honey.


Are you seeking guidance, or just relaying a very interesting story? If seeking guidance, then it might be helpful to give us more information. You say you restarted in 2014, and that you brought in queens. What state is your apiary in now, e.g., how many colonies do you have now. Of these, how many from the original survivor genetics? Have you successfully propagated any of the original survivor genetics? Are you actively working these survivor colonies? What goals do you have - I'm sure we could all chip in and get your wife some honey


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## tpope

I appreciate the encouragement and offers to help. 

You don't know how good or bad your bees are until you have something to compare them to. Most of my purchases have been from known VSH suppliers. I have the resources now that will allow me to raise more than a couple of queens each year. I have gained confidence working with the bought bees that I won't be wasting my efforts on my survivors.


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## tpope

Looking at the bees flying into and outta my hives, I feel that I have 12 today that are active. 
One is a single hive body. Three are 5 frame nucs. The remainder are in at least a double deep.
It's time to start planning how to open the brood nest since I am limited in how much comb I can give towards checker boarding. I did leave a large amount of honey so that I would have resources available. I am scratching my head about extracting some of the honey to gain the comb for use. Gonna have to get in there and see.


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## squarepeg

if you haven't already seen this, a possible option for you tpope:

http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?290784-Opening-the-Sides-of-the-Broodnest

my experience agrees with the notion that foundationless frames will get drawn earlier in the season than foundation frames. my observations also support the idea that once a colony is engaged in wax making it will be less likely to swarm.


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## tpope

Yes, I am channeling Matt and Walt for my nucs as they build. I have some comb and will have to wing the rest..


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## lharder

I've had good success with lack of comb the last few years, aggressively pyramiding brood into each new box. Ie, I if I have 7 frames of brood, and am adding a new box, then I put 4 in the top box, leaving 3 in the box underneath, foundationless frames on each side, using plastic frames outside of that as follower boards. I use a top and bottom entrance. This is done on a flow. They will aggressively build comb. They will leave comb behind in lower boxes as you build up. Easy to manage as the brood is in the top two boxes. Once they start filling the left behind comb with lots of nectar, you can reverse the set up with brood on the bottom and now you can manage honey. Last year, I mostly didn't use excluders, and management of that became a pain as they would often chimney up back up. This year I will use excluders for part of the season.


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## squarepeg

if you currently have surplus deep frames of drawn comb and honey you can go ahead and checkerboard a second deep over your singles, perhaps something like this, where e = empty comb and h = honey:

e e e h e h e h e e (southernly facing side to the right) 

i'll be doing this with a few hives soon, a couple of which will become my cloake board hives for queen rearing.

after queenrearing, these cloake board hives will have splits removed from them to make up more nucs and to get them back to a single deep. 

for your double deeps, consider moving the brood to the bottom and checkerboarding the upper as shown above, unless the brood nest is straddling the gap.


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## tpope

AstroBee said:


> Are you seeking guidance, or just relaying a very interesting story? If seeking guidance, then it might be helpful to give us more information. You say you restarted in 2014, and that you brought in queens. What state is your apiary in now, e.g., how many colonies do you have now. Of these, how many from the original survivor genetics? Have you successfully propagated any of the original survivor genetics? Are you actively working these survivor colonies? What goals do you have - I'm sure we could all chip in and get your wife some honey


So sorry. I missed this reply earlier. I am doing both AstroBee. I am telling my story to illustrate that good things can happen. I am also looking for any support that you all feel like giving. I have a pretty thick skin... 

I do get that many feel that I should have not brought in outside genetics as soon as I did. The truth is that I have 3 other bee keepers within 2 miles of my apiary. One that is willing to work with me somewhat.

Frankly, I needed some help with numbers so that I could build my resources. I found that splits need to be particularly strong in my area if they are to succeed. 

I bought a nuc in 2015. It grew very well into an 8 frame deep. I pulled the queen and some brood plus some honey and comb from one of my existing hives and made a nuc. The existing 8 frame colony was successful in making a new queen but the old queen perished in my first lesson about using a pollen sub patty and small hive beetle. I did manage to get a nuc established from my survivor hive using a frame of eggs and young larvae. I also purchased 3 Pol line queens. One went to a local keeper and I made nucs for the other two. I was successful in overwintering 1 of those. I also spent 12 weeks recovering from knee surgery to remove a torn meniscus starting in May. 

2016 I overwintered 5 colonies.. bought another commercial nuc. Tried my hand at grafting to learn that you must ensure that the bees are not choosing to raise their own queen when adding grafts. Had a nuc from my survivors swarm after I moved it into a larger box. The remaining bees raised a queen and filled 2 medium supers. SquarePeg offered queen cells and I bit. I made 3 successful queens. One was used to get a cutdown split queenright and the other 2 are in nucs. I bought 2 nucs and 2 queens from a listed VSH supplier. I made a nuc from my resources for one queen and the other went to my nearby keeper for his expansion. I caught a prime swarm locally that came from the rock facade on a porch column. My area suffered an extreme drought that severely limited my fall flow. I did learn how to catch and mark my queens.

I went into the fall of 2016 with 12 colonies of bees. Today, I have the same. 3 are in 5 frame deep nucs. 1 is in an 8 frame medium. 3 are between a deep with a medium and 2 deeps. The remaining 5 are in 3 deeps or taller. The 2 survivors are in 10 frame boxes with chest high stacks.

I will be taking inventory of available comb, honey and pollen when weather next allows. I will be expanding the brood nest and checkerboarding my single story colonies from the resources I find. I have drawn comb ready for the 3, two way mating nucs that I am putting into use this year. I am daily increasing my box and frame count.

My goals are to give the second year colonies the resources they need to allow them to become productive. I want to graft from my survivors and make increase. I would like to go into this coming winter with between 20 and 36 hives for myself. I want to also place some of my genetics with my local keepers since they will be my drone providers.

My wife will surely get her honey. I promised her that she would when she asked for it... I also warned that the cost might be unexpected. I have long had the want to...


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## tpope

lharder said:


> I've had good success with lack of comb the last few years, aggressively pyramiding brood into each new box. Ie, I if I have 7 frames of brood, and am adding a new box, then I put 4 in the top box, leaving 3 in the box underneath, foundationless frames on each side, using plastic frames outside of that as follower boards. I use a top and bottom entrance. This is done on a flow. They will aggressively build comb. They will leave comb behind in lower boxes as you build up. Easy to manage as the brood is in the top two boxes. Once they start filling the left behind comb with lots of nectar, you can reverse the set up with brood on the bottom and now you can manage honey. Last year, I mostly didn't use excluders, and management of that became a pain as they would often chimney up back up. This year I will use excluders for part of the season.


Ahh the chimney effect. Mine like to do it too when provided an excess of comb over a couple of seasons. I will try to move frames around to ensure that my bees utilize them completely. Key word... try.


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## tpope

squarepeg said:


> if you currently have surplus deep frames of drawn comb and honey you can go ahead and checkerboard a second deep over your singles, perhaps something like this, where e = empty comb and h = honey:
> 
> e e e h e h e h e e (southernly facing side to the right)
> 
> i'll be doing this with a few hives soon, a couple of which will become my cloake board hives for queen rearing.
> 
> after queenrearing, these cloake board hives will have splits removed from them to make up more nucs and to get them back to a single deep.
> 
> for your double deeps, consider moving the brood to the bottom and checkerboarding the upper as shown above, unless the brood nest is straddling the gap.


I have a hodge podge of drawn comb. It makes using it wisely a chess game with my bees at best. It reinforces the idea that one should try to standardize their frame size.

I will be soon taking note of what I have available in my hives. I appreciate your directions. I did buy the parts necessary to make a cloake board.


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## squarepeg

it sounds to me like you are sitting pretty good tpope, and congrats on your overwintering success.

i might consider looking to those triple deeps for resources, especially if you are planning to make a number of splits. 

your colonies are likely a little bit ahead of mine being farther south and lower elevation, but if those triple deeps have a deep or less worth of bees in them at this point, i believe they can afford to donate a deep of comb to the nucs. 

by the time they have 2 deeps full of bees you'll be able to pull splits off of them and will probably need to do so to prevent swarming. it won't be long after that wax making season will be here.


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## tpope

Yes, those tall stacks were left to provide for spring expansion. It's about time to start using them. I built some medium depth nuc boxes last week with the intentions of using my drawn comb to checkerboard my nucs. I will be making deep nucs next week.


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## squarepeg

sounds like an excellent plan tpope, now if the weather will just cooperate.


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## tpope

lharder said:


> I've had good success with lack of comb the last few years, aggressively pyramiding brood into each new box. Ie, I if I have 7 frames of brood, and am adding a new box, then I put 4 in the top box, leaving 3 in the box underneath, foundationless frames on each side, using plastic frames outside of that as follower boards. I use a top and bottom entrance. This is done on a flow. They will aggressively build comb. They will leave comb behind in lower boxes as you build up. Easy to manage as the brood is in the top two boxes. Once they start filling the left behind comb with lots of nectar, you can reverse the set up with brood on the bottom and now you can manage honey. Last year, I mostly didn't use excluders, and management of that became a pain as they would often chimney up back up. This year I will use excluders for part of the season.


Heat rises. I would think that 4 frames below 3 would be better in terms of covering and heating the brood.


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## lharder

tpope said:


> Heat rises. I would think that 4 frames below 3 would be better in terms of covering and heating the brood.


Either or. Probably both still offers a relatively compact arrangement. They will work harder getting comb built in that top box.


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## tpope

I got in some of my hives today. The queen pictured is from squarepeg's beetree. She was in a 5 frame deep nuc. She has eggs and brood covering about half a frame on 4 sides. I gave her 2 drawn combs, 2 frames of honey and a frame of pollen, all mediums.

I was into one of my hives that I left a good amount of resources overwinter. They still have most of the deep that they filled with honey. I was surprised to see that the shallow super underneath had capped drone brood along the edges. I wanted some of the resources in the mediums below. I pulled frames to look and see what I had in hand. I was shocked to see many drones walking on the combs.


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## squarepeg

she's a beauty! 

(but it's what's on the inside that counts)


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## tpope

Wife said she has a big butt... These are the bees that fly in the coldest temperatures. I need to get her marked. Pretty sure that they will add up well.


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## orthoman

I am not trying to pick a fight or hi-jack the treat; however, I frequently see/hear/read this statement ...." that foundationless frames will get drawn earlier in the season than foundation frames..."

I have read this statement numerous times and I wonder if this is in fact, "an actual fact" that has been studied and quantified -- compared in a side by side study with foundation. Or is it just one more of those comments that keeps getting repeated over and over until people think it is factual?


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## squarepeg

orthoman, i'm not sure i would call it a 'study', but a few years back i compared putting a single new frame in the middle of the broodnest in about a dozen hives in the very early spring and well before new white wax was getting drawn.

the foundationless frames did indeed get drawn but the foundation frames became a 'barrier' to broodnest expansion and actually set the colonies back.

it is this observation that forms part of the rationale of matt davey's 'opening up the sides' with foundationless frames method for swarm prevention, and i believe is an observation that has been pretty consistently reported by others who have tried it.


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## orthoman

Thanks for the response. Although still anecdotal, at least, you tried a small experiment and have some sense of what happens. Maybe some university, or scientifically minded individual, will actually set up a beeyard and run a side by side comparisons with a large number of hives, quantify everything, and publish the results.


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## tpope

I have found that the foundationless frame will be drawn while one with rite cell or even just wax will be ignored before a good flow...


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## tpope

Had a really nice afternoon today. I checked all of the hives that I had a question about. The good news is that the nuc from squarepeg is doing well. The bad is that I have two casualties. The ugly part is that one of my survivors is no more.

The SHB have been busy laying eggs in the frames. I wish that I had more freezer room.


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## tpope

Took a look see into some of my production hives today. Looking very good. 
I reversed the deep hive bodies on the colony that I requeened with a cell that squarepeg raised. They needed the room above. Lots of pollen and fresh nectar. I found the queen on a comb of pollen with what appears to be freshly laid eggs. Hmmm... I have drones flying.
The second hive I checked is also doing well. They are brooding the bottom deep very well. They have not moved into the medium above and started to consume the honey. I will be using my drawn comb to checkerboard this weekend.


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## squarepeg

:thumbsup: nice report tpope! looks like we're off and running.


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## Stiddfamilyapiary

Im not sure if you have ever heard of OTS queen rearing (on the spot). Mel disselkoen is a large pusher off this tactic and actually named it and has an awesome book over it. You do not have to graft anything and the book has in depth pictures through the steps. No need to purchase bees after learning this. Also by using his method there are brood breaks which will help in combating mites due to the mites hatching out of brood and if there is no brood then there can't be any might reproduction!! Something you might look in to


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## squarepeg

tpope, the hardwoods here haven't started greening up yet, how about down by you?


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## tpope

Stiddfamilyapiary said:


> Im not sure if you have ever heard of OTS queen rearing (on the spot). Mel disselkoen is a large pusher off this tactic and actually named it and has an awesome book over it. You do not have to graft anything and the book has in depth pictures through the steps. No need to purchase bees after learning this. Also by using his method there are brood breaks which will help in combating mites due to the mites hatching out of brood and if there is no brood then there can't be any might reproduction!! Something you might look in to


Welcome to beesource! Actually, I have an autographed copy of Mel's book. I choose to graft so that I can raise as many queens as I want from a specific one...


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## tpope

Yes squarepeg, the early ones are just peaking out. I have several Sassafras near the house that are blooming. But, nothing major yet.

I am trying to have patience and not start too early... I have drones capped in all of my larger hives. I did not see any swarming preparations when I inspected last weekend. I did give a couple of shakes of nurse bees to a nuc that needed them. The hive they came from is really strong. Several queen cups that are dry.


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## squarepeg

good report, many thanks. i have a lot of sassafras on the property but it's not blooming yet. seeing pretty much the same in my hives as you.


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## tpope

I came in from work yesterday to find a weaker hive that was building well getting robbed out. It was gone when I saw it. I think that I know the culprit. I am torn between requeening or just breaking them down for nucs.

On a positive note, my checker boarding efforts are doing well. The queens have expanded the brood nests upward. I saw drones flying and picked one up to view. He seemed to have had quite a day with someone's virgin. I had lots of bees that were orienting in the afternoon sun.

The cold snap does not seem to have harmed the trees. I have seen a couple of Poplars that are leafing out. 

I spent today building nuc boxes that are divided the long way to use as queen mating nucs. I have the frames cut and built and the boxes mostly painted. I want to get them drawn by my nucs I am using as building resources. I also built a swarm trap from a rotted bit of an old deep.


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## squarepeg

seeing similar evidence of drones mating here also tpope, and the nectars and pollens are flowing nicely as well. i'm going to try splitting one or two of the larger colonies using the artificial swarm method sometime next week. by the time those new queens are ready for mating we should be in pretty good shape with weather and drone availability. i'm going to hold off on grafting for a little longer, in part because i want more bees in the hives to make splits with, and in part because i would like us to be closer to swarm season.


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## tpope

I'm getting ready to graft. Queens grafted now will take mating flights in April... I have drawn frames for my 3 Mann Lake mating nucs. That's medium depth, half frames, three to a side and room for six. I built out 3 deep nucs that have 5 half frames to each half. I keep flip flopping between Cloake board and Joseph Clemens nuc sized queenless starter/finisher. I want to make several rounds of queens and really increase my numbers this year.


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## squarepeg

awesome. i'm still stuck using five frame (full sized) deeps for mating nucs, and so won't be able to make as many new queens. maybe next year....

i think you are a good week or two ahead of us as the tulip poplars aren't leafing out here yet.

good luck with the queen rearing tpope!


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## tpope

I am using my overwintered nucs as brood factories this year. Most are filling 2 boxes and have a third added with 4 frames of comb and 2 half frames of foundation. I gotta get my deep, minis drawn sometime...

Cloake board it is this time. I set up for grafting Friday.


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## squarepeg

very cool. i believe your timing is right on the money.


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## tpope

Today, I removed the uncapped brood from the deep where I will be placing grafts tomorrow and slid the board in to make the top queenless. Searching through the frames I found one that had a queen cell started in a cup that was on the frame bottom. Judging from the size of the larvae, it was an egg when I set the hive up with a cloake board. I saw the cup earlier but did not spot an egg... It went into a nuc. I did see eggs that had not hatched yet on a frame. I'll be looking there for my grafting stock as tomorrow will be day 3... I placed 2 very nice pollen frames that contained a bit of nectar next to where the grafts will hang. I had a couple of frames that were mostly nectar and I used drawn comb to give space for more nectar and 2 half frames of foundation as an I dare ya...
Redbuds are blooming along with choke cherries and Dogwood. The bees seem to be on a strong flow. The weather appears to be good for as far as one can predict. Spring is here...


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## tpope

I grafted 14 cups Friday. I picked up some 3.75 reading glasses and parked my truck so that I had good sunlight behind me. The glasses were a bit of a pain to wear. Kinda like when I first started wearing bifocals... i was able to see the freshly hatched larvae next to the eggs rather clearly. I cut the height of the comb down for access ease. I used a chinese grafting tool. My steering wheel provided a rest for the frame. I know that folks recommend that one should cover the grafted cups with a damp towel to keep them from drying out. I really think that they are like me and loose their count and where they are... the towel is a great tool for keeping up with what is done and which is next. I was a bit surprised to hear the cell builder when I approached it with the cell bar. Folks are right about the whine they have. I thought that I heard them sigh when I put the cell bar in.


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## squarepeg

tpope said:


> ...I thought that I heard them sigh when I put the cell bar in.


that was probably you sighing and you didn't realize it. 

fingers crossed for your grafts tpope!


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## tpope

Well, I think that my deliberations are done. I will be setting up a dedicated queenless cell builder. I had poor results with my efforts at using a cloake board. 

I followed the directions as can be found online and beesource. I had 8 of 14 grafts accepted and being well tended when I removed the board on day 2. Then judging from the size of the larvae, they were abandoned. The nurse bees went back to the bottom frames of brood and left the queen cells to perish.

I am now confident that I can identify and graft the correct aged larvae. I did get a queen cell from the bees effort. Time will tell how that plays out.

My production hives are strong and worrying me that they may swarm despite my efforts. I will be making splits soon as I would rather have bees than honey this year.


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## squarepeg

dang! how many frames of brood did you have in the upper box that you put the grafts in tpope?


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## squarepeg

these are the instructions i've followed:

http://nebula.wsimg.com/b81244acaa2...E9AA7688652D2F900&disposition=0&alloworigin=1

the only glitch i've had is not making sure to remove any cells started on the brood frames in the upper box. the result was rogue virgins that destroyed a number of the grafts.


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## tpope

I had 5 deep frames of brood in an 8 frame hive.


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## squarepeg

are you saying that you have two 8 frame deeps with a cloake board in the middle, and five frames of brood in the upper 8 frame deep?


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## tpope

Actually in thinking about it this morning, there was a medium above the deep that had brood on 4 frames too.


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## tpope

I moved this queen into a nuc today.


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## tpope

I got home this afternoon to my wife meeting me in the yard telling me that I had done bad... "Huh?" "You go and look on the porch."

I had a box from Mann Lake with TempQueen inside on one side of the door and a homemade mini nuc on the other side... Wife blames the package for the dozen or so scouts that are flying around looking for a new home.

Sigh.. I reckon that I am being bad. I go and check the apiary. No hives that look swarmy. I do see some scouts checking out my swarm trap though.

I checked just at dusk. My traps are still empty. Maybe tomorrow I'll be good.


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## lharder

Last year I had some scouts really interested in the 2 inch intake/outtake pipes of my furnace. It was weird how persistent they were.


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## tpope

I have a small swarm in one of my traps. I guess that they liked what they found. They moved into 2 medium, 8 frame boxes that had a full load of new ritecell. I'll give them a frame of young brood and move them away for a while.


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## tpope

I guess that I should have been faster with the brood anchor for my swarm. They found a gap in the two pieces of plywood I had covering the drawn frames that I was planning to feed into my nucs and decided to take up residence there. I'll see what I can remove for salvage tomorrow when I get some help with the lifting. They can draw foundation for their own use!


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## squarepeg

tpope said:


> They can draw foundation for their own use!


and they will, but you can't blame them for taking the easier path.


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## tpope

One of my new queens.


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## tpope

Her sister.


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## tpope

And another sister from the same mother.

I only showed 3 of the four... They are just starting to lay. I hope that their future is bright. They were born from much trial and tribulation...


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## gww

tpope
I can never find the queen and so can not take picture of my own. I looked at two splits today with about 5 combs each and could not see a queen though they may be queenless since they were done with queen cells. I see it really well when my mentor is in my hive and his eyes go right to the queen. I just have had zero success so far and drone don't help because to my eyes they all look like queens. 
I try to keep up with your updates.
Cheers
gww


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## tpope

Practice will help you find the queen gww. If you'll grab those drones up as you go, you'll get some practice at picking up the queen when you find her. That said, I went through the same 4 nucs eight days ago and only found one queen. They look way different when they are laying. Much larger and easier to spot. Yet, it is always like finding a prize Easter egg. Ya never know what ya have until there it is...


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## gww

tpope
You keep posting and I will keep reading.
gww


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## tpope

Thursday was an eventful day. I found that I had converted a laying worker hive into queen right. Nice looking brood pattern although too late to matter much. Then I found the queen and marked her. Unfortunately, in doing so I managed to pick up a worker bee and squeeze the queen wrong. I killed her.
So, I now have a queenless hive at close to the beginning of my summer dearth. What to do??? Well I think that I am going to seize the moment and use this hive as a starter and do a bit of grafting. Queens will hatch and mate after the summer solstice.
Oh boy! New roads to travel.


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## squarepeg

dang, sounds like something i might have done. 

fusion_power is also reporting having just started a round of queens. i've thrown in the towel here out of concern it had gotten too late in the season, but perhaps i shouldn't have.

i'm looking forward to seeing how yours and his do in terms of mating success.


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## Riverderwent

tpope said:


> Well I think that I am going to seize the moment and use this hive as a starter and do a bit of grafting. Queens will hatch and mate after the summer solstice.


More lemonade.


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## tpope

Riverderwent said:


> More lemonade.


In a way... I suppose. Payback for no sourwood honey.


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## lharder

Yes, I always take advantage of failures to experiment. Unfortunately, my good ideas come in the evening requiring me to go into the hive again the next day.


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## tpope

Yep, I too find the time to second guess myself. A lot of it is a day late and a dollar short though..


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## tpope

I went into the lemonade hive today to look for queen cells and get it ready for grafting. I found fresh eggs and very young larvae. I quit looking part way through without ever seeing a queen. I really don't know if the queen I marked survived or if there was more than one queen.
I do know that I won't be using a queenright hive for a cell starter.


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## squarepeg

interesting. how's it looking for mrs. tpope getting a little honey this year?


----------



## tpope

That to do is done. I have been doing a bit of extracting already.


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## squarepeg

good to hear it man. so you'll get to keep on beekeeping for at least another season.


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## tpope

Yes, my plans are to continue keeping bees into the foreseeable future. I have established an out yard that will hopefully be good forage for my bees. It certainly allows me to keep the strength up on freshly made nucs. I am also clearing some pines to get a bit more room to place hives on home farm. The wife was OK with the fence line clearing but became wise to my ways when she saw what else I cut.


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## tpope

Have a flow going with golden rod, crepe myrtle and wild clematis. I have been checking my nucs. All are queen right and raising brood. I gave extra boxes to the ones that needed them. Some I put into 8 frame hives since I was close to out of nuc boxes. I don't figure that I'll see much comb drawn, but I am daring some... I have a few that did not have much in the way of stores. I put a hive top feeder on and fed a bit since we look to have a few rainy days in the forecast.


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## squarepeg

good report tpope, thanks for the update. i've been wondering about how things were progressing down there in haralson. 

i'm thinking we'll see an uptick in the nectar flow once that rain passes through. 

did your autumn olive transplants take? a handful more small ones have sprung up this year that could be moved this winter if you are interested.


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## tpope

The only one that did not make it was the large one that we both felt like might not live. I was going to root some but felt that they had not grown enough yet. I also don't have my mist propagation bed setup. I'll fertilize a bit later this fall. We'll see about those sprouts.


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## drummerboy

tpope said:


> The only one that did not make it was the large one that we both felt like might not live. I was going to root some but felt that they had not grown enough yet. I also don't have my mist propagation bed setup. I'll fertilize a bit later this fall. We'll see about those sprouts.


Kudos to everyone who has contributed to this thread!:applause: As Winter approaches, I'll hope that the discussion continues. Thanks!


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## tpope

I have no intentions of running away. I recon that you'll be able to read a plenty. My writing my ramble a bit but I am just sharing what I am learning and seeing.

I made some migratory hive tops from the scrap plywood that I had laying around. I would have thought that 3/4 inch with a coat of oil based sealer and then a coat of oil based porch paint would have sealed this just fine. Wrong. It has delaminated badly. I'll be using Advantek from now on for my bottom boards and migratory tops. I cut out some tops last year and allowed them to be used without paint. They were impressive.


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## tpope

Spent a couple of hours this weekend pounding in some rebar stakes and ratchet strapping hives down. Irma is forecast to pass a bit to my west as a tropical storm.

The bees don't care. They are on a flow of nectar and have two kinds of pollen to gather.


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## tpope

I just got to check my outyard this afternoon. Everything looks good. At home, Irma blew one tree down on Sunday morning, left me with leaves and branches to clean up and rained about 7 inches of rain. Much of the golden rod has not begun to bloom.


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## tpope

My apiaries smell like the gym right now. Golden rod is close to full bloom and the bees are bringing in pollen and nectar. Rather nice flow. Some nucs still have a few drones being tolerated. 
I pulled frames and bees to make up a couple of nucs for breeder queens. I feel that I am going to have to keep a sharp eye on them until the banked queens get started laying. My bees are raising brood well now and have a good flow. Maybe I can get some frames drawn.


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## squarepeg

pretty much the same here tpope with exceptionally strong foraging seen during the afternoon hours.

i'm only getting a faint whiff of goldenrod in my yards. it appears that they may be preferring something else at this time but i'm not sure what that would be.

good luck with the queens!


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## Juhani Lunden

Here in Finland some warmer weather finally arrived. We had to wait all summer! Now bees are collecting deep blue pollen, maybe thistle?
Weaker nucs have capped brood and queens laying. I haven´t looked at the stronger ones. All winterfeeding is done.


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## tpope

Wow blue pollen would be different Juhani. I have no idea what it may be.

I checked my breeder queen nucs today. I found emergency queen cells in both on the frames I added from the outyard last weekend when I realized that I needed more bees. I lost too many that returned to their original hives. One nuc had ate enough candy to release the attendants but was still blocking the queen from escaping. Since they were feeding her through the wire, I released her into the hive.
The other had been released and was already laying. I did not look over the entire frame looking closely for eggs once I found them, but the area that they were displayed a nice pattern.

I present to you Y24 from Latshaw Apiaries.


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## 1102009

tpope,
a nice fat queen 
juhani,
here blue pollen is from phacelia


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## tpope

Thanks Si. She has been an egg laying machine so far.

We had our first frost this morning. A low of 37F and a high of 61F today. Bees are still finding pollen this afternoon so I doubt that the frost killed everything. Got a light and darker yellow coming in. But with it being the first frost, I have been taking an inventory of my bees and equipment as I prepare for winter. I find myself having grown to 32 hives. I feel that I have the drawn and filled comb to overwinter these bees. How to handle the next spring will be educational...


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## squarepeg

very nice progress for the year tpope, congrats!


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## Buzz-kill

tpope said:


> Thanks Si. She has been an egg laying machine so far.
> 
> We had our first frost this morning. A low of 37F a


You had a frost at 37 degrees? Must be different in Georgia.


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## Juhani Lunden

tpope said:


> Wow blue pollen would be different Juhani. I have no idea what it may be.
> 
> I present to you Y24 from Latshaw Apiaries.
> View attachment 35833


It actually pretty sure was Phaselia as Sibylle said.

Were the workers around the queen her offspring? Several different colourings.


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## 1102009

Very nice,tpope,good progress! Luck to you!

Could be the yellow bees are the first hatched from your yellow queen?
The grey ones the older ones?
If you consider bee math....


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## drummerboy

Buzz-kill said:


> You had a frost at 37 degrees? Must be different in Georgia.


Frosts can occur without the air temp being 32F. Happens all the time.


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## tpope

No way that those workers were her offspring Juhani. She had not been in that hive long enough. I pulled frames from three different hives to makeup that nuc. I left it in the yard where made and had more flyback than I anticipated. I went to my outyard and stole more bees to get my numbers up.

The frost was a surprise to me too Buzz-kill. I had not picked my peppers. The temperature stated was from the closest government reporting station. It is about 10 miles to my south. Still, take a look at the link. It explains how the temperature measured at eye height can differ from ground level. http://www.weather.gov/arx/why_frost


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## Buzz-kill

drummerboy said:


> Frosts can occur without the air temp being 32F. Happens all the time.


Not if the temperature is being measured correctly.


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## clyderoad

The temperature of what is being measured correctly?

Ever hear of hoar frost?


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## Buzz-kill

clyderoad said:


> The temperature of what is being measured correctly?
> 
> Ever hear of hoar frost?


I didn't think this should need explanation but frost is composed of ice crystals. It only forms on surfaces that have cooled to below the freezing point of water.


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## clyderoad

Ah. the surface of the object- not the air then.


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## Buzz-kill

clyderoad said:


> Ah. the surface of the object- not the air then.


Oh you really got me there! No not really. 

That was my original point about the 37 degree comment. If air temperature is 37 degrees the surface temperature of objects like grass are not going to be below the freezing point of water. In fact they will generally be warmer than the air temperature because the ground radiates heat. That is why when air temperatures are measured they are generally at about 5 feet because the closer or farther from the ground will affect the reading. So when someone says they are seeing frost at 37 degrees one of two things may be occurring. The device being used to measure the temperature is inaccurate or the location of the temperature recording device is not at the location where the person is seeing the frost. For example the thermometer is reading 37 degrees near the ground and they are seeing frost on their roof. But I would not consider frost on a roof with 37degree ground temperature to be the first frost of the season. If you go high enough off the ground we have frost everyday of the year so really one should consider the first frost as one that occurs at ground level. Of course if one lives at an area of steep elevation a first frost might occur in the front yard but not in the back yard. And now I am done with this silly discussion.


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## clyderoad

It aint that simple Buzz. Go ahead, look it up for yourself.


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## gww

I don't know but we had a forcast of 40 degrees and the news men were calling for light frost. I know it was not wide spred because I looked. I also know that I still have sweet potatoes in the garden and the tops of the plants are turning black and so I know they got bit. Perhaps it has to be freezing for water to freeze and apparently it can get cold enough in the right places when the over all temps are above 32 cause there is no denieghing that my sweet potatoe leaves are black and I know what caused it.
Cheers
gww


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## Juhani Lunden

tpope said:


> No way that those workers were her offspring Juhani. She had not been in that hive long enough.


Ok, thanks. Would be interesting to see how uniform Latshaw inseminated queen workers look. 

Maybe a pic later.


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## tpope

Juhani Lunden said:


> Ok, thanks. Would be interesting to see how uniform Latshaw inseminated queen workers look.
> 
> Maybe a pic later.


I will try to remember to get that picture for you in the spring. You have my interest...


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## drummerboy

clyderoad said:


> It aint that simple Buzz. Go ahead, look it up for yourself.


:thumbsup:


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## tpope

I went to the workshop today to continue making wooden ware for next years increase. I had to side step.. my bees were working the Dutch Clover that is currently blooming in the yard. It's not enough to be a flow, but it surely beats the numbers I see prying crevasses to rob..


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## squarepeg

we're seeing a little clover blooming here along with some henbit and have had only had a couple of light frosts so far. 

i threw out a few lbs. of ball clover a couple of weeks ago along the bluff area that doesn't get mowed, hoping that enough of it 'takes' and that it eventually takes over there.

i'm seeing a little attention given to the crevices here and there but i can't tell if those are robbers or just propilizers.


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## tpope

I have some henbit blooming now. Not as much as there will be later. No bees working it that I see. Clover continues to bloom. Saw a bit of golden rod that is besides the highway and getting the warmth from the pavement that is blooming late...
Both breeder queens are still raising brood. I have kept an eye on their development. Gonna have to keep the feed on or move a box of honey for their use.
I did find a nuc that appears to have been robbed out. I stuck it into a freezer for the immediate time. It seemed to be a bit wet and I saw a few too many small hive beetles. I looked for mite frass and saw none but will wait until I pull the comb and look in good daylight before calling it. I thought that numbers were OK when I closed down the entrance.


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## tpope

The high today was 63F with a mid 30s low. The bees are flying and a good many are bringing in a pale yellow pollen. I'm not sure where it may be coming from. I did look into a 5 deep nuc. They have almost finished the 1/4 lb pollen sub patty I gave them last week and appear to still be raising some brood. I wonder sometimes if young queens are eternal optimists; they haven't worked so hard laying that they welcome some time off... Probably just trying to increase the colony size to a comfortable level by any means.


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## 1102009

mmh I wonder how survivability would be influenced in my hives if I would feed pollen substitute.

After reducing brood mites are concentrated in the cells but would be thinned out if I forced breeding, but..

if I forced breeding the winter bees would not have as much power left.

What´s your climate zone again, tpope?


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## tpope

The pollen sub is only going to my late starts that were either too small to store much pollen or have used what they gathered for brooding already. The larger hives have good pollen stores and plenty of honey.
My USDA plant hardiness zone is 7B 5 to 10 degrees F. The low this morning is 30F with an expected high of 61F (-1C to 16C) for today.


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## 1102009

Ah yes I went back and saw you made them in september.


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## tpope

Strange events here. We had in excess of 8 inches of snow in the last 24 hours. I have only seen one event in 1993 that the snow was greater. I'm in the south and don't see this kinda stuff.


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## tpope

The strange events continue to unfold. I had bees flying last week. There seemed to be a minor nectar flow. I do know that I saw two different shades of yellow pollen coming in. I see dandelion, Henbit and white clover blooming in the yard and not a bee on them.
I have lost 5 nucs out of 32 hives. Three were due to starvation and one was robbed out. The fifth is an unknown; possibly queenlessness that I did not detect. No mite frass that I could see in any of them. Simply things that I should have done differently... My outyard appears to have not experienced the fall flow that I thought it had and the younger nucs tried to raise more brood and thus consumed more honey than I thought. I'll have to feed if I try to make nucs up after 17 June in the future.
I did put shims with sugar blocks onto my remaining single story nucs. I plan to check more hives the next time the weather permits.


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## tpope

Well, I guess that a spring, summer and fall nuc should have different strengths when first made. And... the winter weather can affect things too.

The short story is that my winter losses continue to, well, snowball.. My Latshaw breeder queens have perished due to the cold and low bee numbers. They had plenty of supplies but seemed to lack enough bees to keep the temperatures stable. I would have made stronger colonies if I had known that it was necessary. It is kinda hard to guess the weather.


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## GJM

How did your no treatment commitment work out? No honey for or from your wife? Either way, condolences. i'm not even a beekeeper yet, just hoping to get into apiculture this year. I've read that there are varoa resistant strains available, but have also read that many of the the allegedly resistant queens have mated indiscriminately (oh, ladies! Where were you when i was young--oh, right, you are insects. never mind then.) So the bees from those queens often aren't really mite resistant. Is there such a thing as a bee truly immune to mites? I've read that Russians are so resistant and have seen some posts online about Russian-Italian hybrids, allegedly with Russian mite resistance and Italian colony vigor, honey production, gentle temperament. I appreciate any informed advice because I'd prefer not to encourage development of pesticide resistant mites by dousing bees with miticides. Usually at least few mites survive the dousing, breed, pass on their resistance genes, and soon the chemicals don't work anymore, because all that's left are resistant supermites. That process is of course why antibiotic resistant staph and other superbugs now constitute a sometimes- fatal problem in hospitals and elsewhere. Liberal use of antibiotics has just developed more antibiotic resistant bugs. In addition, it seems that miticides can do nothing to improve bee genetics, quite the contrary, because they allow/help nonresistance genes to remain and spread through the bee population. Some call untreated bees "mite bombs," but encouraging survival of the weakest, least resistant strains seems comparable to long term nuclear radiation exposure. A bomb does immediate, short term damage but the radiation exposure can do damage for generations. Better by far, I think, to exclusively keep mite resistant bees if possible, so the mites starve off and if the mite resistant drones should perhaps "get lucky" with any local queens, those resistance genes will pass on and become more common among bees. That would be the ideal long term solution to varoa, it seems. But all i've got so far is "book larnin'". Since I hope to start my first hive this year, pray tell whether/how I can do it with genuinely mite resistant bees that can survive winter in zone 6a. Thanks.


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## lharder

Just get the best stock you can and go for it. Also learn to make increase. You can make more nucs up the first year with purchased mite resistant queens the first year. Then start raising your own queens after that. If your plans are not that ambitious, find other TF buddies to work with.


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## clyderoad

GJM said:


> How did your no treatment commitment work out? No honey for or from your wife? Either way, condolences. i'm not even a beekeeper yet, just hoping to get into apiculture this year. I've read that there are varoa resistant strains available, but have also read that many of the the allegedly resistant queens have mated indiscriminately (oh, ladies! Where were you when i was young--oh, right, you are insects. never mind then.) So the bees from those queens often aren't really mite resistant. Is there such a thing as a bee truly immune to mites? I've read that Russians are so resistant and have seen some posts online about Russian-Italian hybrids, allegedly with Russian mite resistance and Italian colony vigor, honey production, gentle temperament. I appreciate any informed advice because I'd prefer not to encourage development of pesticide resistant mites by dousing bees with miticides. Usually at least few mites survive the dousing, breed, pass on their resistance genes, and soon the chemicals don't work anymore, because all that's left are resistant supermites. That process is of course why antibiotic resistant staph and other superbugs now constitute a sometimes- fatal problem in hospitals and elsewhere. Liberal use of antibiotics has just developed more antibiotic resistant bugs. In addition, it seems that miticides can do nothing to improve bee genetics, quite the contrary, because they allow/help nonresistance genes to remain and spread through the bee population. Some call untreated bees "mite bombs," but encouraging survival of the weakest, least resistant strains seems comparable to long term nuclear radiation exposure. A bomb does immediate, short term damage but the radiation exposure can do damage for generations. Better by far, I think, to exclusively keep mite resistant bees if possible, so the mites starve off and if the mite resistant drones should perhaps "get lucky" with any local queens, those resistance genes will pass on and become more common among bees. That would be the ideal long term solution to varoa, it seems. But all i've got so far is "book larnin'". Since I hope to start my first hive this year, pray tell whether/how I can do it with genuinely mite resistant bees that can survive winter in zone 6a. Thanks.


My advice to you is to learn the ways of the bees and leave the other stuff alone until you do. The beginning of the journey is time for proven practical methods.


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## trottet1

Deleted post.


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## AvatarDad

deleted post


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## tpope

GJM said:


> How did your no treatment commitment work out? No honey for or from your wife? Either way, condolences. i'm not even a beekeeper yet, just hoping to get into apiculture this year. I've read that there are varoa resistant strains available, but have also read that many of the the allegedly resistant queens have mated indiscriminately (oh, ladies! Where were you when i was young--oh, right, you are insects. never mind then.) So the bees from those queens often aren't really mite resistant. Is there such a thing as a bee truly immune to mites? I've read that Russians are so resistant and have seen some posts online about Russian-Italian hybrids, allegedly with Russian mite resistance and Italian colony vigor, honey production, gentle temperament. I appreciate any informed advice because I'd prefer not to encourage development of pesticide resistant mites by dousing bees with miticides. Usually at least few mites survive the dousing, breed, pass on their resistance genes, and soon the chemicals don't work anymore, because all that's left are resistant supermites. That process is of course why antibiotic resistant staph and other superbugs now constitute a sometimes- fatal problem in hospitals and elsewhere. Liberal use of antibiotics has just developed more antibiotic resistant bugs. In addition, it seems that miticides can do nothing to improve bee genetics, quite the contrary, because they allow/help nonresistance genes to remain and spread through the bee population. Some call untreated bees "mite bombs," but encouraging survival of the weakest, least resistant strains seems comparable to long term nuclear radiation exposure. A bomb does immediate, short term damage but the radiation exposure can do damage for generations. Better by far, I think, to exclusively keep mite resistant bees if possible, so the mites starve off and if the mite resistant drones should perhaps "get lucky" with any local queens, those resistance genes will pass on and become more common among bees. That would be the ideal long term solution to varoa, it seems. But all i've got so far is "book larnin'". Since I hope to start my first hive this year, pray tell whether/how I can do it with genuinely mite resistant bees that can survive winter in zone 6a. Thanks.


Welcome to Beesource GJM. Sorry for the lapse in replies, life has me busy at the moment. 

My treatment free bees continue to do well by my standards. No issues with providing honey for the household. 

Your questions show that you have done a good deal of reading on the subject. You have no doubt found that there are varying answers about what bees to keep and how to be treatment free.

I still believe that treatment free is possible and in my case desirable. I have my own bees, those from nearby apiarists and bought/introduced resistant bees. No magical bees... Just careful selections made from what survives in my location. 

Learn to overwinter your bees. Learn to make nucs for increase. Learn to graft queens. Then you can grow what is available into more bees. Start with the best you can find locally and endure...

I hope that you exceed your dreams.


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## tpope

Well, I have fruit trees beginning to bloom. I guess that it is about time to call it loss wise for the winter. I have 19 of 32 surviving. Most of my losses were nucs that I feel I did not feed up in the fall and the winter extracted its toll. I did see that some of my full sized hives seemed to have had low bee numbers and also perished in the cold. No time yet to determine the death cause. They had plenty of honey so it was either mites or queenless. My flow last year was such that I am unsure if I had the usual brood break in July August time frame.
Side note... I loved seeing the dead hive beetles...
I feel that I have good genetics for treatment free bees. I have discoverd more backyard keepers in the area. No idea where their bees originated. Seems that I may have some challenges remaining TF.


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## tpope

Made up a cell starter yesterday. It's time to be making some queens. I had planned to graft today, but the weather is such that very few bees are flying. I'll have to wait until later in the week.


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## squarepeg

yep, you should be in good shape down there tpope. i ended up with 4 colonies going through early season supercedure. so far 2 out the 4 have been successful.


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## tpope

I hope that the other two are successful for you squarepeg. Today was graft day from a 2016 SP bee tree queen. I am seeing queen cups prepared but no eggs yet. My apple trees are budding out. Time to multiply.


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## squarepeg

way to go tpope. a sister to your breeder queen was my third most productive hive in 2017 yielding 152 lbs. of harvestable honey after leaving 54 lbs. for the bees. good luck with the grafts!


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## tpope

Well, I have poor acceptance. 2 of 10 are being flooded with royal jelly. Lots of room for me to improve. I have not gone through the cell starter to see how many cells they started when I made them queenless. I tried to use mostly capped brood frames but I do know that one had some young larvae on it. I may have missed a few eggs along the outer margins. I do not plan to cull them if I have some. They all came from lemonade daughters. I'll just need to cut the cells early and make nucs.
I will graft again Friday. I want to keep this cell starter working for a bit while they are willing.


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## squarepeg

the lemonade daughters would be worthy of getting cells from should it work out. my pick for getting the first grafts from this year will be one of those lemonade queens. 

looks like favorable weather at last for working the hives this weekend. i anticipate harvesting quite a few cells from my supers after pushing the queen down to the deep below an excluder. i've already got 2 nucs started that way.


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## tpope

I made 8 more grafts today from a 2016 queen that isn't related to my bees. I found that my cell builder has capped one of my grafts a day early. The other should be capped tomorrow. I have wild cells on three different frames. Some are capped and others look to need one or two days before being capped. It looks like I will be moving some cells while they are in the tender stage. I intend to clear the frames of the wild cells on Tuesday since I don't want a virgin to hatch and clean out all my work. I will be placing cells into mini mating nucs and doing some fly back splits in an effort to grow my drawn comb inventory.


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## tpope

I did remove the wild queen cells from my builder yesterday. I really did not like the size of the cells. I chose not to use them since I have some nice looking grafts that will soon be available.


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## tpope

I moved three queen cells into mini nucs today. I had the fun of shaking bees in the rain. Two nice grafts from my bee tree queen and a queen cell from the bottom of a frame in a natural cup from making lemonade.


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## squarepeg

nice!


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## tpope

I checked my medium mini mating nucs on Tuesday 10 Apr. I found that two had hatched. I saw the lemonade daughter. The other was a bee tree. The third I think in hindsight was one that I mistook for an earlier graft when it was a later one. 

I found 5 nice cells in my cell builder and what appears to be the hatched cell from a bee tree queen that I missed under the nicely drawn comb.

I made up 2 deep framed mini nucs. I had drawn comb and some with honey that I pulled from hives and used some frames with just foundation. I put one cell in the medium mini nuc that didn't hatch out. I shook bee from the bee tree hive into my mini nucs. While doing this I found a frame with eggs that I put into my cell builder to graft from.

The next day I came home to find bees robbing my 2 mini nucs. I had to quickly make robbing screens and install them. When I checked inside these 2 mating nucs, I found that I needed more bees so back to the hive I first got them from. First frame I pulled had the queen on it. It went into a 8 frame medium with some honey and drawn comb. I carried the minis to my out yard so that they would stay put this time.

Today I grafted from the frame in my cell builder. I had some nice larvae in big pools of royal jelly. The bees had started building queen cells in several places too. Remember that I am wondering if I have a virgin wondering around in there that did not tear down the other 5 cells that I placed on Tuesday... I put the grafts in my cell builder and returned the frame with queen cells to the now queenless hive. Sitting here typing this, I wish that I had reversed what I put where since I know the full sized hive would raise the queen cells very well and the cell builder might become queen right and tear the queen cells down. Hmmm.

I learned the value of TempQueen in small mating nucs. It really helps to make the bees stay put. I did not use it for my second round because I forgot. I got reminded why I like robbing screens and when to use the out yard for making new hives.


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## squarepeg

:thumbsup:

setting up my cloake board hive tomorrow t, hopefully taking grafts next weekend.


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## tpope

I have not found a need to wait before grafting with my little cell builder. They were ready as soon as I was.

I checked my grafting work from last Thursday. It appears that 8 of 10 will soon be capped. I also checked the cell in a medium frame mini mating nuc to find that it has emerged. 4 more to check in the outyard... I noted that the Cherokee roses are starting to bloom. The chinese privet is budding nicely and I am sure that the Poplar trees are getting ready. 

I have found queen cups while working my hives but have yet to find any queen cells that I didn't cause. Swarm season is in full swing with the coming flow. Maybe my traps will yield for me.


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## squarepeg

tpope said:


> It appears that 8 of 10 will soon be capped.


:thumbsup:


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## tpope

Hived a nice swarm today. Had to use a deep and medium 8 frame box just to hold them. Gave them a comb to start laying up. I'll check tomorrow to see if they came from the hive I think they did and decide if I'm going to break it down into nucs.

Checked for queen hatch in my deep mini nucs that I forgot to use TempQueen. 1 of 4. Brood or TempQueen seems to be essential to hold the bees in place reliably when waiting for a cell to hatch.

Checked Dar hive that I had placed the queen in a nuc. I cut extra cells and placed 2 into medium mini mating nuc and one in a deep 5 frame nuc with 2 frames of bees and brood. Moved them to the outyard.


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## squarepeg

ruh-roh george. did you get 'em?


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## tpope

I sure hope so... There was not much activity outside the hive when i returned at dusk. Maybe they have started to draw wax.


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## 1102009

Isn´t that nice!
Following.
Good luck


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## tpope

Well Sibylle, I am sorry to say that the swarm I caught came from one of mine. The queen was a lemonade made from last year. They had 4 medium 8 frame hive bodies to call home. I had checked the top two boxes and thought that they had plenty of room to build up and out. I was wrong. They were using the interior of all boxes and had begun to back fill their brood nest.
I did use the swarm cells to make nucs and the remaining brood and food to make more nucs for some of the grafted queens cells that I pulled today.
My to do list just gets longer as my bees toss me curve balls.


----------



## 1102009

tpope said:


> My to do list just gets longer as my bees toss me curve balls.




They must be very healthy. I hope I catch mine too if they swarm. I let them. Well, some.
Please update on how the grafted cells were accepted ( but I think you do


----------



## tpope

Sibylle, I do try to keep this updated. You all need to understand that I have my good days along with my bad. 

I grafted Friday.

My swarm has stayed put so far. I'm pretty sure that the queen has laid up the drawn comb I gave them and that they are drawing new comb for her to use.

I checked some of the grafted cells that I placed on the 18th. That was the day that they should have been hatching. I was concerned that I did not see any removal of the wax on the tips when I harvested them but placed them anyways. I checked on three of them today and found that they had not hatched. The morning of the 17th the low was 30F/-1C. I wonder if that was my problem. I did find that some of the cells I cut off of plastic foundation on the 18th had hatched but that was a much larger hive than my 8 frame medium cell builder.

I found the queen in two of my lemonade hives today and made a cut down split on both and moved them home. One was last years queen, but the other was a supercedure. She was not marked and darker too. Hive was well laid up.

I saw nectar being ripened in every hive that I examined today. Blackberry is providing a good flow. Privet and poplar have yet to bloom here.


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## tpope

I searched through a hive that I had earlier removed the queen for ripe queen cells. I only found three. I left one and cut the other two and moved to my mini mating nucs that had my disappointing grafted cells this morning before the rain. Strangly I found a hatched cell in one and another that showed removal of the wax from the cell tip just before hatch. Hmmm, I guess that the bees know best. I gave the good ripe queen cell to the nuc that seemed to need it the most.


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## tpope

Checked my grafting work today. 8 of 11 are almost capped. Putting a frame of eggs into my cell builder a day before grafting really helps when I can easily pickup a larvae and then place it into a cell cup.


----------



## tpope

I checked my first mating nucs for laying queens yesterday. It was 21 days post hatch. I did not see any and thus made plans as to where I would use the queen cells that need placing today.
Today when I checked before inserting a ripe queen cell, I found eggs and saw the queen. 
My second round was to hatch on 4/12. I saw another queen calmly walking the comb but could not find and eggs. I did see a couple dozen bees that were head first in cells. I did not use any smoke so I figure that they are polishing the cell to get it ready for egg laying. We shall see how this goes.
I placed ripe cells into a couple more mini mating nucs that I could not find any evidence of having a queen. The remainder were put into full frame length nucs with a good frame of capped brood and bees and one with food.
Some days ya win some, some times ya lose... I found emergency cells on the frames that I had shifted to the top of a hive on my lemonade hive at my outyard. I was getting some bees to repopulate the mini mating nucs from them. I made a nuc with a couple of frames and brought it home. No real idea as to the true age of the cells... I will have another look and may make more nucs tomorrow. I ran outta time today and did not have the boxes with me.
I found that a nuc I had made up with two nice deep frames of mostly capped brood and a cut off of plastic queen cell had emerged and swarmed or absconded. No bees at all. I could see where some of the hatching brood had chewed out before dying. Go figure... I gave a frame each to couple of strong hives to clean and protect. I figure all that pollen and brood would soon if not already be laid full of hive beetle eggs.
I figure that my flow is about two weeks late here. I had frost this morning. We are usually frost free by 15 April. I saw the first, single bloom that was just opening on chinese privet today. Tulip Poplar has not started yet.


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## tpope

I had a blessing of swarm and emergency cells on the remaining frames when I returned to my outyard yesterday. I made up three nucs and moved to the home yard. Temperature in the mid 80's!

Added a medium super to my swarm today. They are drawing comb like... a swarm. Also supered the hives that still have the overwintered queens with an additional box. My flow is strong. Locally it is mostly blackberries. I have seen tulip poplar in town that is in bloom so there should be some close that are blooming but hidden. Privet is on the way. Yall hang on now. This is where it starts..


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## gww

Just cause I don't say much on your thread, I enjoy your updates.
Cheers
gww


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## tpope

gww said:


> Just cause I don't say much on your thread, I enjoy your updates.
> Cheers
> gww


Well just that comment means a lot... I am glad that you enjoy my updates. I am just trying to share my experiences and show that I am just as human as much of the readership here. 

I started a bit over a year ago using an app on my phone called Dayone. Between it and this series of postings, I have a pretty good record of what and when for my beekeeping. This allows me to gauge my progress both during the year and from year to year.

Dayone allows me to keep track of the past from what I have journaled there. I am very happy for a 1 year anniversary that I won't share here...


----------



## squarepeg

great report t. are you seeing any new white wax yet? i didn't have any as of last weekend, but i've been able to hear the wax work standing a couple of feet away from most of the hives yesterday and today.


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## tpope

Pitiful excuse for a report on my part... Yes, I am seeing that the bees are beginning to draw new white wax in my established hives. I am seeing a bit of back filling in the hives that I have removed the queen to keep from swarming and to allow a brood break. I think that all are supered well enough to last a couple of days to a week. I took inventory of what I have assembled today and think that I have enough for another round of supers with foundation. I need to build more and quickly..


----------



## squarepeg

yep, main flow is on by you t, and kicking in here as well. have a good one!

i eyeballed the makings for a starter/finisher hive last weekend. i've got a early supercedure colony that successfully got a new queen off but is too small to make a good honey crop, and then i've got several hives with queens excluded in the bottom deeps that can afford to donate some frames of capped brood and adhering nurse bees.

if all goes well i'll set up the cloake board hive this weekend and try to graft next weekend.


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## tpope

It's the time year where the bees really want to make queens. They'll cooperate well for you squarepeg. You really don't have to be too particular either...

I grafted 10 more cells today. I skipped putting them into my builder yesterday but was able to find enough just hatched larvae from my Dar queen that I put into a nuc. I was going to graft from the bee tree queen that I put into an 8 frame medium but they apparently didn't care for the lodging provided and mostly left. I did see a small hand full of 2 to 4 day old larvae that the remaining bees were caring for... I guess that they had too much room? At least I had a pretty good round of grafting earlier.
I checked my mini mating nucs in the home apiary for queen hatch and was delighted to see that both cells seemed to have hatched. 
I am seeing that drawn comb is getting filled with nectar and that the bees in my nucs are starting to draw wax.
This frost one morning and then afternoons in the mid to upper 80's is making me sweat...


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## tpope

Checked my grafting work today. I have 6 of 10 being cared for. I am approaching the expansion numbers that I am comfortable with. That said, I think that I will continue to raise some queens. I still have a lot to learn and find that I learn best by doing. I want to prove or disprove the mini mating nucs...

The honeysuckle and privet sure do smell good around my home apiary.


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## Jovian

Where about are you located tpope?


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## tpope

Jovian said:


> Where about are you located tpope?


Haralson County. GA. A bit north of I-20 on the GA/AL line. Town is called Buchanan but my location is a bit confusing to most mapping services.


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## Jovian

Ah nice you are only a few hours from me. I'm just north of Huntsville AL in a town called Toney. Used to be on 20 everyother week going to school for work.


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## tpope

Yes, we are close Jovian. I hope that your bees are getting a part of the same flow that I am seeing here. I have had to add second stories to all of my nucs that have been made on a frame of bees and one of food. Most have a laying queen present. Two exceptions had capped emergency cells along with placed queen cells that had hatched. I figure that they put off small swarms and the remaining bees are waiting on the new queens to hatch and mate. It must have been kiss and tell looking at the time line... lay a few eggs and leave.


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## tpope

Made up the 6 nucs that I needed for queen cells today in the outyard and brought them home to place the cells. I moved some really nicely drawn frames of honey. Pretty white wax. Nice hot 92F working in a jacket today. This makes me question trying to graft more this year... but I will..
My queen that was stretching the 21 days to be mated is a drone layer. Not that I can find her in the last 2 times looking. She seems AWOL. I'll be shaking them out in the next day or so. I'll use the comb in a nuc made for the half width comb. I want to use more occupied comb next year in my mating nucs to see if this improves my placed cell to mated queen rates. I am at about 40% this year. Little resources used though for the return that I did get.
My flow continues to be strong. My strongest hive is starting to have some bees hanging around the outside in the afternoons. Three deeps and three mediums. It's kinda tall to put another box on... I guess that I need to pull some frames to extract soon. Will see how the rain this week effects things.


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## tpope

Found an unexpected varmint hiding in a mating nuc. Apparently these things can navigate polystyrene from underneath a horizontal plane! It failed the hive tool test.


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## squarepeg

tpope said:


> It failed the hive tool test.




scorpion?


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## tpope

My cell starter/builder did not perform as well as I would have liked on the last round. I have added fresh nurse bees in the form of brood but they just seem to not fly to forage much and the cells they built were rather middle of the road. I decided to give them a queen today and retire them from building duty.

When I opened the hive they seemed a bit cross. Nobody slammed the wire on my jacket but, they were a bit loud. 

I chose to move them from being in an 8 frame medium to a nuc; 2 medium 5 frames and a deep up top since this allowed me to give the young queen some drawn comb to lay in. 

Their new queen was housed in a polystyrene mating nuc. I added the half frames to the nuc with the attached bees. I couldn't get them all without dumping the remaining bees into the new nuc. When I did, there was a bit of small polystyrene frass that went in too. The home bees changed their tunes when the newly marked queen was let loose on the combs.

I got a good laugh as I observed that the bees were nasonoving at the entrance. There were tiny bits of the foam being blown out as the excited bees announced their approval of their new queen.


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## tpope

squarepeg said:


> scorpion?


Dead bug that was once called a woods scorpion.


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## Jadeguppy

I hope never to have that experience.


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## tpope

Jadeguppy said:


> I hope never to have that experience.


Finding the varmint is not so bad. It's been years since being stung by one but I still recall a sting worse than a bald faced hornet. I hope that you never go there too...

Privet is about gone. Bees are still finding good forage from Poplar. Elderberry is just starting to bloom. We have had some showers and thunderstorms. Temperatures are moderate finally... Hoping to see a sourwood flow.

I need to set up another cell builder while my bees are still on a flow and willing to make queens. I have thoughts to explore about the hows and whys of raising bees in my location. I know that I'll have to feed, but how much to get comb drawn when otherwise they won't? Hmmm...


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## 1102009

t,
what is your experience when it comes to mating the queens in such unpredictable weather?

I rather have this scorpion than yours. God!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelifer_cancroides


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## tpope

Si,

What I am seeing is that the more unsettled weather gives fewer mated queens. My success increased once my hives were making their own swarm cells.


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## tpope

Checked some nucs for laying queens today. The cells were grafted 4/20. I placed 8 of 11 into mating nucs. I found 6 of 8 laying. I combined a queen and her frames from a mini nuc into one full sized nuc that was queenless. The other was a pretty strong full sized nuc. I brought it home and named it my builder. I gave them some eggs and young larvae and another frame of mostly capped brood.
I am seeing elderberry just starting to bloom. White clover continues to bloom. Not sure what the bees are into ATM but the flow continues. I have seen a bit of bearding but adding a super helped.
I hope that we get some rain this coming week. It sure would help. Might have a sourwood flow...


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## tpope

Checked my nucs that were made from grafting on 4 May. I placed 6 of 10 cells. Today I found that all hatched. 1 in a deep mini mating nuc was absent. The other end has a nice queen laying well. The 4 nucs all have laying queens and capped brood.


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## tpope

Today was time to check the nuc that I added young larvae to. I found that they have drawn 4 cells. I cut two and made a nuc for them.








My flow is small right now. I have pollen coming in but not much nectar. Sumac has not bloomed yet though. Sourwood is showing signs that it will also bloom this year. This leaves me trying to decide if I want to raise more queens this year. I feel that it is to the point that I'll have to feed some that I have already made...


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## beemandan

Sourwoods at my elevation have never produced a significant amount of nectar. Same is true for sumac. They seem to forage for pollen on it though.


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## tpope

I am at 1200 ft. I get a sourwood flow some years. I have been extracting my early honey trying to get ready...


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## tpope

Wife called me about noon today. Said that I have a hive blown over.


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## squarepeg

dang. looks like one of your big ones t.


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## Jadeguppy

tpope said:


> Wife called me about noon today. Said that I have a hive blown over.
> View attachment 41153


The next page on this thread won't show. It keeps coming back to page 9. 

I had one fall over this year, but split apart more than that. Hopefully the queen wasn't killed and they will be fine.


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## tpope

This is a lesson to self... put two blocks under a single hive. They may grow from a swarm into something awesome. One should be prepared.
This years swarm from a lemonade queen. Hived on one deep comb of brood and 7 deep frames of plastic foundation with 8 medium frames of plastic foundation on top. They drew and laid up another 8 medium frames plastic foundation. I added 8 deep frames of drawn comb which they used for honey storage. 
I noticed late yesterday that the hive seemed to have a bit of cant.. I wrote it off as my mistaken observation. Apparently the heavy top along with an overnight thunderstorm was enough to lay the hive onto its side. There was little damage. The bees had a good coating of propolis holding things in place. 
The bees just kept foraging and doing their thing. They were calm. No robbing from the open top.
I had put out some honey and water from cleaning some of my extracting equipment yesterday. No bees had found it today. I don't know what it is, but my bees are on a flow. I don't have many bees on my dutch clover in the yard and sourwood is not open yet.
I have pulled several supers and extracted them. It looks like I need to increase my tempo.
My overwintered hives that did not swarm are filling impressive supers this year square peg.
I feel pretty good that the queen is fine in all of this Jadeguppy. This line of bees makes an impressive use of propolis. The top came off and the top super was jogged about 3/4 inch out of alignment from the others. Otherwise it all stayed in place.
I am considering pulling some nucs from my strongest hives when my flow soon ends.


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## Jadeguppy

That is awesome. Leave it to the bees to have a solution for our oops.


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## 1102009

Why don´t you use a belt strap?

The setting is a little flimsy or is it not?

Nice they made it.


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## tpope

I had a strap on it earlier but omitted it after the bees started gluing the hive together with propolis. I put a second cement block underneath to spread the contact area out a bit. My wife plans for me to move it after our flow stops.


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## tpope

Hive checks at the outyard today. Found a cut down split that didn't successfully requeen. It sure was nice to grab a nuc and do a combine. I added a wet super to a hive that had outgrown its present quarters. I put a second story nuc on my recently made queens. It was a mix of wet combs and plastic foundation. Hopefully they will raise more brood in the comb and I'll see about feeding them later in the fall and getting some more drawn or maybe I should now... I want a brood break if possible but know that I need my overwintered nucs to have more resources than last year.
I have sumac and sourwood blooming. I have another variety of sumac yet to bloom, crepe myrtle and wild clematis. They won't yield much more than maintenance flows.. if the rain continues...


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## squarepeg

:thumbsup: way to go t!


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## tpope

Crepe myrtle is blooming as is the short leaf sumac. Bees are rather idle in the mornings. I think that they are just collecting water to fuel their hive cooling and some bright yellow pollen that a few bees are carrying in. Afternoons seem to still have a flow.
I had a humming bird visit our feeder for the first time in a good while. Dearth is nigh...
I ran the weedeater and sprayed for weed control this weekend near my hives. Nobody cared although the lawnmower and its dust created a stir..


----------



## tpope

Quite a bit of attention to this sumac.


----------



## tpope

Golden Rod has just started. My wild Clematis is just budding too..


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## tpope

Bees are bringing in two different shades of yellow pollen. My flow continues. I went through most of my hives in the outyard yesterday afternoon. All looked good except one nuc that is queenright but not doing much bee numbers wise. I plan to feed it and swap positions with another hive. I stole enough brood and bees to populate three nucs while there and transported them home. I still have flying drones and drones being raised.
Today I placed II queens into the nucs. The bees response to the queens was incredible. The entire nuc was Nasonoving in less than a minute. I believe that I could have released them directly into the nucs but chose to allow the bees to eat the candy. My comb is either brood filled or honey filled right now. I had to pull some deeps that were being used as supers and extract them to have enough drawn comb so that these queens have a place to lay when released.
I had one nuc that I didn't get closed up for the ride home. It was down on bees so I placed it where a strong nuc was.
I put in frame feeders to make a flow if necessary. I want to ensure a good sized population of bees before the queens quit laying. I hope for three rounds of brood before first frost.
Anyone have suggestions that would help???


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## 1102009

Hi tpope,
you are doing excellently, much to learn from you. Thanks for updating.
I would feed the new nucs, staring now. Feed sugar dough ( or whatever is fed in US) for brood and when there is a good number of bees to process nectar feed with syrup if necessary.
Good luck!
When does your first frost arrive?


----------



## tpope

Thanks SiWolKe,
Our first frost here is usually 23 October.
I have learned more on this forum than I did in my first 10 years from books and my mistakes with bees. Thanks for your advice. I think that I will put some sugar water in my feeders. We are seeing daytime highs of 88F 31C. My bees are using their water. I will also mix up some honey with pollen supplement and feed in small amounts so that the ever present hive beetles don't have a place to lay eggs. I put robbing screens on before moving the nucs but the flow has been such that bees are not looking for unguarded honey.


----------



## 1102009

I learned most practical things from my own experience ( after taking classes) and from 
Michael Bushs website and book, which is available in german.
Plus my apprenticeship in sweden this year with Erik Österlund. Still I´m only 5 years and that´s nothing.

But today I follow my gut feeling and my heart more than any advise given except to the basic knowledge.
There are too many factors involved in european treatment free beekeeping and in a special location to be able to blindly follow any directions.
I came to realize that my bees surprise me too often. Open the hive and it´s never what you expect. Accomodate to their wishes and it may be fine.
I have not adapted to what they tell me yet, but will try my best.

Good luck to you, tpope.


----------



## tpope

SiWolKe, I had no idea how local beekeeping was when I started. I had a copy of "The New Complete Guide To Beekeeping" by Roger Morse and a version of "ABCs and XYZs Of Beekeeping" that along with whatever I could get through the local library to guide my efforts. Zero mention of Varroa.

Moved a hive occupying a Palmer 4 beside 4 deep with three layers of mediums into 8 frame boxes today. I started with the side that was queenless so that I could take a good look through before getting into the heavy concentration of bees. Just honey and bees... Moved on to the other side. I decided that I would just take the two top boxes and set them aside. When I lifted the box above the deep, I saw a queen cell hanging from the very top of the comb on a deep. That was one of six across 4 different frames. I did see the queen. In fact I caught her three times before I lost sight of her. I had a good number of drone walking the comb and some that was capped between the boxes. There was brood on some portion of the entire lower two boxes and still room to store nectar before ripening into honey.

I made a nuc with some of the frames with a couple of queen cells and boosted the population of another nuc with some too. I hope that I changed their mind about swarming. I don't want another nuc this late in the year, but I will try to ensure that the hive it came from does not go queenless. So I'll play the odds and see what I can learn.


----------



## 1102009

> Zero mention of Varroa.


My classes were "natural beekeeping" and Varroa was mentioned at the end when the teacher treated. He did not want us to be shocked. But we were.
I still don´t know much about local beekeeping because I keep away. The main topics are treatments and who wins the honey harvest race. Too depressing.



> That was one of six across 4 different frames.


Sometimes bees raise cells and break them down again, depends on how strong the pheromones are right now. But maybe better not to risk swarming this late of year.
Late in year maybe but it seems they are bursting with bees and stores and have drones, so it will be well, your managements.
Please update.

I had a queen once after 2 tries wit a split which went bad because the queens were not coming back from mating flights. Gave them egg comb and once a supersedure cell. In august they finally had a queen.
She layed 5 combs in two days but they raised 3, having old bees.
When I saw VSH done I donated a capped comb to boost them. They were a strong production hive after winter.
It would not have worked without them having comb and another hive with many broodcombs to steal from.

In such moments you are alone to decide what to do. Many more situation followed and still follow when nobody can tell you want to do in your unique situation.


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## tpope

I checked my new queens today and found eggs in all. I even caught one laying.


----------



## 1102009

Isn´t that nice!
Congrats!
Thanks for the pict.


----------



## tpope

Checked split made on 30 August with capped cell. Found fresh eggs. This year, August was not too late to raise queens...

I still have a good number of drones in some hives. There is enough of a flow from the golden rod and asters that the bees paid no attention to my work today. Could use some rain to help the flow. It has been almost 3 weeks since we had more than a small shower.


----------



## squarepeg

nice.

same here on the rain, although we got lucky yesterday afternoon and had a decent shower.

big uptick in foraging today. goldenrod here just past peak with a little of it going to seed.

looks like temps moderate by next weekend, hoping to get into a few hives then.


----------



## tpope

I have been trying to check a couple extra each time I put my jacket on. I am mostly checking for queen right and observing stores. I'll close up after seeing a nice pattern of eggs on a frame. I have seen bee numbers in some nucs that caused me to give them more room. Comb is used up so I am having to open the brood nest with new plastic foundation frame in some cases. I am hoping that the queen will lay them up and cause the bees to draw cells around the larvae. If not, I'll have to move some frames around later.


----------



## tpope

My bees were working these flowers and golden rod this morning.


----------



## 1102009

Looks like aster, very good flow.


----------



## tpope

Yes, I think that they are a type of Aster. Some rain would make a big difference in flow right now. It is in the forecast...

I noticed that I had a small swarm alight on an overhead branch in my apiary and it drew some comb before leaving or whatever as I did not see it until recently. I was concerned for my breeder queens so I checked them today. I was delighted to see the light colored new house bees. They raised a round of bees very timely. I was a bit worried looking through the last one. I found eggs on a couple of frames. Open honey and pollen too. I did not note the nice light colored young bees and I didn't find the queen in the middle of her nest as I looked. In fact she was hiding under the bottom rail of the very last frame I pulled. I had a duhh moment when I realized that I had been seeing a good number of this queens young bees as I looked for her. They were so dark that I didn't catch on very quickly.


----------



## 1102009

Do your queens differ in colour much?


----------



## tpope

My apiary raised queens run mostly the same color. Some are a bit lighter or darker. The bees also vary a little but are mostly more deeply marked.
Here is a new queen with the light coloration surrounded by my common workers.







Her offspring really stand out from the others.


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## Litsinger

TPope:

Enjoyed reading all your posts thus far and look forward to seeing what observations and insights you share going forward. Looks like you have really perfected how to make more bees.

Russ


----------



## tpope

Hope that you find something useful in my ramblings Russ. My understanding of making more bees is really just starting to show results. It seems to snowball if I try.


----------



## Litsinger

Thank you, TPope. It seems like there is no end to the learning with bees is there?

Sounds like as long as you find a way to get a little surplus honey for mamma- all will be well in your beeyard 

Merry Christmas- and I'll look forward to reading your future posts.

Russ


----------



## tpope

Thanks and a Merry Christmas to you and yours Russ. I'll do my part to keep to ensure that my wife has all the honey she wants. No, I don't think that one will ever know all that bees can teach. I find that as I have learned and picked up skills that it does become easier most days.

Then you have days like today... It was marginal flying weather this afternoon when I spotted too many bees flying at one hive. I have said that I need to pick up a stethoscope for some time now. I soon will. I would prefer to know if I have a deadout that is being robbed without having to enter it tomorrow when we should see highs in the upper 50s. I could seal it up tonight and preserve the resources for future use.

If it is being robbed, I know the culprits and will end the lineage when I can requeen.

My late season queen rearing experiment has ended. The virgin was mated and started laying. But they became a feeder to a larger hive. I must do thing differently if I am to establish a nuc in August. Larger population from existing hives, feed and then feed some more and if possible isolate them where all hives are the same strength. Or... I could just sell the queens and use the remains to boost another hive. Good knowledge to have...


----------



## Litsinger

TPope:

Thank you for your reply. We too had good flying weather today, affording the opportunity to see the bees working.

Regarding your comment concerning the robbing colony, did I understand you to say that you will eliminate their queen based on this behavior?

I just heard the other day someone surmising that robbing was a heritable trait and could be mitigated through selective breeding. I found this assertion facinating- have you seen this in action?

I made some nucs this year in July and they were a flop. I am rethinking the whole idea of creating new queens. Not too many answers, but a whole lot of questions.

Here's to a healthy and prosperous New Year to you and your family.

Russ


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## tpope

I will not allow these robbing bees to produce queen nor drone. It is a action/trait that causes me problems. I have no direct experience with the inheritability of robbing. That said though I see many of the hives I have that are not engaging in this behavior. Robbing a hive that is dying from varroa is the makings of a mite bomb... Some argue that this is good in that the newly infested hive that lives is able to overcome an acute infection and the susceptible ones will die and be removed from the population. Personally I just can't support survival of the thief at the expense of another that may in time show far more desired traits. I try to answer my many questions as best I can. I find that the answers are there but require my attention to the lessons that bees teach in their own time.


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## Litsinger

TPope:

Thank you for your reply. I certainly can't argue with your logic, and I have noticed that some colonies have a greater proclivity for robbing than others. I was just struck about the idea of robbing voracity being a genetic trait- I suppose I should not be surprised.

Much success to you as you learn from your bees, and I look forward to following your efforts.

Sincerely,

Russ


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## squarepeg

tpope said:


> I find that the answers are there but require my attention to the lessons that bees teach in their own time.


:thumbsup:


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## tpope

Had a nice sunny high of 61F with little wind today. This followed a high of 58 yesterday. I have managed to look into any nucs and larger hives that the activity or lack thereof caused my concern. I have fed fondant to those that I found lacking in supplies and added drawn comb where an undrawn foundation was... I interspersed these with the partially filled combs that I pulled from deadouts. I am attempting to use Mr. Walt Wright's nectar management principles and protect my drawn comb. The red maples and willows nearby are showing buds. The Solstice is approaching yet so it is a bit early, but I have ensured that I have a checker boarded box atop most hives. 
I got much of what I used from a colony that had gone queenless in the fall without my recognizing it. It was in process of being robbed. I removed the hive bodies early this morning when it was still too cold for flight. I put a stack of empties in the spot and added a bucket laid on its side with some pollen sub next to it. This seemed to work at distracting the bees from looking for more poorly guarded honey. I had a good laugh at the yellow dusted bees returning to their hive and being harassed by the guards. It took a bit for them to be accepted back in. I guess that they reeked of strange pollen sub..
I have a couple of nucs with small clusters, but they do have food available now, more so than before. I'm looking forward to seeing purple eyed drones. Somebody needs to do some nailing and spread a bit of paint.


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> Somebody needs to do some nailing and spread a bit of paint.


How I do empathize!


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## tpope

Merry Christmas to yall and your families. May the new year be happy and profitable.

Bees are flying today looking for forage. We are at least a week behind last year. I have continued to feed pollen sub.


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## tpope

Bees were foraging today. Dandelions are blooming in the lawn and the bees have found them. I saw pollen being carried into the hive of the one that I examined for activity today. I am sure that they would have taken pollen sub but I was busy today assisting a neighbor with removing a red oak. I just don't get what the bees find when looking for forage from a freshly cut red oak. There were a few flying around the wood on the truck as I unloaded it this afternoon. It smells like the cat pissed on the wood to me....


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## squarepeg

very cool tpope! 

it was too chilly for foraging up here on the ridge top today, barely made it to 50.

in a way i would rather them not start brooding until the days get a little longer, but they typically don't ask my permission.


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## tpope

Days are getting longer now squarepeg... It doesn't bother me that my bees don't ask permission. I just wish that their keeper was not such a slow learner..

I am seeing bees orienting to the hive location. I don't think that this could be new bees yet but it looks as if some hives are starting to forage. The dry pollen sub is getting devoured on days that the bees are flying. They seem to appreciate it even on marginal days.The rain and warming weather has caused the purple dead-nettle to start to bloom.
I have hive top feeders on a couple of nucs. The 2 to 1 sugar water is only being lightly used. I am using this as a gauge to tell when they might need more sugar brick. I don't have to light a smoker of suit up to get a quick peek.


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## squarepeg

very cool t!

it made it up to 56 here today. lots of flying, no robbing, no pollen coming in, seeing a few wax crumbs getting hauled out indicating they are just starting to uncap some of last year's honey.

a few years back i put out some dry pollen sub in january using a telescoping cover turned upside down. it was a blast watching the bees having a party with it.

since then i have decided to refrain from providing anything that might be interpreted by the colonies as a 'flow'.

mostly because i am interested in letting the colonies time their operations based on what is happening in the field.

also because i'll have more bees than i'll have time to mess with again this year.

i don't think there's too much risk when you are augmenting an existing flow as you are doing, and you'll likely be able to start pulling splits a little sooner for having done so.


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## tpope

Up to 65 today... saw two different pollens being brought in today. One was dull yellow and small quantity. The other was bright yellow. The bees had full baskets and several were foraging for it. The bees were still looking for the pollen sub. I had a dozen bees in it as I fed. 
I did a spot check on my sugar blocks. I found that most had used a portion of it. One nuc needs more. I will look through and replenish as necessary tomorrow.


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## tpope

I replaced sugar blocks on the hives I am feeding at the out yard on Monday. Bees looked good numbers wise.

It was 68 F Tuesday. I saw white clover blooming in a warm micro climate in town. I checked the home bees for sugar levels. I only had one hive that required more. I did find one nuc that bee numbers was very low. The queen was there and had laid a silver dollar sized patch of brood on two frames. The nuc still has plenty of stores but I don't think that the bees could cluster to keep brood warm and still get to honey. I gave them a nice frame of mostly capped brood with the clinging bees from a hive that is building nicely.


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## tpope

Bees flying today. They found the Mahonia that is blooming. I saw several hives that were bringing in pollen. 

I will be selling nucs this year to keep my bee hive count sorta stable and the bees outta the trees.


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## tpope

Woke to 20F this morning. Temperature has warmed with the passing of the polar vortex today to 53F and nicely sunny. The bees are working the Mahonia... I am planning to check stores this weekend. Should be in upper 50s to lower 60s. Gonna be eyeballing for my cell starter/builder. I can hardly wait to see a purple eyed drone.


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## tpope

Had extremely beautiful weather this weekend. I was either satisfied from the bee traffic and incoming pollen or else I looked inside. I had surprises waiting. Some were pleasant and others not. I have seen three different types of pollen being collected. A dull yellow seems to be the most abundant. Some bees carried baskets full that were almost bigger than a their head! There were small quantities of a very bright yellow and good abundance of a light tan. I did not see any red from dead nettle... hmm. I had several hives that are brooding strongly. I had two that I expected to die and did. One was a full sized hive that did not successfully requeen itself; didn't realize that earlier. The other I had been trying to keep going. I had one that was robbed out. It seems that a critter had scratched the entrance reducer off and the robbers found it weakly defended; they made it a feeder. Time to take matters inhand and see what is bothering my hives at night. I found one hive that I had turned around on the stand back in the fall. I failed to note that the rain could and did pool in the back. The hive beetles were working on raising some brood in the mess. I saw good pollen collection but did not note a queen when I took a quick tour of the box. Will need to keep an eye on them.


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## squarepeg

nice report t, thanks for the update. we had some of that beautiful warm up here as well. the preceding arctic blast claimed a couple of more colonies here too. will update on my thread soon.


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> The hive beetles were working on raising some brood in the mess.


TPope:

Thank you for your update- I have observed that SHB are able to overwinter with the help of the colony but didn't realize that they start reproducing this early in the season and outside the cluster... another reason to take them seriously.

Glad to hear you have several that appear to be off and running despite the cold snap.

Good luck to you over the remainder of the winter season.


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## tpope

The small hive beetle do overwinter in my area within the cluster. I have a perverse delight in seeing the dead beetles whenever I have a freeze out. 
I am not for sure that the SHB are reproducing at the moment. I saw smaller versions of the adults and either SHB or wax moth worms in the mess that was covering the bottom board. Gotta say that I made an assumption. I did take the steps that I could to solve the root problem of rain water puddling on the bottom board and reinserted the entrance reducer. They will be getting a couple of beetle blaster traps and a Freeman trap bottom board ASAP.


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## Litsinger

Duplicate Post.


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> I did take the steps that I could to solve the root problem of rain water puddling on the bottom board and reinserted the entrance reducer. They will be getting a couple of beetle blaster traps and a Freeman trap bottom board ASAP.


TPope:

Good feedback. I appreciate hearing about the steps you are taking to combat SHB. I am in climate zone 7a, so I imagine our seasonal pest development tracks fairly closely with yours.

I found myself wrestling with SHB quite a bit last year, and as a result of what steps I observed that seemed to work I am prepared to make the following management changes this year:

1. Retaining the entrance reducers year-round- I currently utilize 3/8" Eastern reducers and recognize that leaving them in-place will likely hamper forage efficiency to some extent but it seems a small price to pay. I also experimented with upper entrances, and it may have been strictly coincidental, but I never observed SHB's gaining entry to a hive through them. As such, I am going to cautiously look to further integrate upper entrances to strong colonies to see if this might be a suitable means to minimize SHB intrusion while maximizing forage efficiency.

2. Retaining Freeman trays year-round- I was advised to leave the trays in until a colony had drawn-out the first box and then to leave it out permanently. While thankfully I did not have any hives get slimed-out, I was not comfortable with the numbers of hive beetles that emerged during inspections with the trays out. Again, leaving the tray in may hamper honey ripening a bit, but I for one am more comfortable finding only a few SHB inside. Further, I have found that the trays are handy for conducting mite counts after renewing the oil, so this seems like a good diagnostic side benefit.


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## tpope

You happen to get to watch small hive beetles fly into a strong nuc with just a round 3/4 inch opening and you might view year round entrance reducers in a different light. The beetles are ever present. Strong colonies can deal with them.

I have never viewed a Freeman trap in the same light as a screened bottom board. I leave the tray in year round. I want any SHB that goes through the wire to drown. Be that adults that would just fly back in or larvae that hatched and is looking to pupate in the ground... Wax moth larvae too... as well as Varroa. That said, I do not use Freeman traps on all hives. I have removed some trees that provided shade. My strong colonies deal with SHB through corralling them. I assist with a well oiled beetle blaster trap and a Freeman trap when drastic matters are necessary.

The bees that nest in trees have few bottom openings that could help in honey ripening... I am from the humid south but never used screened bottoms.


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> The beetles are ever present. Strong colonies can deal with them.
> 
> The bees that nest in trees have few bottom openings that could help in honey ripening... I am from the humid south but never used screened bottoms.


Good advice and perspective, TPope.

I am always looking to learn and apply what is working for others, so that is why I enjoy and appreciate you sharing your strategies and approaches here- I am learning a lot.

Good luck this year.

Russ


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## tpope

Placed some supers in the outyard today. I realized on my way home that I did not check to see if the bees had a solid honey dome or not. I gotta do that and perhaps move some frames around before I can call it checker boarding. I had been wondering what the bees were bringing in as some seem to be on a flow. I saw some red maples that are blooming today. That explains it... the sap has rose.


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## Gray Goose

If it is being robbed, I know the culprits and will end the lineage when I can requeen.

My late season queen rearing experiment has ended. The virgin was mated and started laying. But they became a feeder to a larger hive. I must do thing differently if I am to establish a nuc in August. Larger population from existing hives, feed and then feed some more and if possible isolate them where all hives are the same strength. Or... I could just sell the queens and use the remains to boost another hive. Good knowledge to have...[/QUOTE]

I would tend to disagree with the first statement. Late in the season when there is less bloom/nectar flow And you have big hives and small hives, Punishing a hive/queen for robbing is like spanking a fish for swimming. Bees for 1000s of years have survived, One method they use is, if you either have too many bees in the area or have a light flow, is for a Hive to find resources where ever and how ever they can. In the big hives "instinctive mind" the little hive is not making the winter any way so why not take the stores so they have a better odds making it. That is a trait you WANT the desire to survive. I'll take the queen if you don't want it. By robbing out a Small NUC (think late swarm) there is a "place" in the spring for a swarm to go that has comb started. So nature is insuring one makes it and the "place/hollow tree" is still there for next years swarm. 

I would have the little NUCs in a yard of only small hives , reduce the entrance and place robber screens.
Wiping out the queen from the hive that robs in the fall, from a small NUC, is Illogical IMO. If mine I would make splits from that Hive in the spring, It Actually wants to survive.....Think it thru some more. BTW the bees are doing the robbing, not the Queen, and they will all be dead by the time the dandelions bloom next year, And the robing trait could come have from the Drones, so are you killing all the queens that had drones the year that "Culprit queen" was bred, as well?

I'd lean into looking at your NUC tactics before I pinch a Queen.


Gray Goose


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## tpope

I understood talking with the Brody family that you were dead! I guess that their niece and nephew were wrong... It must have been the gander.

Sorry, I just could not help myself.

I do agree about changing tactics on making late season nucs. In fact I plan to. That said, I had little problems with robbing in the past. I would like to get back to that. Selecting against the trait is one way. New genetics can be another.

I would love to have more control over the local DCAs. I am doing my part to flood them with good genetics. My problem is that there are several other folks in the area that have bees. I do ply them with my queens and will continue this practice. Unhappily, I have found that some require more hand holding than I have time to spare.

Thanks for taking the time to dissuade me. I do appreciate your efforts. Time too has tempered my desire to do them in. You are correct implying that the troublesome hive did in fact have a booming population of bees and did not die from Varroa. I have seen how they are building up this year on their ill gotten booty. In fact they have already been given more space to expand. They are making good on the early red maple flow. I intend to use some of their bees as my early resources for queen rearing this year and to provide them with as many supers as necessary. Somebody gotta make my wife's honey. We'll see how they fare come fall and judge then.


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## tpope

Just a small update since bees have begun to forage tree pollen. I had 32 colonies going into winter. I am at 25 now. So I lost about 22%. My biggest problems were late season queen loss and nucs becoming feeders.


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## tpope

I had a relatively nice day today with a poor forecast. I took a look see at the hive that was so challenged by hive beetles. I found the queen and a small amount of brood. So I went looking to see if I could find them some help. I added a capped frame of brood and one of fresh nectar. I also reduced the hive size. I need to put them into a nuc but did not have the opportunity today. What I found in the donor hive is exciting. The fresh nectar was a surprise. The capped drone brood means that it's time to start grafting.
Somebody needs to nail and paint faster...


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## squarepeg

capped drone brood, nice! time to get busy t. 

we had an all out wide open foraging day today, the first day like that in a few weeks. multiple bees per seconds going in loaded to the max with mostly bright yellow pollen.

can't wait to get into the hives and see how the colonies are doing. i'm very happy with what i am seeing at the entrances in all but one or two...


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## Gray Goose

tpope said:


> I had a relatively nice day today with a poor forecast. I took a look see at the hive that was so challenged by hive beetles. I found the queen and a small amount of brood. So I went looking to see if I could find them some help. I added a capped frame of brood and one of fresh nectar. I also reduced the hive size. I need to put them into a nuc but did not have the opportunity today. What I found in the donor hive is exciting. The fresh nectar was a surprise. The capped drone brood means that it's time to start grafting.
> Somebody needs to nail and paint faster...


tpope, What I have done with a "small amount of brood and a queen" and even a newley mated queen on 1 or 2 frames of bees is to "coast" them on top of a strong hive. I place 2 excluders on top of the stronger hive and then a box with the weak or new queen and then the lid. Seems as the bees move up to work the new area they end up helping to be nurse bees. Often I go back in 3 weeks and find the top box now 2/3 to 3/4 full of bees and brood. it is somewhat a combine, so a layer or 2 of newspaper is advised. You really need to watch the hive because there are now 2 queens and they could build up fast. I do not like to break into the brood nest of a "good" hive to borrow brood. With NUCs it may be eaiser to get a frame of brood. If I like the newley mated queen pattern in 3 weeks, I often, tear the whole thing down place the new Queen on the bottom board, add some room and take the original hive to a new stand, "flyback split" basically box level moving. I am a big fan of brood nest integrity so I tend to do other things besides moving frames of brood. In the warm area you are in ,,your tatic may be fine, but here there is 2 feet of snow in the yard and we can have frost into June so temperature is always in my plans, yours not so much. Seems bee keeping is local so what works great in zone 7 may not be advised in zone 4

16 hives zone 4 8 and 10 frame WW


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## lharder

yes be careful about adding brood to a weak hive. They may not be strong enough to keep it warm. Swapping hive positions with a strong hive is a good way to get an initial burst. Also while doing inspections on a strong hive, if you happen to find the queen, I just shake some nurse bees into the weak hive to get it going. Once strong enough then you can add frames of brood.


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## tpope

I do hear your concerns about chilled brood gents. Our forecast is for lows in the upper 40s F for the short term. Was 71 this afternoon.

Are your excluders wood bound Gray Goose?

I checked my outyard today since it was mostly sunny. I found more capped drone brood. Hives checked were brooding well. I pulled a capped brood frame and one that had some capped and larvae to start my cell starter. Put them into a 5 frame deep nuc with three frames food and moved to the home yard. Will need to give them a good check for emergency queen cells.


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## Gray Goose

tpope said:


> I do hear your concerns about chilled brood gents. Our forecast is for lows in the upper 40s F for the short term. Was 71 this afternoon.
> 
> Are your excluders wood bound Gray Goose?.


Yes I use all wood bound excluders, less adhesion to the tops of the frame, and a space to go over the top and down the other side and a space to the lid.
I kind of use them like an inner cover.
Queens can fight between unbound excluders and if not perfectly aligned maybe a bee blocker.

with unbound I would use a super in between for the "space" I.E. 2 deeps with one queen ,then unbound excluder then Super, then unbound excluder, then second brood box with second queen.


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## tpope

Thanks Gray Goose for the reply and describing for me in detail how you are using the excluders. I do not feel that the small hive beetles my bees face will allow me to use an excluder as an inner cover. I do understand the need to separate the queens.
My extended forecast now says that stacking this hive a top of another would be a good idea. Once again, I appreciate your input...


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## tpope

Weather has warmed somewhat. Had mid 50s today with enough sunshine that the bees were flying. I found drones walking on the comb. I cut out 5 emergency queen cells that my starter/ builder had begun. I grafted 11 cups and put into the starter. I had a time finding larvae to graft. The nuc that breeder queen is in has been laid up or stuffed with food. They got another box with drawn comb and foundation added. My grafting was a bit wobbly at first but it comes back.
I'll be adding drawn comb to my other breeder queen that is in a nuc so that I can easily find the correct age larvae when needed. I can see where Mr Palmer's comb rotation into the queen's laying area is a good time saving effort.
If my grafting is adequate, I'll soon be drawing on my resources to get some queens mated. Nail and paint is such a bore when I wanna be raising bees.


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> Nail and paint is such a bore when I wanna be raising bees.


TPope:

Good update- this I understand... assembly and painting is a necessary evil and the cost of doing business isn't it?

Good luck to you this Spring in your propagation efforts.

Russ


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## tpope

Thanks Russ... working on the propagation wide open. Making, assembling and painting is progressing too.

Gonna check grafting work tomorrow. I will remove successful cells to a fresh nuc for finishing. I only want a couple right now.

Anyone close by that wishes a fresh queen cell and can pick it up, message me.


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## squarepeg

i am a bit envious that you are already getting to graft and make splits t. 

the forecast is looking favorable for tomorrow being my first good opportunity of the season to go deep into the hives. not sure if i'll be able to check them all but i'm going to try.


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## tpope

I hope that you can get well inside your hives tomorrow squarepeg. My weather is a bit iffy but I am determined to check my work and do plan to move successful cells into newly made mating nucs. I hope to have freshly hatched larvae available to pull another round of grafts from. Meet you midways if that interests you..


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## squarepeg

appreciate the offer t!

i'm guessing i'll see some capped drone brood tomorrow, but i've only seen one single drone entering a hive so far.

being a little bit north and at higher elevation puts me on the wrong side of the borderline when conditions are marginal compared to you.

fingers crossed that your grafts do well.


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> Anyone close by that wishes a fresh queen cell and can pick it up, message me.


Now that's a tempting offer...


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## tpope

Well, I moved the one queen cell that they were drawing out into a 2 frame nuc... 
I had to go hunting to find the larvae I needed to graft to fill the cups today. Thus does it continue...


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## tpope

I took a peek today into my starter. I regrafted earlier into the 10 cups that the bees had cleaned for me. I have 9 that are showing to be good. They were all full of royal jelly and being drawn out nicely.
I opened up some entrances that are a bit congested and took a look see into a couple of hives. My bees have been collecting a good bit of nectar and ripened some too. I added room to a couple of hives. It should be pretty easy to populate mating nucs...
I am considering setting up a second starter/ finisher.


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## squarepeg

nice!


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## tpope

Made up a second cell starter/builder today. I don't want something to go wrong with my time schedule for raising queens so I feel that a backup is a good thing. I would love to be finished with increasing hive count in April and settle into raising a few queens for the neighbors.
I gave the new starter/builder a round of 12 grafts when I set it into its new home. 
The hives that I pulled resources from are building nicely.


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## tpope

I looked through both starters today. The original has torn down one cell so I have 8 there. I added a frame of mostly capped brood and adhering bees. Starter B has 3 capped cells. I did not find any emergency cells started and the remaining uncapped brood appears too old to form viable queens.
I will be populating my mini nucs with bees, TempQueen, and a queen cell. I will also use some 5 frame nucs for queen mating. My experiences with the minis last year makes me want to use the full sized nucs so that I have something to show for my early efforts. Plus, I really want to ensure that I have made a few queens from my breeders.


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## tpope

Made 12 grafts from Italian breeder. Checked nuc that got a 48 hour queen cell. They did not approve and chose to draw their own cells on two frames. The weather was kind cold and windy today. I did not care to go looking for frames to allow me to split up the queen cells. I will tomorrow if they are still intact. The tips were chewed but we'll see...


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## squarepeg

been staying a little on the chilly side up here as well t. forecast is for 60's the next 3 days and i'm off work so fingers crossed i can get into the remaining hives.


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## Jadeguppy

tpope, sounds like things are going well. Congrats.


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## tpope

I hope that the weather is good for the virgins mating Jadeguppy. Then things will be going well. If it doesn't work for these virgins, I plan to make another round until I have more than enough.
I need to take some time off work myself to try to catch up... My bees have been a bit cross when I have been looking for the frames and bees that I need for making nucs. Smoke has been my friend. I'll bet that it works for you too squarepeg... git 'er dun!


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## tpope

Well I got a goose egg for my grafting on 3/21. I placed a frame with eggs and young brood into that starter to see if it will help get them back in the mood to draw queen cells. I made 12 grafts Saturday and put them into my other starter. I'll try to dodge showers tomorrow and put a bar of grafts into the stubborn starter.


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## Jadeguppy

Sorry to hear that. Hopefully this next set will take. Any ideas on why they didn't take? I haven't checked mine. We decided to focus on yard work and wait until tomorrow or Tuesday to check since I need to check one on Tuesday anyway to see if the queen I dropped made it back to the hive.


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## squarepeg

double dang t. sorry if i missed it, but what are you using for a starter?


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## tpope

I appreciate the sympathy folks.

Jade, I check pretty early to ensure that I don't have too much wasted time with my starters. I believe that the fresh frame I swapped in had too many competing mouths to feed and my cells just did not have the attention they should receive. I also had several days that there were no young larvae to feed. I will be more selective about the frames that go into my starters in the future. I will also be adding fresh grafts shortly after the ones in the starter get capped.

My starter/builders are 5 frame deeps squarepeg. I am working to add a bar of grafts every 5 days to each.


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## tpope

Royal mutt.. Can you see the remains of a mark?


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## squarepeg

tpope said:


> My starter/builders are 5 frame deeps squarepeg. I am working to add a bar of grafts every 5 days to each.


understood, thanks t. i may give that a try soon, i've got an exceptionally good queen i would like some daughters from.


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## tpope

squarepeg said:


> understood, thanks t. i may give that a try soon, i've got an exceptionally good queen i would like some daughters from.


Fill them nucs up while there is a flow.


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## squarepeg

should be pretty good for the next 2 - 3 months. have yet to see a drone return after having mated. no scouts checking out any of the 4 trap locations so far. but i really think we are just on the verge of all that, today the tulip poplars sprouted leaves and the first autumn olives are getting worked...


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## tpope

How long does it take to make a mated queen squarepeg? Let's call it a month... that gives you 1-2 months if all goes well. I have an apple tree on the farm that is blooming. I am trying to build on the early part of the flow. Your way is not wrong, I have a goal of making a little bit of honey and a lot of queens this year..
I grafted 10 cups from my best squarepeg beetree queen and put them into starter A. I checked my earlier (48 hrs) work. I have 12 being drawn out right now. Just did get that done before a shower.
Rode to the outyard and checked to see if my queens have hatched. I found that 10 0f 11 appeared to have hatched. Quiet nucs with pollen being brought in. 
I made up 3 mini nucs. Two had tempqueen used and one that was chock full of bees but without. The tempqueen was new last year and stored in the freezer. The two with looked good after 5 days. The one without it was EMPTY except for an unhatched QC that was placed just 2 days ago. I'll either have brood or tempqueen from now on. It's hard to make queens without bees to tend and warm.


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## tpope

Found this calmly waltzing the comb of her nuc today.







Virgin Carni


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> Found this calmly waltzing the comb of her nuc today.
> View attachment 47011
> 
> Virgin Carni


Looks like a keeper, TPope... enjoying reading your posts. Someday when I'm grown up I want to try my hand at rearing queens.


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## tpope

Litsinger said:


> Looks like a keeper, TPope... enjoying reading your posts. Someday when I'm grown up I want to try my hand at rearing queens.


No need to grow up. Young eyes are the best at seeing the correct aged larvae. Hands are steadier too. Mind can remember what you should be doing to keep to the schedule. Don't wait, just jump in. You can do this Litsinger...

I hope that she makes a good queen. These are my first Carniolans. I really liked how they overwintered and like to forage when most of the other bees are still inside. This was the last nuc that I had to check for cell hatch yesterday. I had the time so I looked for the queen and there she was.. Looks like I have good weather for the next bit. Should be good for the queens to mate.

Yall should try this at home!


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> Yall should try this at home!


Thank you for the encouragement, TPope. Your points are sound.

I am going to start by seeing if I can keep bees alive. That accomplished (hopefully), I plan on moving toward propagating for expansion and traits. 

Keep up the good work, and I'll stay tuned...


----------



## tpope

Grafted 12 to put into starter B. I grafted from the 2016 queen that I pictured earlier. I found her looking for a frame of brood from her nuc to add to one of my starters. I left a comb where I removed the donor frame. This surely made finding grafting material easy today. It also provided me with a good number of nurse bees to add into the starter when I brushed them off.

I found that all of the last set were not capped.













I made the earlier grafts Saturday 23 March. Today is Thursday 28 March. Makes me feel good about the larvae I am choosing to move.


----------



## tpope

I know that today is April Fools day but my bees in starter B pulled a slick one. They had a queen cell tucked into a nook and she hatched. And then did what young queens do.
I'll rebuild tomorrow to again have two starter/builders. I am very glad that I chose to have two at this point. I have managed to avoid this mistake in the past. I will be brushing the bees off the comb in the future to inspect better.
Sure am glad that I am alternating the days for putting another bar of cells in.


----------



## Jadeguppy

Ouch! I am keeping my fingers crossed that no rogue queens make it above the queen excluder and get my developing grafts. Looks like you are getting good at picking the right larvae.


----------



## tpope

Jadeguppy said:


> Ouch! I am keeping my fingers crossed that no rogue queens make it above the queen excluder and get my developing grafts. Looks like you are getting good at picking the right larvae.


I am sure that you will do fine on your grafts. Hedge your efforts by grafting again now.


----------



## tpope

Gathered the bees and resources from the outyard that I needed to make another cell starter/builder today. I put 10 cups in from my 2016 survivor queen. That puts it back into the rotation without loosing too much time. Hopefully...
I checked to see if the Carniolan queens were laying yet. 7 of 8 had eggs. I marked them. I was very pleased to find that my mini nucs were successful. I'll allow the queens a bit more time to lay before putting in a fresh cell.
I used a Pro-Nuc to move the bees today. It performed well. No leaking bees. Easy to open when desired. Simple to close too. Lots of ventilation. They nest well when stacked for use. A ratchet strap holds the stack in place without squashing them flat. They make a great place to brush or shake bees off comb and then pour into a mini nuc.


----------



## Litsinger

tpope said:


> I used a Pro-Nuc to move the bees today. It performed well. No leaking bees. Easy to open when desired. Simple to close too. Lots of ventilation. They nest well when stacked for use. A ratchet strap holds the stack in place without squashing them flat. They make a great place to brush or shake bees off comb and then pour into a mini nuc.


TPope:

I wasn't familiar with 'Pro Nuc', so I looked it up. It appears he has come up with a really ingenious idea with a lot of value-added features. If his pricing is in-line, I imagine he will be giving the corrugated nuc boxes a run for their money.


----------



## tpope

Litsinger, I am trying them to see if I want to use them for selling nucs. I would definitely pay extra to get my bees in a Pro-Nuc. That said, I have been surprised to find that there are some pluses to using them daily. Next for me is seeing how they work for getting a queen established.
They are about twice as expensive as the corrugated boxes before you add the stapler, screen and strap. Let's not forget the labor to assemble.


----------



## Litsinger

tpope said:


> They are about twice as expensive as the corrugated boxes before you add the stapler, screen and strap. Let's not forget the labor to assemble.


Good point- I wonder how the pricing compares if you buy a whole pallet directly from the manufacturer? Looks like the MOQ is 40.


----------



## tpope

Litsinger said:


> Good point- I wonder how the pricing compares if you buy a whole pallet directly from the manufacturer? Looks like the MOQ is 40.


I saw 400 pieces to order direct... I have ambitions for the year and 400 would be a great number but that would be queens not nucs...


----------



## Litsinger

tpope said:


> I have ambitions for the year and 400 would be a great number but that would be queens not nucs...


What do they say about going big? :scratch:

In all seriousness, I applaud your queen rearing efforts- you'll be running with the big dogs before too long...


----------



## tpope

Just trying to stay out from under the porch...


----------



## tpope

Daughter of Carniolan breeder from Latshaw Apairies 







Apples are blooming locally. Bees are covering the Dogwoods in the yard. I noted the first Dewberry bloom. Blackberries and Tulip Poplar are soon to bloom. I had a dark honey that was fresh on the frame I grafted from today. It made quite the mess on the feed sack that covered the passenger seat for my truck. The taste reminded me of sorghum. I see new wax being made and surplus nectar coming in.


----------



## squarepeg

it was great to see you and your bees this morning t! 

i'm very happy being able to get those queens and cells from you. they made it home safe and sound and are already in the nucs.

you may be my secret weapon going forward given that you can start queen rearing about a month before i can.


----------



## tpope

Good to see you too. Glad the return trip was uneventful. I hope that they preform well for you.


----------



## tpope

On Sunday while Squarepeg was on the farm, I checked a mini nuc by mistake. I confused it with the other one that had the mated queens. I am glad for that... I found a queen cell that the bees had abandoned. I handed it to squarepeg who started intently watching it for movement. Which he saw, so it went into the mini nuc that held a mated queen. I had a thought process later that afternoon and looked into the other half size deep nuc. One of the cells there was alone so it went into the other side of the mini that held the other queen...
I had queen cells to move from a starter/builder today so I checked the two unhatched cells to find that they were both hatched. I planted 7 cells into mating nucs from my survivor queen. I found a nuc that I had checker boarded earlier that had made plans to swarm anyways. In fact the queen was not to be found and they had queen cells nicely drawn on 2 frames. So I split them with the intent of requeening both later. Had to dodge the rain and just took too long to get things done. Didn't get the next bar of grafts made today.
Sometimes ya sacrifice the rook to kill a bishop... I did get a new location to place bees.


----------



## squarepeg

tpope said:


> Sometimes ya sacrifice the rook to kill a bishop... I did get a new location to place bees.


yep. congrats on the new location.

planning to check the cages on the two mated queens tomorrow night to see if released.

probably could have direct released based on reaction from the queenless nucs, but chickened out.


----------



## tpope

Cool. Your cells should be emerging too. 

I am reaching critical mass with my efforts. I would be very happy to supply someone with queens or cells...


----------



## Gray Goose

tpope, If you were a bit closer I would take you up on that offer. I want to add about 5-10 hives this year, however it snowed here yesterday


----------



## tpope

Sorry if some thought that I was looking to give away my hard work. Not the case at all. I have a lot invested through sweat. Be more than happy to sell yall a few queens.


----------



## AHudd

tpope said:


> Daughter of Carniolan breeder from Latshaw Apairies
> View attachment 47363
> 
> Apples are blooming locally. Bees are covering the Dogwoods in the yard. I noted the first Dewberry bloom.


Nice looking Queen.
We have a lot of Dogwoods on our place, but I have not seen any bees on them. Have you noticed a particular time of day the bees work them? They sure smell to me like they should make nectar.

Thanks,
Alex


----------



## tpope

AHudd said:


> Nice looking Queen.
> We have a lot of Dogwoods on our place, but I have not seen any bees on them. Have you noticed a particular time of day the bees work them? They sure smell to me like they should make nectar.
> 
> Thanks,
> Alex


They seem to yield towards mid day. I had never seen my bees use the Dogwood until I had about 20 hives here. That said, I believe that the bees may seek out other forage that is sweeter when available or less effort to collect.


----------



## AHudd

Thanks for the feed-back.

Our Redbuds have faded. This is the first year we got the full run of blooms without a killing frost interrupting them. The blackberries have not started yet, but the bees are on something, I just don't know what.

Rain and cooler tomorrow. I guess it's break time for a day or two until this weather passes. 

Alex


----------



## tpope

The blackberries are just showing white along with the invasive cherokee rose. I moved 4 cells into new nucs today. I also grafted 11 cups to put into the starter/builder that I cleared a bar last Friday. My rapid regrafting needs to slow some. I am using up my drawn comb and available bees. So, I'll add a few days between putting in a fresh bar.


----------



## Jadeguppy

tpope said:


> The blackberries are just showing white along with the invasive cherokee rose. I moved 4 cells into new nucs today. I also grafted 11 cups to put into the starter/builder that I cleared a bar last Friday. My rapid regrafting needs to slow some. I am using up my drawn comb and available bees. So, I'll add a few days between putting in a fresh bar.


We have run into the same issue. Not a bad issue to have though.
What are you using to get them mated? I'm currently using some 3 frame nucs I made last year, but am considering putting in grooves to make a 3 or 4 compartment queen castle out of a medium box. Haven't decided if I want to go that route. I like the idea of keeping everything uniform.


----------



## tpope

I am using bought mini nucs, home made deep minis and 5 frame nucs.


----------



## Jadeguppy

I like the mini concept, but dread having to store them. Do you scrape the wax off each season? Wax moths and shb are a problem year round here.


----------



## Gray Goose

Jadeguppy said:


> I like the mini concept, but dread having to store them. Do you scrape the wax off each season? Wax moths and shb are a problem year round here.


can you store them in a mid sized chest freezer, on low setting barely froze, I am thinking, 3 x 6 x 4 layers maybe could store 100 in a freezer.
I have 2 fridges full of honey maybe 50 deep frames to give to splits and swarms, for a head start. freezing should stop most of the critters from destroying them. Pop them out into the sun for a couple days prior to use.
GG


----------



## tpope

Jadeguppy said:


> I like the mini concept, but dread having to store them. Do you scrape the wax off each season? Wax moths and shb are a problem year round here.


I try to store mine inside a hive by making use of a specially made box. Divide a 5, 8 or 10 frame box in half the long way. Pick your favorite depth and width. Fill with the work that the bees did when you are done with raising queens for the year. Then you'll have the resources you need next year when you and the bees are ready to raise queens.


----------



## Jadeguppy

Gray Goose said:


> can you store them in a mid sized chest freezer, on low setting barely froze, I am thinking, 3 x 6 x 4 layers maybe could store 100 in a freezer.
> I have 2 fridges full of honey maybe 50 deep frames to give to splits and swarms, for a head start. freezing should stop most of the critters from destroying them. Pop them out into the sun for a couple days prior to use.
> GG


I do have a chest freezer, but more frames than will fit. Mother nature wanted to remind me of where I am. I just pulled up a frame from a mating nuc (2 medium frames) and had to cut a large section off of it due to moth maggots. It happens to be the only one of four with a queen cell that emerged. Darn things even get into my house and find any little bit. My foster kitty is trying to help out by catching the moths.


----------



## tpope

My flow is on the way... Tulip Poplar is just opening. Moved 10 queen cells into mating nucs today. Donor hives are building well. I did not have a hard time finding the frames of bees that I needed today. The mini nucs are starting to need frames removed too. Luckily I have more to populate.


----------



## tpope

Busy, busy. Catching queens, making mating nucs, grafting cells, checking hives, making UPS runs. I am learning that anyone seriously raising queens has to be super organized. The calendar on my smart phone is keeping me on track with what I need to do and a reminder too. 
Cell builders are looking good and working well. They are raising larger numbers of grafts each round. Yesterday, I put 15 cells in the one that I pulled 11 from today. They all showed acceptance. Maybe the grafter has improved too.


----------



## Jadeguppy

Congratulations


----------



## tpope

Jadeguppy said:


> Congratulations


Thanks. You can do it too.


----------



## JWPalmer

That is the kind of busy that I like. I have been using a queen calendar app to keep track of things. Really helps. The few cells I salvaged from my last grafting attempt are due to emerge Friday/Sat. morning. They are going into mating nucs tomorrow after work. Will try another round this weekend in the upper chamber of a queenright starter finisher with queen excluder. Looks like five of my hives swarmed and are currently queenless but that should change within a week. Just giving me a shortage of nurse bees for the other nucs at the moment. Still looking for a decent honey crop so some hives are off limits for resource harvesting.


----------



## tpope

JWPalmer said:


> That is the kind of busy that I like. I have been using a queen calendar app to keep track of things. Really helps. The few cells I salvaged from my last grafting attempt are due to emerge Friday/Sat. morning. They are going into mating nucs tomorrow after work. Will try another round this weekend in the upper chamber of a queenright starter finisher with queen excluder. Looks like five of my hives swarmed and are currently queenless but that should change within a week. Just giving me a shortage of nurse bees for the other nucs at the moment. Still looking for a decent honey crop so some hives are off limits for resource harvesting.


What app are you using? My current is too cumbersome. I had declared all hives open to being resources this year but found that a couple have built up so well that I have put on excluders and supers.


----------



## JWPalmer

Google appstore, search queen calendar. It is the one with the orange bee. Works pretty well and gives me notifications when things need to be done. Has an internal timer that starts when you create the file. Enter your info in the morning or it will notify you when it is too late to do anything that day.


----------



## Jadeguppy

I'm using JC's excel file. You put in the day you are grafting and it updates all the dates to reflect that. No fancy notifications, but no counting out days.


----------



## tpope

Dang it... JW's app is for android. My work requires that I use an Iphone. I work on various Macs all day and even at home but greatly prefer an android phone but refuse to carry two phones.
I currently use an Excel file to input my grafting dates but I have to enter an event and time into my calendar to get a reminder on my Iphone. PITA... But not so bad that I want to write an app to cover my needs. I would rather work my bees.
Thanks for the inputs!


----------



## JWPalmer

The Chitwood Family Farm queen calendar will make the calendar entries for you. Do not know if it works on an Iphone though.


----------



## tpope

JWPalmer said:


> The Chitwood Family Farm queen calendar will make the calendar entries for you. Do not know if it works on an Iphone though.


Android is easier to develop apps for. Apple wants a cut and is a smaller market.


----------



## tpope

Bought mini mating nucs and my supplier back-ordered the tempQueen I need to use with them. Bought Pro-Nucs and the delivery will be too late for my immediate needs. I am in process of cutting and assembling 12 medium nucs and 10 deep double mating nucs. 
I had a good hatch rate on my last round of placed cells. I have a few openings in mating nucs for placing fresh cells. Mostly due to mated queens being pulled.
I pulled 23 cells today at day 10 from graft.
My flow is in full swing.
I have caught two swarms this week.

When I burn my candle from both ends, it smells like beeswax!


----------



## Jadeguppy

tpope said:


> When I burn my candle from both ends, it smells like beeswax!


LOL Love it!


----------



## Litsinger

Jadeguppy said:


> tpope said:
> 
> 
> 
> When I burn my candle from both ends, it smells like beeswax!
> 
> 
> 
> LOL Love it!
Click to expand...

+1 to that- exactly what I thought!


----------



## tpope

Pulled 12 ripe queen cells today. 5 went into nucs where the queens were pulled. The remainder were placed in freshly made mating nucs. It's nice to be able to pull a frame from an older mating nuc to use to hold the additional bees in place.


----------



## tpope

I have been busy... lately...
The last few days of May with temps in the middle 90s have been tough. I placed queen cells into my mating nucs that failed to produce a mated queen. The heat and lack of rain along with soon to end flow season are suggesting that I should start taking stock of where the bees have built to and the required resources to over winter. Seems kinda early to start fall planning, but that's where I am. Sumac and Sour wood are forming blooms. Dearth follows.. So early this year.


----------



## Litsinger

tpope said:


> Dearth follows.. So early this year.


Same here... and no sourwood in the lowlands.


----------



## Gray Goose

what a difference the locale makes, Apple trees in bloom here, been a very wet spring, I am hoping for a good Hay crop which is the big nectar flow from here, starting in 3-4 weeks. I do not think we will have a dearth this year in northern Mich.


----------



## tpope

We are alive and well here... been very busy with trying to build a business. Bought a band saw mill and have been learning to use it. Long days of logging in the heat and then sawing and stacking the lumber... Makes one tired and ready for rest. Bees are fairing well. Keeper needs a good warm day to take a look... We are looking forward to a new year!


----------



## gww

Cool on the saw mill. Mine is home made but believe me when I say that I understand the effort of processing trees to boards.
Cheers
gww


----------



## Litsinger

tpope said:


> We are alive and well here...


TPope:

Glad to see your post this evening. I look forward to hearing how things are faring in your beeyard.

Happy New Year to you and your family.

Russ


----------



## tpope

A Happy and prosperous New Year to you and yours Russ.


----------



## Litsinger

tpope said:


> A Happy and prosperous New Year to you and yours Russ.


Thank you, my friend. And same to you!


----------



## tpope

It's time to start thinking about grafting. I can see the buds swelling on the red maples


----------



## Litsinger

tpope said:


> It's time to start thinking about grafting. I can see the buds swelling on the red maples


TPope:

Same here. I have heard scattered reports from across Kentucky of some Red Maples blooming already in protected locations.

Here the Slippery Elm buds are swelling too... and while I've not observed any deadnettle or henbit blooming yet, the plants are starting to show steady growth.

Looking at the extended forecast, it looks like they are predicting milder than average temperatures from now till the end of March for the Southeast so we might have an early and tumultuous start to Spring.


----------



## tpope

Remarked to my daughter that ground hog day was about 4 weeks away... I will stock the pollen sub feeders. May put a little sugar syrup into a hive top feeder... Definitely will be taking note of sources of resources for making up my queen starter/builder. I started grafting the first week of March last year. I intend to start earlier this year to determine if I can get queens bred earlier in my area. I do have an advantage this year. Overwintered queens in nucs that I can sell early.


----------



## Litsinger

tpope said:


> I intend to start earlier this year to determine if I can get queens bred earlier in my area. I do have an advantage this year. Overwintered queens in nucs that I can sell early.


Thank you, TPope. I'll look forward to hearing how this turns out for you- this continued mild weather we are having in the Southeast will no doubt continue moving things along.


----------



## tpope

Bees have been flying and foraging on what they can find. Had decent weather some part of the last 5 days. Apparently pollen is in short supply right now. They are using my pollen sub heavily. I put some sugar water in an open feeder. It was not as attractive as the pollen sub.


----------



## JWPalmer

This what I am seeing as well. Bees have plenty of capped carbs in the hive and are not into the syrup feeders but are foraging pollen, or pollen sub, like crazy.


----------



## Litsinger

tpope said:


> Had decent weather some part of the last 5 days.


TPope:

I have been reading about swarm calls in Southern Georgia already...


----------



## tpope

Noticed that the number of bees working the last bit of the Mahonia was down. Decided to put out some sugar water Saturday. The bees finally found it today when the red maples are not yielding much for the bees to forage. The maples appear to have started 1 Feb or a little earlier. It has begun!


----------



## Litsinger

tpope said:


> The maples appear to have started 1 Feb or a little earlier. It has begun!


Glad to know... excuse me while I furiously start painting.

How are your overwintered colonies looking?


----------



## tpope

Wow have my bees been slow rolling it with the rain and cool weather.


----------



## Jovian

Same here. It seems like a crawl compared to last year


----------



## tpope

Jovian said:


> Same here. It seems like a crawl compared to last year


I appreciate the feedback. The season will soon accelerate ya know and I'll be scrambling.


----------



## tpope

Found that a nuc that survived the winter in good shape was queenless. Double eggs in some cells. Trying to raise a queen. I should just shake em out but must be getting soft and gave a frame of eggs and larvae.


----------



## William Bagwell

Wow, just wow. That little sucker was packed with bees! Your were spot on advising me to transfer them today. Feel privileged to be your only spring nuc customer this year.

Got it home, put it in the center of the hive stand and opened it up. We sat and watched them for at least 15 minutes as they orientated. Was still a bit cool so we ran a few close errands... They were already bringing in pollen when we went down to move them to a 10 frame deep. Very gentle, could probable have worked without a veil. Kept taking my right glove off to take pictures. Wife figured out real quick she had too many clothes on under her vented suit. 

Saw no SHB while transferring the frames. Did find two when I shook the few remaining bees out of the nuc. Dispatched them with a screw driver since stupid me left my hive tools at the house. All of them

Very happy and excited to have BEES!

Thank you,

William & Patrice


----------



## tpope

I hope that they do well for you. It sounds like you will be keeping a close eye on their progress. Great meeting you.


----------



## Litsinger

William Bagwell said:


> Very happy and excited to have BEES!


William:

Great story- best of luck to you this year. Three years in, and I am still excited to have bees...


----------



## tpope

Caught a swarm and made a couple of splits. Blackberry blooming. Had a frost on Saturday...


----------



## William Bagwell

Congratulations on the swarm! Have four bait hives out in various places, two 
here and one each at my sons and a coworkers home. 

Resisted the temptation of doing a one week inspection. Yesterday was two 
weeks so I just had to take a look. Doing great! They have drawn out almost 
3 1/2 of the 5 new frames. Mix of foundation, both wax and waxed 
plastic and two foundation-less frames. Capped brood on at least one of the 
new ones and stores on three more. No sign of drones or queen cells yet. Had 
my daughter take pictures of each frame as I pulled them. Very quick 
inspection and spotted the queen as I went through the pics. Great method 
that will not scale to multiple hives.

Need to start a thread of my own and quit hi-jacking yours. Not sure if the 
TF sub forum is the correct place? While technically I am at the moment, if 
moving bees 65 miles causes them to loose resistance. Or I catch a swarm or 
three... Like your subject line says, it is a Journey and if I stumble along 
the way have an expensive chemical free 'crutch' still in its box.


----------



## AR1

William Bagwell said:


> Need to start a thread of my own and quit hi-jacking yours. Not sure if the
> TF sub forum is the correct place? While technically I am at the moment, if
> moving bees 65 miles causes them to loose resistance. Or I catch a swarm or
> three... Like your subject line says, it is a Journey and if I stumble along
> the way have an expensive chemical free 'crutch' still in its box.


Sounds like a successful start. Treatment free is tricky. I am TF, mostly, but I also killed a bunch of hives that might have survived if I'd known what I was doing. If you only have a handful of hives there is a strong chance of losing all of them. My current opinion is that you need sufficient hives that you can make several splits every year to replace losses. TF will have higher winter losses so you need a few extras.

Some bees just won't survive at all treatment free. I got a swarm in the spring and later split it in summer. TF gospel is that swarms and splitting knock back the mites enough to keep hives alive. By mid fall both those hives were completely packed with mites and died before winter. Nothing but constant treatments would have saved them. Wrong kind of bees.


----------



## tpope

William Bagwell said:


> Congratulations on the swarm! Have four bait hives out in various places, two
> here and one each at my sons and a coworkers home.
> 
> Resisted the temptation of doing a one week inspection. Yesterday was two
> weeks so I just had to take a look. Doing great! They have drawn out almost
> 3 1/2 of the 5 new frames. Mix of foundation, both wax and waxed
> plastic and two foundation-less frames. Capped brood on at least one of the
> new ones and stores on three more. No sign of drones or queen cells yet. Had
> my daughter take pictures of each frame as I pulled them. Very quick
> inspection and spotted the queen as I went through the pics. Great method
> that will not scale to multiple hives.
> 
> Need to start a thread of my own and quit hi-jacking yours. Not sure if the
> TF sub forum is the correct place? While technically I am at the moment, if
> moving bees 65 miles causes them to loose resistance. Or I catch a swarm or
> three... Like your subject line says, it is a Journey and if I stumble along
> the way have an expensive chemical free 'crutch' still in its box.


I worry about what your neighbors bring into the equation. Their operations are out of your control. If their hive succumbs to mites or foul brood, you may get a problem that treatment free can not control. Got the tshirt...

No worries about posting to my thread. It is all relevant.


----------



## tpope

AR1 said:


> Sounds like a successful start. Treatment free is tricky. I am TF, mostly, but I also killed a bunch of hives that might have survived if I'd known what I was doing. If you only have a handful of hives there is a strong chance of losing all of them. My current opinion is that you need sufficient hives that you can make several splits every year to replace losses. TF will have higher winter losses so you need a few extras.
> 
> Some bees just won't survive at all treatment free. I got a swarm in the spring and later split it in summer. TF gospel is that swarms and splitting knock back the mites enough to keep hives alive. By mid fall both those hives were completely packed with mites and died before winter. Nothing but constant treatments would have saved them. Wrong kind of bees.


Great insights. I agree about the higher winter losses and the need for a beekeeper to make more splits. I am finding that there is a maximum of splits an area will support on an average year. Losses will be higher if one chooses to not feed the bees through a dearth. And then there are the neighbors that choose to buy bees from who knows where that bring who knows what in...
Makes for a hard to toe line...


----------



## JWPalmer

William, you are free to start a thread of your own journey. If you will be treating in the future, maybe the TF forum is not the place to put it. Although, we could always move it later. I think developing TF bees is more important than TF that also do not need to be fed. IIRC, Randy O posted that he got two hives out of 1000. One step at a time.


----------



## tpope

Made a couple of cut down splits this afternoon.
I tried to get a good picture of one of the queens but I didn't get what I hoped for.
I assure you that she is in the picture. How are your queen spotting skills?


----------



## Litsinger

tpope said:


> How are your queen spotting skills?
> View attachment 54615


Apparently poor, tpope. I am going to speculate that she is is on the upper third of the frame right in the middle along the length?

Glad to hear that things are off to a good start for you. Sounds like we're about a week / 10 days behind you all as I see blackberry blooms swelling but not open yet.

Best of success to you this year.

Russ


----------



## tpope

Thanks for playing along Russ. The queen hid underneath a worker in the picture, One can see her dark abdomen and wings sticking out. The picture is rotated 90 degrees counter clock wise...
Got locust blooming.


----------



## William Bagwell

Late reply - Coworker was on vacation all week. Additional lack of sleep on 
top of that from the storm last Sunday night and its 21 hour power outage... 

@AR1 Yes, learning to make splits is on my short list. Hoping to catch a 
swarm or two to practice on. If not will do the least risky single split 
possible with the one hive. 

@tpope Both neighbors bees may have died over the winter. Last fall we were 
seeing many bright yellow striped bees (likely Italians) Not seeing any of 
them this year. If they completely died months ago I'm probably safe. A few 
stragglers hanging on then may be in for a wild ride soon as my bees find 
them.

Also, any suggestions for when I get ready to add a second box? Like almost 
everything in beekeeping there are too many ideas. Some of which are 
contradictory. Over or under? What to move if over since the only drawn frames I have are in the hive. 

Oh, failed on the queen spotting until Russ gave it away. 

@JWPalmer Being totally TF is most certainly a goal. (Should be everyone's!) 
Lack the resources to go 'bond', so a contingency plan is needed. Perhaps 
should reopen the thread where we were discussing this back in January? "New to bees" over in "Equipment & Supplies to Obtain".


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> Got locust blooming.


I still have my fingers crossed that locust will bloom here- we had a very late freeze last week that singed the ends off the tulip poplars pretty good.


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## Litsinger

William Bagwell said:


> Also, any suggestions for when I get ready to add a second box? Like almost
> everything in beekeeping there are too many ideas. Some of which are
> contradictory. Over or under? What to move if over since the only drawn frames I have are in the hive.


William:

Given that you are South of me (and remind me if you are supplementally feeding?) you would probably be best served to add a new box to the top of your existing broodnest once you see the colony drawing out comb on frames 1 and 10 and they will likely go right on expanding upward with little trouble.

If they show reluctance you could consider 'pyramiding-up' a couple brood frames from the existing box, but use this approach judiciously- particularly if you are still (like me) having occasional nighttime temperatures in the 30's and low 40's.


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## William Bagwell

Litsinger:

Got it. Try just adding a box and only move a few frames up if they ignore it. Yes, I have been feeding them. Four 4 LB bags mixed approximately 1 to 1 in just over three weeks. Actually was considering discontinuing feed for a while since I think the flow is on. 

Stupid newbie question of the day. Standing behind the hive, is frame #1 on the left or right?


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## squarepeg

left.

i think you made a great choice to start out with some of tpope's bees.

waddya say we start a new thread as to better chronicle your journey william?


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## Litsinger

squarepeg said:


> left.


Right... I mean exactly. 

An adage that an old beekeeper told me is that it is, "2 and 8 and don't be late". 

Meaning, if the bees have frames 2 and 8 80% drawn-out, they are ready for another box.

I do hope you'll consider squarepeg's suggestion to start your own thread.

Russ


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## William Bagwell

Thanks squarepeg and Russ! And will do...

Based on your 2 & 8 at 80% I was getting close over a week ago. Off this week (revenge on my coworkers) so will try to pick up a deep locally. Had four spares but they are all tied up as swarm traps at the moment. If not can use a medium and hope pyramiding is not needed. Or knock together a deep with butt joints. Ain't got no time for finger joints.


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## JWPalmer

William, I make my boxes with rabbeted joints. I cut the long sides 19-1/8" long and cut the ends 16-1/4". Cut a 3/8" deep x 3/4" wide rabbet on the sides of both end pieces (don't forget the 3/8" x 5/8" frame rest) glue and nail and presto, hive body.


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## tpope

Caught a swarm on 5 May from a large hive that I had removed the queen earlier in an effort to keep them at home and making honey. I put the colony in the bottom deep and added the medium above it that had the most brood in it. The bees back filled that box and the couple of mediums above that had brood. Didn't draw anything new but extended the existing comb. Wound up with a honey cap forcing the laying queen into too small an area for them to like... Swarm!
Checked this week and have a nicely laying queen. Moved frames around to allow them some room.


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> Checked this week and have a nicely laying queen. Moved frames around to allow them some room.


tpope:

Glad to read that this colony was able to successfully re-queen. Hopefully these were some genetics you were looking to propagate such that the bees did you a favor by swarming.


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## tpope

Litsinger said:


> tpope:
> 
> Glad to read that this colony was able to successfully re-queen. Hopefully these were some genetics you were looking to propagate such that the bees did you a favor by swarming.


Well, I tried to set them up for honey production with the intent to split them later for gaining hive count. Wife and Dad want some honey. They did not get much last year with my attempts to grow hive count. The colony is indeed one that I have pulled a round or two of queens from each year. Since I don't have much trouble grafting, I would prefer to make my own queens, but I will dance with the one that I brung so to speak.


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> Since I don't have much trouble grafting, I would prefer to make my own queens, but I will dance with the one that I brung so to speak.


Glad to hear that it worked out for you tpope.


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## lahun

Good efforts. Best of luck...


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## lahun

I think it will.


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## tpope

lahun said:


> Good efforts. Best of luck...


Thanks I appreciate it! Life has been busy during the fall and into winter. I look forward to warmer weather.


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## Litsinger

tpope:

Glad to see your post here and I sincerely hope all is well with you and your family.

I will look forward to your update when you can. Have a great week.

Russ


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## William Bagwell

tpope: also glad to see you posting again! 

Still going good here. Well, caught swarm and a split made the next day are. Original hive not so much... Between a swarm, a split and at least one after swarm they had way too much space for too few bees. Fizzled out in June about the same time I bought out the guy moving to Hawaii. Currently at seven total, two are your genetics.


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## tpope

William Bagwell said:


> tpope: also glad to see you posting again!
> 
> Still going good here. Well, caught swarm and a split made the next day are. Original hive not so much... Between a swarm, a split and at least one after swarm they had way too much space for too few bees. Fizzled out in June about the same time I bought out the guy moving to Hawaii. Currently at seven total, two are your genetics.


Great news William Bagwell. So happy for your success and the feedback on my bees. I was recently wondering how you were doing. Glad that you posted.


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## tpope

Got a good weather day to check hives. Found that my largest hives were void of bees with honey stores still intact.

Wash, rinse repeat is getting old. I want improvement. Gonna have to study my forward.


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## JWPalmer

tpope said:


> Got a good weather day to check hives. Found that my largest hives were void of bees with honey stores still intact.


Well that just sucks. How many did you lose? Spring is close.


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## tpope

I have a light flow it seems. Pollen from multiple sources. Bees that remain are brooding up well. 
Losses are close to 2 outta 3. Gotta figure out if I wanna continue to rebuild numbers each spring or treat and be able to grow numbers. The coming year will set the tone. Gonna have to get better.. somehow


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## JWPalmer

Don't know if you have followed what I am doing, but this year I decided to go partial treatment. I let the weaker hives die (9) and then started limited OAV treatments on the rest (11). Of those, I lost one that appeared to be queenless. So I am down to 10 hives at the house. Of those, 5 had very low mite drops when I finally did start to treat. Those are my breeders for this year when I get to do it all over again in the fall. I think totally TF is hard to do, but I am keeping my fingerrs crossed that a hybrid program will be somewhat successful.


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## Litsinger

tpope said:


> The coming year will set the tone. Gonna have to get better.. somehow


TPope:

I am sincerely sorry to read about your set-back. Based on your efforts and experiences up to this point, have you seen any trends emerge? Similarly, have you thought through what you changes you plan to make to help facilitate your goals?

Again, sorry for your troubles. I do hope this next year is one in which you can determine a workable solution for moving in the direction you want to go.

Pining for warmer weather in Kentucky,

Russ


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## GregB

JWPalmer said:


> I think totally TF is hard to do, but I am keeping my fingerrs crossed that a hybrid program will be somewhat successful.


Thinking the same for my location (IF one to sell bees/queens).
Very much location dependent.


----------



## tpope

JWPalmer said:


> Don't know if you have followed what I am doing, but this year I decided to go partial treatment. I let the weaker hives die (9) and then started limited OAV treatments on the rest (11). Of those, I lost one that appeared to be queenless. So I am down to 10 hives at the house. Of those, 5 had very low mite drops when I finally did start to treat. Those are my breeders for this year when I get to do it all over again in the fall. I think totally TF is hard to do, but I am keeping my fingerrs crossed that a hybrid program will be somewhat successful.


Yep, been reading about your trials and results for a while... My thought processes are going down yours.. Hybrid but how? or still toe the line? I have not decided.


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## tpope

Litsinger said:


> TPope:
> 
> I am sincerely sorry to read about your set-back. Based on your efforts and experiences up to this point, have you seen any trends emerge? Similarly, have you thought through what you changes you plan to make to help facilitate your goals?
> 
> Again, sorry for your troubles. I do hope this next year is one in which you can determine a workable solution for moving in the direction you want to go.
> 
> Pining for warmer weather in Kentucky,
> 
> Russ


I have definitely seen a trend emerge... my bees die too much. Seems to be the ones that are making good honey and bee numbers. 
My area has seen a large influx of new keepers. Even a large operator with origins from commercial.
I am leaning towards organic acid treatments.


----------



## tpope

GregV said:


> Thinking the same for my location (IF one to sell bees/queens).
> Very much location dependent.


It's getting too hard for my tastes here to try to be completely TF... gotta do different as I want to grow bees to sell.


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## crofter

If you were almost making a go of it with what you were doing it may not take much help to make the outcome tolerable.


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## Litsinger

crofter said:


> If you were almost making a go of it with what you were doing it may not take much help to make the outcome tolerable.


Good point, Frank. I don't presume to have the right answer for tpope, but if one plans on sampling before treating it could present the opportunity to see how the mite load develops for each colony as the season progresses and help assess the ability of each colony to significantly forestall mite population growth.


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## Gray Goose

it is not illogical to :
Sample all
propagate from the best 3 or 4
Treat the worst hives so as to have a place for queen cells with a common mite free start.
wash rinse repeat.
hopefully you get more and more hives in the "breeder or propagate group, and weed out the ones not capable of making it VIA requeening.

GG


----------



## crofter

Litsinger said:


> Good point, Frank. I don't presume to have the right answer for tpope, but if one plans on sampling before treating it could present the opportunity to see how the mite load develops for each colony as the season progresses and help assess the ability of each colony to significantly forestall mite population growth.


Yes, probably better to assess the mite loads in the fall and take the projected losses then. Size up which will be the keepers. Cleaning out deadouts is a real bummer.


----------



## GregB

tpope said:


> It's getting too hard for my tastes here to try to be completely TF... gotta do different as I want to grow bees to sell.


Like I ranted recently....

The "gurus" conveniently omit that what maybe possible at their place (*IF true*) will not transfer 1:1 to everyone else.
Clearly (and it is NO secret) - I went "hard bond" for *5 seasons* now and this is not working too well for the propagation efforts *at my place. *One reason I so stubbornly did this - to demonstrated to myself and everyone if the thing is actually working (or NOT).

Well, clearly the TF thing is not sustainable in my own suburbia - it is over-run by annual and massive "almond bee" dumps which cancel out small-scale TF efforts. I will not be surprised if this winter will give me 100% loss again - the winter here is harsh as is alone (on top of the "hard bond").

If I am to seriously consider propagating the queens on small scale (and sell few) - I gotta learn some IPM methods (while still producing the clean bee products for myself).

PS: as Litsinger pointed out - the "hard bond" definition above should really be changed to the "survival method" or something similar; 
the proper "hard bond" is well described below by Litsinger.


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## Litsinger

GregV said:


> I went "hard bond" for *5 seasons* now


GregV:

One thing I am becoming painfully aware of as I study Kefuss is that what you and I (and myriad others) have been doing is not the 'Bond' method. We might need to devise a new moniker for it like, 'acid test' method, 'survival' method or 'insanity'... but not 'Bond'.


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## GregB

Litsinger said:


> GregV:
> 
> One thing I am becoming painfully aware of as I study Kefuss is that what you and I (and myriad others) have been doing is not the 'Bond' method. We might need to devise a new moniker for it like, 'acid test' method, 'survival' method or 'insanity'... but not 'Bond'.


Russ, can you elaborate?


----------



## GregB

Litsinger said:


> GregV:
> 
> One thing I am becoming painfully aware of as I study Kefuss is that what you and I (and myriad others) have been doing is not the 'Bond' method. We might need to devise a new moniker for it like, 'acid test' method, 'survival' method or 'insanity'... but not 'Bond'.


However, I will say this - IF I am to do this "full time" (for example, if/when I retire one day) I actually see a feasible way forward.

0)Find a suitable location to house a large enough base (not just a spot for 4-5 hives)
1)Quickly build a centralized, strong base using imported resistant stock - have to have 100-200 unit base at the least (critical mass is essential)
2)Over-run few local DCAs with my own stock - the DCAs surrounding my base (this is why the critical mass is important)
3)Routinely test the hives for the mite level - so to have numerical intelligence on the desired colonies - so to propagate from the desired colonies (based on the numbers!)
4)Physically terminate OR short-term treat (and shift the queens) - for the highly-susceptible units - do this based on periodic mite-counts (not waiting for the mite infestation to develop)
5)Extensive queen propagation program in place (including metrics to identify a desired stock - morpho estimates/mite minitoring/etc)
6)Certain levels of quarantine are a must - after few seasons now, I see my entrance designs seem to be working as a good robbing prevention

Having enough time on hands, these can be implemented IMO.


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## msl

Litsinger said:


> One thing I am becoming painfully aware of as I study Kefuss is that what you and I (and myriad others) have been doing is not the 'Bond' method.


Kefuss used a varen't of bond(sort of) and then apropitated the name , but he didn't come up with the name or the "main" principal ,The term “Bond Test” was first coined at a meeting of the German Bee Research Institutes at Bremen to describe the principle of ‘Live and let Die’ for the testing they started in 1993... Interesting that you don't hear about them at all, as it seems to have(insert shocked expression) faild
Like religion there are many subsets of the same faith, and many in one feel they are the one true faith

Arguably gotland (started in 99 same as kefuss) was true bond, and kefuss was human selection that ( the gurus) tried to sell as natural selection..
weaver did much the same as kefuss, (but without kefuss' pre selected stock that is swept under the rug) and lost 993 out of 1,000 hives in the 1st year.. much of what lived was just lucky and didn't have resistance, many were prone to EFB and thier survival was do to a lack of brood rearing... he had to offer up another 1,000 hives to get any were near close to enuff for a breeding program...




GregV said:


> I actually see a feasible way forward.


looks about right to me 
I would add treated drone production hives to max out drone quality and quantity and note you can get by with a lot less stock doing moonlite mating or II


----------



## Litsinger

GregV said:


> Russ, can you elaborate?


Certainly- I'll give it my best shot:

The _CliffsNotes _version of the ‘Bond’ Method:

Step 1- Start with a minimum population size of one hundred (100) production colonies- preferably more and preferably with base genetics from a known background of resistance. Run drone comb in all colonies regardless of their propagation status.

Step 2- Identify the top 25% most productive colonies of the population based on pollen-collection as candidates for further evaluation.

Step 3- Conduct hygienic testing of the top 25% and identify those which produce 100% removal of freeze-killed brood at twenty-four (24) hours. Those which do are classified as ‘hygienic’.

Step 4- Conduct phoretic and brood cell varroa counts on all ‘hygienic’ colonies and select the top +/- 10% of this group for queen rearing.

Step 5- Raise queens from the colonies which successfully pass Step 4 and requeen the entire operation from this stock.

Step 6- Start back at Step 1 each year and repeat the process annually.

As you might imagine, there are a lot of finer details I have left out but this gives one a sense of the relentless and data-driven winnowing which is the real hallmark of the ‘Bond’ Method.

So to put this in perspective- from an apiary size of one hundred (100) colonies, one would only expect to find three (3) queens worthy to propagate- and it would be the same this year, and next year and the year after that in perpetuity until…


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## GregB

Litsinger said:


> The _CliffsNotes _version of the ‘Bond’ Method:


Good; thanks.
I edited my post above to reflect your very appropriate comment.


----------



## Litsinger

msl said:


> Kefuss used a varen't of bond(sort of) and then apropitated the name , but he didn't come up with the name or the "main" principal ,The term “Bond Test” was first coined at a meeting of the German Bee Research Institutes at Bremen to describe the principle of ‘Live and let Die’ for the testing they started in 1993...


MSL:

Good point of clarification- the main thrust of my message was to underscore that whether it is Kefuss (268 colonies) or Gotland (150 colonies) or Weaver (2,000 colonies) it would seem that one has to start with a sufficiently large and diverse base of genetics to reasonably hope for the ability to affect meaningful change.

And further, if one is focused on developing resistant bee stocks that are suitable to meet economic goals (as opposed to Fries or Le Conte) it seems that the selection needs to be guided by other (and hopefully complementary) principles than simply survival.

I am likely 'tilting and windmills' but it seems that Dr. Kefuss' systematic approach to TF selection (now ubiquitously referred to as the 'Bond' Method) is maligned as having failed when others have tried it- but the reality is that few have actually endeavored to implement his method as described.



GregV said:


> I actually see a feasible way forward.


GregV:

Your response reminded me of a two-part ABJ article entitled, ‘Bomb versus Bond’ (attached).

One bit in particular seemed to fit-in with what you are describing:

_'Spivak thinks this Soft Bond approach is the most realistic for backyard beekeepers in areas densely populated by other beekeepers where the risk of mite reinfestation is high.

Which brings us to the relationship between natural defense and intervention that is so difficult to parse. Where the twain meet is in management, and dealing with mites requires a level of knowledge, skill and experience. There are choices to be made that will vary by circumstance. “It’s not black and white – not nontreatment versus treatment, it’s how to manage our bees,” said apiculturist Maryann Frazier recently honored by the Eastern Apiculture Society (EAS) for her career at Penn State. “It’s a semantic problem,” said Dave Tarpy, an entomologist at North Carolina State University. “That dichotomous choice is exactly the problem – it’s not dichotomous. ‘Treatment’ is assumed to mean using synthetic acaricides. We need to use the words ‘control’ or ‘mitigation’. The opposite is not doing anything.”

Spivak says that the “Hard Bond” method can work for beekeepers in relatively isolated areas that start with a large number of colonies, are willing to take severe losses for a period of time, and know how to raise queens from surviving stock. Beekeeper Rob Keller, who keeps his bees without chemical treatment, described the concurrent responsibility of that choice to “never let a colony circle the drain”. Breeding this way for resistant stock requires collaborative neighbors or a relatively remote apiary in order to control mite infestation and genetics.'_


----------



## GregB

Litsinger said:


> Spivak thinks this Soft Bond approach is the most realistic for backyard beekeepers in areas densely populated by other beekeepers where the risk of mite reinfestation is high.


I don't know if anything (outside of being a opportunistic "bee garbage man") is even possible around here.

The very definition of the "backyard beekeeper" (small scale) assumes such backyard beekeeper will never be able to withstand the numeric pressure.

I am coming to an opinion that any "hopeful" messages to the backyard beekeeper must be, instead, *honest*. If you don't have the numbers on your side, you *will be run over*.

The researchers and gurus must just say it already - one has to have the numbers.
Otherwise, I don't know what it is they are messaging - either a lie or a misdiagnosis.

In 1200s several stand-alone, autonomous Russian fiefdoms (very powerful regionally) fell to the numerically superior and unified Mongol invaders. The Mongols just ran the Russians down - one by one. Well, finally, about 200-300 years later the Russians unified under Moscow they drove the Mongols away.
A unified program finally ran over the DCAs, so to speak.


----------



## Litsinger

GregV said:


> Good; thanks.


GregV:

Thank you for receiving my message in the spirit it was intended- I'm just sharing what I have been learning- and coming to the realization that if things go sideways here in my apiary, I can't blame Dr. Kefuss for it because I have not implemented his recommendations. What do they say, 'Against Doctor's Orders'?


----------



## GregB

Litsinger said:


> I'm just sharing what I have been learning


Certainly.


----------



## Litsinger

GregV said:


> I don't know if anything (outside of being a opportunistic "bee garbage man") is even possible around here.


While I certainly don't know what might be possible in your specific locale, I expect that your experience with TF will likely better equip you to explore what might work in your situation. If nothing else, implementing a version of the 'Soft Bond' Method might allow you to make incremental gains year over year and hopefully make a dent in the drone pool.

If nothing else, it might put you in a position to have the numbers come Spring to spot your neighbors a few colonies to short-circuit their need to bring in 'almond bees'.

Just thinking out loud here...


----------



## gww

Russ
To me it sounds like keffus and webster had exactly the same principle and were hard bond. They did not stop bad bees or kill off bad hives. They let all be part and even helped all in the breeding process good or bad. Then they picked their best. They did not try decide the things needed and only put those things in the breeding pool based on thinking nature might know more than man what was needed. Websters example was wheat in a field with all other wheat participating and then saving the biggest seed. Sounds like a pure hard bond to me.
Cheers
gww
PS I have had the view, even though I know how stuff gets watered down, that no fear of bringing all genetics in to my apiary is not a bad thing cause who knows what is needed and more is better. The ones helped by the correct combination will live.


----------



## Litsinger

gww said:


> They did not stop bad bees or kill off bad hives.
> 
> ... who knows what is needed and more is better.


GWW:

While I have but limited understanding of the details of Kirk Webster's breeding program, I can certainly attest to the veracity of your sentiments as relates to Dr. Kefuss.

At least in the case of Kefuss, annual re-queening each colony each year and also supplying drone comb to each colony as well allows the daughter colonies of last year's breeder queens to raise drones that hopefully have better than even-money odds of investing something favorable into the overall gene pool at-large. So it certainly goes well beyond the 'genetic curatorship' I kind of feel like I am doing now to instead relentlessly promoting the genetics that are favorable to one's needs and carpet-bombing the area with drones with these genetics in their heritage. 

And while I can only speak for my very small corner of apimondia, I have modeled much of what I am currently doing after your approach and philosophies. 

I do wonder as I read anecdotes from other folks on this forum and elsewhere if we both benefit from relative genetic isolation such that when the stray neighbor down the road brings in a package or two the overall net effect of that is negligible (and potentially slightly additive in terms of vigor) such that we can somewhat blithely say that, 'more is better'?

For my part, I have been trying to be intentional about bringing in a swarm or cut-out colony or three from my area but outside my flight path each year as a way of hopefully supporting some local genetic diversity without unduly influencing local adaptation.

Regardless- I think I'm not going too far out on a limb by saying that anything we can do to assist in developing or maintaining a stable, locally-adapted bee population so they have the opportunity to develop resistance mechanisms that are most appropriate to our specific local disease and parasite profile is a good thing.

In our specific cases, it may mean simply 'doing no harm'.

For others, it might mean doing whatever is necessary to allow colonies with pluck to have a fighting chance to spread their genetics out.

Either way, I think it means allowing our colonies with some modicum of resistance the opportunity to dispatch copious amounts of drones into the neighborhood.


----------



## gww

Russ
My view is that except for places that have large influx of bees all the time, those areas that kind of stay stable, have to be better now than 35 years ago.
Cheers
gww


----------



## crofter

I have seem msl put forth the argument that if you want to bring to dominence the characteristics represented by the top of the Bell curve of your stock you have to simultaneously remove the portion at the lower end as well as select the preferred. Positive selection alone is not strong enough with bees breeding habits. Too much built in resistance to change. Very difficult to prevent their inherent traits from reverting to the mean.


----------



## msl

Litsinger said:


> I am likely 'tilting and windmills' but it seems that Dr. Kefuss' systematic approach to TF selection (now ubiquitously referred to as the 'Bond' Method) is maligned as having failed when others have tried it- but the reality is that few have actually endeavored to implement his method as described.


Right, the main issue is Dr Kefuss work has been used to justify the "inevitable success" of the "let them die and split the living" version of "bond".. Again much like religion people listening to what a guru tell them is in the texts and believing it, instead of reading it for themselves..
In short the popular form of bond/internet bond has little in common with Kefuses methods beyond with holding treatments.


Litsinger said:


> One thing I am becoming painfully aware of as I study Kefuss is that what you and I (and myriad others) have been doing is not the 'Bond' method.


much like you when I sat down and actually read Kefuss' work I was surprised how different it was form many others who said the were bonding......

What you all are coming to is the whole impetus behind the A shift in message? The case for IPM instead of bond as the path to TF for new back yard beekeepers thread
The science and realty of beekeeping just doesn't add up to success with backyard bond as preached, or as written 


One must remember, in the (paraphrazed) words of Sam Comfort "In 100 years it won't matter what you or I did with our bees" 2-3 generations of bees and whatever you have done is gone... treat, don't treat... little maters in the end..
Take them off the chemical treadmill and they die, take them off the genetics treadmill and they die.
the "treaters" aren't the problem they are made out to be, neither are the TF... The main problem is the mismanagement by keepers in both camps creating/allowing mite bombs that make it harder to keep bees alive (TF/TX) (speaking for the average BYBK)

we see TF work and take old in areas where its easier to keep bees alive... more bees alive=less imports...
The 1st step to TF is locally adapted stock that lives better in an area
The 1st step to Locally adapted stock is to keep bees alive (almost to the point of no matter the cost) so less imports come in
The 2nd step to locally adapted stock is propagation and distribution (a hard sell in the amazon age, who wants to wait till local queens are available) but this is how you take the DCAs back (this is why I feel 48 can be so important, distribution) 

Then the 3rd is increased selection to improve the local stock, and now that the DCAs are at least influenced you can start gaining ground towards shifting the stock





crofter said:


> I have seem msl put forth the argument that if you want to bring to dominence the characteristics represented by the top of the Bell curve of your stock you have to simultaneously remove the portion at the lower end as well as select the preferred.


yes and that's straight out of the keffus play book as well.
What makes his work great is he set out to answer a question, Now that we have the answer there is no reason to let a colony die for selection reasons as we will know how good or bad it is long before it hits the point of no return.


----------



## gww

Frank


> simultaneously remove the portion at the lower end as well as select the preferred. Positive selection alone is not strong enough with bees breeding habits.


The only thing about this is that you may narrow your gene pool good for mites but mites might not be the only possible problem in the world. Some of the studies seemed to suggest that the unmanaged bees that seemed to do the best seemed to have the most allele. It sorta seems counter intuitive to go through a lot of effort to reduce genetic variance. But, I admit to not understanding much.
Cheers
gww
Ps Birds that have long beaks had to start out with just one and yet were not breed out by masses of birds with short beaks.

Ps ps Plus the hives that live may not all have to be good. With the way a bee breeds, there may be enough in the hive to keep it above board while having weaker bees in the same hive, Then it comes down to percentage. Also, I remember something from keffus about moving queens to bad hives and it not working adding up to a hives having learned behavior also.


----------



## crofter

Yes not a simple problem with a simple solution

We select for things we think of value at the moment but not knowing what trials are to be faced in the future and may well be doing the organism a disservice with our "help". We really are not wise enough to be handling some of the levers we are monkeying with. 


There is a lot to be said for genetic conservancy despite creating some special purpose specimens that would perish without our artificial environments. We should not be burning all our bridges to the past. Maybe it is fortunate that the bees are doing such a good job of resisting our efforts to re engineer them.


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## gww

Frank
I don't want to discount things that are known and many that I am too dumb to understand but have read many studies that came up with not knowing what was happening and pointed out more needed to be studied. 

God bless those that work hard at it. And to those that measure and record.

I did read today though that hot water can freeze faster than cold and no one knows why even though they have tried. I had heard that they still do not really know how aspirin works and saw a new discussion on Bee L where it was said queens might be breeding with many more drones than 14.

I would not listen to me for advice but like the discussion. Dad always told me that eventually you have to make a decision and then after making your best decision, there is no sense in worry and live with what comes. 

I don't try to stop others but more try and plagiarize what works good for them that I decide might work good for me.
Cheers
gww

Ps I couldn't agree more with your conservatory statement.


----------



## msl

gww said:


> Some of the studies seemed to suggest that the unmanaged bees that seemed to do the best seemed to have the most allele.


Most studies show managed bees are more genetically diverse.



gww said:


> The only thing about this is that you may narrow your gene pool good for mites but mites might not be the only possible problem in the world.


vs say the hives dieing dying off in the wild ?
Yes you can over do it
But as a small time operator open mating, your going to be hard pressed to do so if you could many of our issues would be licked... the problem with bees is too much diversity, survival type programs are aimed at killing off that deviersty and we see the traits of good honey production and temperament often removed and bottlenecked out of the population (as see in gotland and avion)..

if you want to talk about loss of deveristy look at the Gotland experiment
started with 150 hives
6 years later there were 6 originals, and one surviving offspring, that's the kind of inbreeding that will create issues (and likly did)
VS a treat to requeen program witch could have grown by several hundred in the same time frame, and would have been much more genetically deverice do to all the different drone combinations

eithe way when you hit around 200, your likely to switch to a page laidlaw closed pop program, your queen selection pressure is less (top 15% vs top 3%) as your now controlling the drone pool (using the top 15% for drone mothers as well ) 








gww said:


> Also, I remember something from keffus about moving queens to bad hives and it not working adding up to a hives having learned behavior also.


He was able to take standard stock and place 40km away (ie none of his drones in the area) drop in virgins and create a new TF yard, lending credence to the idea that treating to requeen would be a good use of resources



> Test population 2 (_N_ = 60) was established in 2002 in Dadant hives 40 km from the location of test population 1. At the origin of this group were six hives purchased from a local beekeeper in 1999 that were split and multiplied to obtain the 60 hives for this test population. These colonies were requeened using virgin queens from test population 1 naturally mated at location 2. Then, colonies were managed as in group 1 for queen rearing and honey production using the best population 2 virgin queens to naturally mate with population 2 drones. Since 2001, this group has never been treated against mites and colony increase was made only by splitting survivor hives.





https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00218839.2016.1160709



Thats not to say moving a queen in to a hive that is having problems is a good idea... takes 7 weeks or so for her gentnics to start to take hold at witch point the mites can be well out of control and like with a mite bomb, gentnics can often not keep up in time before the brood for the winter bees is impacted dooming the colony..


----------



## gww

msl


> Most studies show managed bees are more genetically diverse.


Most might but I "believe" it was a study posted by jwchestnut that said the wild doing the best had the most alelle.

I also remember just recently some discussion from randy on bee l but am not totally sure this was part but it is circling in my mind it at least covered differences in wild close to managed.

Keffuss somewhere discussed bee learning with queen experiments and the difference inside different hives and queen impact not being enough. And that good hive populations taught other not good bees He knew it takes 7 weeks. I don't remember the exact experiment, just what I took from it and his comment that it is what he took from it.

It might be somewhere in something posted by siwakle (spelled wrong I am sure) while she was still a member.

I agree that it is not impossible that I dreamed some though I am usually pretty good and getting pretty close.
Cheers
gww
Ps I didn't think it was about killing off traits so much as bringing the needed trait to become dominate and inheritable.


----------



## msl

gww said:


> Ps I didn't think it was about killing off traits so much as bringing the needed trait to become dominate and inheritable.


By definition feral survivor stocks are less devierce then the base stock they came from as they have had deveristy removed from their breeding population

"Lack of Diversity" is often a call of the gurus, pointing their finger at commercial bees... it doesn't stand up to science
Do to the mass movement of bees around the country mixing with each other the domstomation of bees increases their diversity.

the study your thing about is likly this one Higher immunocompetence is associated with higher genetic diversity in feral honey bee colonies (Apis mellifera)


> Higher genetic diversity was correlated with higher immune response in feral (_P_ MANOVA = 0.011) but not managed bees, despite the fact that the latter group showed significantly higher average genetic diversity (_P_ ANCOVA < 0.001).


while they make an end run around the topic as they are trying to push thier diversity theory, what appears to be happing is the more deverice a feral is, the more chance it has of getting "something" out there that helps it immunity.. Its know as the rare allele theory, used to describe why bee may choses so many matings, the chance of catching the gold nugget.
So this rare allele may be selected against in commercial bees. No surprise there. Dostomtic stocks are about human needs, not wild survival.. even see the stuff on feral sheep? people walk after them a few hundred yards and they fall over exhausted under the weight of the wool left on them with out human management Feral sheep get much-needed makeover before new career as 'lawn mowers'

but the take away is the study found managed bees "showed significantly higher average genetic diversity" compared to ferals.
and we see that study after study. 
a


----------



## gww

msl
That could be the study. I got all kinds of bits and pieces floating around in my mind. 
Thanks for reposting.
Cheers
gww


----------



## msl

To take a twist... my favorite bond story is Sakhalin Huskys








Taro and Jiro — A story of canine strength and tenacity (Includes first-hand account)


The tragic story of the ill-fated Japanese Polar expedition that due to unexpected weather conditions was forced to leave in Antarctica a team of fifteen sled dogs of the Sakhalin Husky breed, two of which survived a year of hunger and neglect.



www.digitaljournal.com




Left chained up to die in antarctica they had 86% losses over 11 months (still better then greg's bees ) 2 out of 15 were found alive 
Yet there are no K-9s in antarctica, and the breed went extinct


----------



## Litsinger

gww said:


> My view is that except for places that have large influx of bees all the time, those areas that kind of stay stable, have to be better now than 35 years ago.


GWW:

I sincerely hope you are right, as it will mean we are making rapid enough progress that I might see TF as a mainstream approach in my lifetime.


----------



## Litsinger

msl said:


> The main problem is the mismanagement by keepers in both camps


Great post, MSL. I appreciate what you said, and would only add that a secondary problem might be keepers in both camps not looking for opportunities to collaborate in genetic improvement. 

Keep up the good advocacy efforts for building bridges to share the gift of good genetics.


----------



## Litsinger

crofter said:


> We should not be burning all our bridges to the past.


In my humble opinion there is a lot of wisdom in this statement- even beyond bee genetics.

That said, I do feel somewhat free living in the US to be somewhat laissez faire with bees given they are not native to the continent.

If I lived in the UK however, I might be torn as to whether to lend support to association or government-led advocacy efforts for the AMM (as an example).


----------



## Litsinger

msl said:


> when you hit around 200, your likely to switch to a page laidlaw closed pop program


MSL:

Great video- two thoughts struck me as I watched it:

1. They recommended productivity as the primary selection criteria- Sounds reminiscent of Dr. Kefuss and in the same vein as Brother Adam's push for 'vitality'.

2. If we assume GWW has an effectively closed population in his area now with sufficient genetic diversity, it seems to suggest that he might be able (if he so chose to) to undertake a selection program by doing little more than encouraging drone production and propagating from his most suitable colonies (based on the criteria that he developed).


----------



## crofter

Litsinger said:


> That said, I do feel somewhat free living in the US to be somewhat laissez faire with bees given they are not native to the continent.
> 
> If I lived in the UK however, I might be torn as to whether to lend support to association or government-led advocacy efforts for the AMM (as an example).



Yes as long as we do not bottleneck globally, there is not much chance of irreversable damage to the European honeybee.

If you could accomplish the visions such as msl and others promote; a large reservoir of generally more productive and disease/pest tolerant/resistant bees, perhaps it could be maintained without a heavy ongoing selection effort. Perhaps the less desirable (at the moment) genetics would not have to be _wiped out_, just reduced to a lower prevalence.

The trick though, would be in actually establishing that dominant reservoir of desirables! Many hurdles there, political, economic, and the simple obstinacy of typical beekeepers.

The dominant business model that influences 90% of the continent's bees has a lot of inertia. They will only buy into what pays dividends immediately, not what is a promise of future benefits. I think that may need the talents of drummers and promoters that don't necessarily have to know _squat_ about bees themselves.


----------



## Gray Goose

In some locals this is the prevalent road block.

_Breeding this way for resistant stock requires collaborative neighbors or a relatively remote apiary in order to control mite infestation and genetics.'_

Greg is having some issue here and I "try" to find the local bee keepers but each year it changes.
Just heard of a couple more folks ordering bees for this spring.

the effort and time to spin up a local collaboration with a day job and bees and a farm is too much to add to the plate today for me. would be a good project IMO, with out buy in from the guys with numbers my 20 hives can get off track very easy, when 100's show up for the "rest" after Almonds. 

Still Looking for that prefect place with no other bees for a 10 mile circle have not found it yet.

GG


----------



## msl

crofter said:


> a large reservoir of generally more productive and disease/pest tolerant/resistant bees, perhaps it could be maintained without a heavy ongoing selection effort.


Given what we know about outcrossing and the recombination rate of bees heavy ongoing selection will likely always bee required, a closed pop just allows you to exert the selection force, it still must be supplied.. this is one reason its real hard to bottle neck bees(at a land scape scale), as long a the bottle neck isn't fatal the recombination will likely (over time) find a new genetic soulstion to create the traite




Litsinger said:


> If we assume GWW has an effectively closed population in his area now with sufficient genetic diversity, it seems to suggest that he might be able (if he so chose to) to undertake a selection program by doing little more than encouraging drone production and propagating from his most suitable colonies (based on the criteria that he developed).


I don't think so..closed or not... its the population exerting force on GWW. (Witch it seems is often the key to success for many) not GWW exerting force on the pop..
In a closed population breeding set up you exert selection pressure because you are in control of the drone pool and the queen mother pool
Climate conditions will be able to exert force on a closed geographic area as it affects the area on a landscape scale, a significant reduction in imports will affect the pop on a landscape scale... a few beekeepers, not so much



Litsinger said:


> They recommended productivity as the primary selection criteria- Sounds reminiscent of Dr. Kefuss and in the same vein as Brother Adam's push for 'vitality'.


I was watching this last night 



I and one thing that stuck me when they were talking about vitality was the point made about our standard of living being much higher (more disposable income) now, creating the beekeeping "hobby" were bee didn't have to pay their own way, even at $10 a pound for honey I know plenty of beekeepers who aren't covering their costs, much less their labor. 

and that is really a key point, the bulk of the livestock is managed for profit, if it doesn't perform its useless. So the end result need to perform if it so become the dominant genetics


----------



## Litsinger

gww said:


> I also remember just recently some discussion from randy on bee l but am not totally sure this was part but it is circling in my mind it at least covered differences in wild close to managed.


I've learned not to bet against GWW. I think this is the post he is referring to:





__





LISTSERV - BEE-L Archives - COMMUNITY.LSOFT.COM






community.lsoft.com


----------



## Litsinger

crofter said:


> I think that may need the talents of drummers and promoters that don't necessarily have to know _squat_ about bees themselves.


I don't know too much, but I think you are right- particularly when one considers how big an economic driver the EHB is in North America.


----------



## Litsinger

msl said:


> I don't think so..closed or not... its the population exerting force on GWW. (Witch it seems is often the key to success for many) not GWW exerting force on the pop..


MSL:

Thanks for your reply- and I anticipated you pushing back on my less than precise use of terms. 

My rationale for doing so was to consider the other side of the coin- what should one do if we assume that the surrounding population is effectively closed based on relative isolation and/or limited gene flow and is 'good enough' to serve as a base for the needs of the beekeeper?

In this scenario, it is taken as a given that you are not going to materially change the population on the whole so your selection options without resorting to imported queens or I/I are:

1. Produce queens from your most suitable colonies and thus seek to increase the frequency of these suitable traits in your own apiary.

2. Produce drones from your most suitable colonies and thus seek to increase the frequency of these suitable traits in your local population.

In both cases we accept that the impact we are making with our efforts is limited at a population level, but we also accept that the population doesn't 'need' much help from us.

I acknowledge that this outline is simplistic but helps me think through what is in my mind the first decision point one should evaluate before proceeding down a path of active selection:

Does the apiary in question operate in a sufficiently closed population or not?

The answer to this question obviously has huge implications for the scope, nature, effectiveness and sustainability of any/all beekeeper-directed selection activities one might consider. 

Am I off the mark?


----------



## gww

Russ
My bees have come to me in a 30 mile radius. I do know packages are brought in by hobby bee keepers. My view has always been my bees were going to die. Even when they didn't till last year, it was still my view. However, my goals are to have bees with out spending money and it seems to be working really well even with bumps in the road. I can only attribute this to what might have happened over the last 35 years or so. I do think things come and go and having a bunch in one place could cause build up of bad stuff but also believe it can come and go.

I don't know the future but for now am meeting my hobby goals and that is good even if I am bad.
I am much too lazy now to set real goals or do real studies and so mostly rely on those that do and what I see. All my swarms could have come from others hives for all I know but so far so good. I do not catch a lot of swarms for the trap number I have out but it is easy and I am not buying bees yet. I did a few splits to see if I could do it but in the end, have no ambition.
I do enjoy the thinking of it though.
Cheers
gww

Ps I do live in a real rural area, even 30 miles around is rural but my closest (flying distance) town is 400 people.


----------



## Litsinger

gww said:


> I do enjoy the thinking of it though.


I'm in the same boat, GWW. And I am not in anywise suggesting you should change your approach- I simply chose your situation as a muse to consider what could (and maybe should) happen if we have a local population that is good enough to work with.


----------



## GregB

gww said:


> Ps I do live in a real rural area, even 30 miles around is rural but my closest (flying distance) town is 400 people.



My county has a modest pop of 546,695 (as of 2019).
About 200K humans are within 5mile radius - which is pretty normal for a bee mating radius.
Let say 1/2000 of this 200K are beeks (a reasonable # in my bee-loving community, IMO).
That's 100 independent bee yards of various sizes (smallish overall) within my immediate mating range.

That amounts to a lot of bees of different shapes and sizes (AND 60-80% of these bees are brought in as annual replacements - this is a local trend).

Makes a good swarm hunting ground for opportunists like myself.
But terrible for open mating for any half-serious selection efforts.


----------



## Litsinger

msl said:


> I was watching this last night


This is a great video- thank you for sharing. It is interesting to consider what Brother Adam would think about the direction the Abbey is taking with the apiary...


----------



## msl

(or the direction of the abbey in general )
makes me said
but it drives a point home I made earlier, any "improvement" to your bees will not outlive your retirement from beekeeping, You stop keeping and they are gone


msl said:


> in the (paraphrazed) words of Sam Comfort "In 100 years it won't matter what you or I did with our bees"


seems more like in 3-4 years not 100
Adam and Kefuss, two of the few true master beekeepers in our lifetime.... The only thing they leave the next generation is writings
Such is the way of bee genetics
I think it was Mike Palmer I first heard about that form... something about all the truly great stocks out that are now gone, they didn't survive the loss of their creator, or a change in management.
It was reinforced when I went down to ASU for an II class... for 20 years they had a II matianed high pollen gathering line and a low pollen gathering line... so strong that each had to be supplemented (IE they had to keep liquid feed on the high pollen line and paddies on the low pollen line as they didn't bring enough of the other in)..change in staff and no up keep and 2 years later when a grad student wanted to use the stocks for research, they were gone... regressed to the mean
So maybe we need to focus on the here and now, short term goals, and just enjoy our bees and bee work, while we remember we will have no long term effect, so we should worry less about it.

Really the only way to change bees, is going to change beekeeping practices, and few of us are willing to take the time to create that kind of change on a landscape scale.


----------



## GregB

msl said:


> So maybe we need to focus on the here and now, short term goals,* and just enjoy our bees and bee work, while we remember we will have no long term effect, so we should worry less about it.*


All the while you, MSL, were trying to teach me how to raise the queens and become a "better beekeeper"....

Wasn't this my entire point all along - meaninglessness of the bee-minutia? (......though very hard to sell, but oh well)
Why exactly some are trying to tell me how to "keep bees better" as if they know better or as if this even matters?

Meanwhile I already accomplished all my original goals looking few years back (opportunistic and cynic sounding maybe).
Maybe just looking for future, potential retirement entertainment on the cheap (playing with bugs you know).
LOL


----------



## msl

GregV said:


> All the while you, MSL, were trying to teach me how to raise the queens and become a "better beekeeper"





GregV said:


> Why exactly some are trying to tell me how to "keep bees better" as if they know better or as if this even matters?


*(cough) (cough)*



msl said:


> Really the only way to change bees, is going to change beekeeping practices


😉


----------



## crofter

_Maybe just looking for future, potential retirement entertainment on the cheap (playing with bugs you know).
LOL _

That is what it has been for me, Greg; probably for gww and a lot of others too. Becoming a _Messiah_ must be a heavy load!


----------



## GregB

msl said:


> *Really the only way to change bees*, is going to change beekeeping practices


What does it matter anyway if the change is NOT to stick around?
The change is not sustainable where the conditions are against it.
Smoke over the water.

Mental therapy is the only worthwhile bee-playing output to keep the shrinking brain busy - this much I can see. Good business opportunity even.
All other supposed valuable outputs are mostly marketing tricks by the various industries.
Almonds are strategic, national commodity, etc, etc... blah.


----------



## msl

GregV said:


> What does it matter anyway if the change is not to stick around?


movable frames, grafting, mini mating nucs..etc.. changes they were and they all stuck around

If in your location it became common practice to pull and overwinter a nuc per full sized hive, what shift in the area genetics you would see in just a few years ?


----------



## GregB

msl said:


> note you can *get by with a lot less stock doing moonlite mating* *or II*


Thought about it and remembered the community mating yard.

Why, we already discussed a simple solution:


> *With a good, saturated drone background, the queen bee does not have time to fly far*, it is better to say this - *the drones do not allow her to fly far and inseminate her within the mating yard, *proof of this is visual observation: swarms of drones within the mating yard, queens very quickly return to their nucs within from half a minute to one minute with a train of drones, and of course dead drones on the roofs of the hives, which die after copulating with the queen bee in the air and fall down.


From:








This is how community mating yard looks like


price per nuc/queen plased on site to mate out isolation from outher drone sources I got responses back from the mating site provider.




www.beesource.com





You just set the virgins right next to the drones for a couple of weeks and be done.
For me personally, this will amount to driving to Milwaukee and mate my queens directly on the drone saturated yard of the Lloyd St. bees (Local honey bee nucs and queens | Lloyd St. Bees | United States)
Drop the mating nucs off/pick them up a couple of weeks later.
This is very much doable.


----------



## GregB

msl said:


> movable frames, grafting, mini mating nucs..etc.. changes they were and they all stuck around
> 
> If in your location it became common practice to pull and overwinter a nuc per full sized hive, what shift in the area genetics you would see in just a few years ?


Clearly I meant - bee changes (not equipment changes, not practice changes).
The entire context here is - the bee changes are not long lived without constant pressure of the trait forming environment.

A nuc per a hive does not matter.
We are talking annual 60-80% replacement by almond bees.
Almond bees are our "local bee" - that is the reality.
To have a fighting chance, here has to be a massive, centralized and organized push-back to hold off the almond bees.


----------



## GregB

And I'd be darn, a brand new video from Ukraine just posted in the context of the local bee.

The guy was experimenting with wintering Buckfast, Carni, Carpathica, and local Ukrainian bees.
Uniformly treated for mites.
Several vendors sent him free queens so he could run side-by-side testing on his channel for the public to see (a promotion for them).

Well, entire Buckfast selection just abruptly died out - all 12 hives dropped over the last couple weeks of February.
Reason - unknown. Plenty of food.

But obviously, this particular Buckfast bee selection was not a good fit for the conditions in some way so that it got completely wiped out (forget the mites - that variable was removed by the treatments).

The other assortments (Carni/Carpa) are holding fine, but the beekeeper is lamenting about just switching back to his local Ukrainian bee and moving on with them.


----------



## crofter

GregV said:


> Well, entire Buckfast selection just abruptly died out - all 12 hives dropped over the last couple weeks of February.
> Reason - unknown. Plenty of food.
> 
> But obviously, this particular Buckfast bee selection was not a good fit for the conditions in some way so that it got completely wiped out (forget the mites - that variable was removed by the treatments).


Greg I sure hope that this gross difference in survivability of that particular group of "Buckfast" bees has to be a wild anomaly. If it is typical expectation then the Buckfast movements propaganda machine world wide should be studied in depth for its amazing effectiveness! 

Should I cancel the three Buckfast queens I have on order?


----------



## msl

GregV said:


> Clearly I meant - bee changes (not equipment changes, not practice changes).


your statement was a direct response to my suggestion of changing practices to change bees as shown below


> msl said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> *Really the only way to change bees*, is going to change beekeeping practices
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> What does it matter anyway if the change is NOT to stick around?
Click to expand...




GregV said:


> For me personally, this will amount to driving to Milwaukee and mate my queens directly on the drone saturated yard of the Lloyd St. bees


reading between the lines I would say not worth your time or gas


> . If you need more than 5 mated queens, we can fill your order but you will only receive 5 per week due to limited resources








QUEEN PRICES | Lloyd St. Bees | United States


Lloyd St. Bees local VSH survivor queen prices.




www.lloydstbees.com




that suggests to me they don't have the resources for saturation


----------



## GregB

crofter said:


> Should I cancel the three Buckfast queens I have on order?


Why, surely you are ordering from a different vendor.
There are others who swear by Buckfast.
You should try for yourself.
But the incident reported demonstrated that the local condition worthiness alone is, definitely, a die or live factor as is (with the mite factor removed).


----------



## GregB

msl said:


> your statement was a direct response to my suggestion of changing practices to change bees as shown below


OK, too many cross threads.
In all we agree - remove the trait forming pressure - the trait will likely go too.
Remove the beekeeper - his bees will go too.



msl said:


> reading between the lines I would say not worth your time or gas
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> QUEEN PRICES | Lloyd St. Bees | United States
> 
> 
> Lloyd St. Bees local VSH survivor queen prices.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.lloydstbees.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> that suggests to me they don't have the resources for saturation


Why, I know the guy personally and he runs 100-200 units in his breeding yard.
That is much better saturation than mine (which I got none).
This is not about buying queens - just cooperation.
What reading between lines, MSL?


----------



## tpope

crofter said:


> If you were almost making a go of it with what you were doing it may not take much help to make the outcome tolerable.


Sorry for the late reply... I sure hope so.


----------



## tpope

Litsinger said:


> Good point, Frank. I don't presume to have the right answer for tpope, but if one plans on sampling before treating it could present the opportunity to see how the mite load develops for each colony as the season progresses and help assess the ability of each colony to significantly forestall mite population growth.


Sorry for the late reply... I am sure that my local conditions are leading to mite overloads. Sampling and treatments seem inevitable. My losses would pay for the labor.


----------



## tpope

Gray Goose said:


> it is not illogical to :
> Sample all
> propagate from the best 3 or 4
> Treat the worst hives so as to have a place for queen cells with a common mite free start.
> wash rinse repeat.
> hopefully you get more and more hives in the "breeder or propagate group, and weed out the ones not capable of making it VIA requeening.
> 
> GG


Yep... pretty much my flight plan.


----------



## tpope

Gray Goose said:


> In some locals this is the prevalent road block.
> 
> _Breeding this way for resistant stock requires collaborative neighbors or a relatively remote apiary in order to control mite infestation and genetics.'_
> 
> Greg is having some issue here and I "try" to find the local bee keepers but each year it changes.
> Just heard of a couple more folks ordering bees for this spring.
> 
> the effort and time to spin up a local collaboration with a day job and bees and a farm is too much to add to the plate today for me. would be a good project IMO, with out buy in from the guys with numbers my 20 hives can get off track very easy, when 100's show up for the "rest" after Almonds.
> 
> Still Looking for that prefect place with no other bees for a 10 mile circle have not found it yet.
> 
> GG


I am finding that this road block is being bought in... Too many packages and bees after CA..


----------



## tpope

Hooo weee you guys have rattled this thread! Good points made with links and questions. I'm no bee master here. Just a simple man. I look to have some joy from raising some bees and a bit of honey too. Some for the wallet and rest for family. I will be feeding more and possibly start using treatments this year. I have had some past decisions bite me. I have had mine and your share of hard luck. Bees are flying in my neck o the woods. Pollen is flowing and it's a new year. I reckon that I am still too hardheaded to toss a towel in... Gots plans..


----------



## William Bagwell

tpope said:


> Hooo weee you guys have rattled this thread!
> snip
> ... Gots plans..


LOL! Do those 'plans' involve something you shared via PM with me?


----------



## tpope

William Bagwell said:


> LOL! Do those 'plans' involve something you shared via PM with me?


There's a good chance the answer is yes. If I can do my part correctly.


----------



## msl

GregV said:


> I know the guy personally and he runs 100-200 units in his breeding yard.





GregV said:


> What reading between lines, MSL?


Running a yard with 100-200 and only producing 5 mated queens a week for sale and only by " advanced request" Seems off to me.. ie I can do that, you could if you felt like it, any one with a single hive and some mini nucs could 
if his mating yard was any good, why push virgins and the concept of mating at your local DCA is better for the beekeeper?

I sold a lot of virgins and cells (48s) last year.. My point to the locals was my DCA wasn't any better then theirs(same this guy is saying). They were buying me out before I could place them and mate them out for my use or resale. The long and short of it is if your primary aim is to sell unmated genetics, you likely don't control the drone stock to double or triple your money in 2-3 weeks 

You have seen with your own eyes, trust your eyes not me (random voice on the internet )


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## GregB

msl said:


> if his mating yard was any good, why push virgins and the concept of mating at your local DCA is better for the beekeeper?


In his eye "locally" mated queen is good.
Eh?
Not at my place.
(The real answer - *it depends*).
Of course, I prefer the queen to be mated in his 100-200 unit yard where he actively enforced IPM and selects his from purchased breeder queens (and does well). Mating in my backyard produces nothing good, compared to that.

(Let me omit the fact the producing virgins is actually easier and much more predictable, and you can quickly push the volume out and make up $$ that way; he offered me few but I declined last year; the virgins are really about the more predictable business model - not about them somehow being superior - that really depends).

He indeed sells lots of queens (sounded something like +/-100 mating nucs for 2021).
I understand that even cut into his nuc business last year (ended up combining).

But you are free to question his business, of course.
Reading between lines?


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## tpope

I'm still raising bees. Had a very disappointing winter loss that has been an uphill battle to rebuild numbers. It has caused much thought about changing my ways and perhaps leading to treatment. I am seeing that there are more new hives in my area and I am sure that they have brought some of my problems.


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## Gray Goose

tpope said:


> I'm still raising bees. Had a very disappointing winter loss that has been an uphill battle to rebuild numbers. It has caused much thought about changing my ways and perhaps leading to treatment. I am seeing that there are more new hives in my area and I am sure that they have brought some of my problems.


seems some of the "places" that had only our bees now have others who are bringing in bees.

the landscape shifts, we need to shift as well.

GG


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## AR1

tpope said:


> I'm still raising bees. Had a very disappointing winter loss that has been an uphill battle to rebuild numbers. It has caused much thought about changing my ways and perhaps leading to treatment. I am seeing that there are more new hives in my area and I am sure that they have brought some of my problems.


Sorry to hear of the troubles. Isolated hives certainly appear to control mites better, in my very limited experience.


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## Gray Goose

GregV said:


> Why, surely you are ordering from a different vendor.
> There are others who swear by Buckfast.
> You should try for yourself.
> But the incident reported demonstrated that the local condition worthiness alone is, definitely, a die or live factor as is (with the mite factor removed).


HI Crofter, Any bee "imported" and then tested against a local bee that this keeper has had for several years, will likely fail. IF YOU got him to send his "Ukrainian" bees to you to test against your they would likely loose. Or against mine, bees adapt, any bee in time would work, just keep making increase from the survivors, if you have any....

that's why I do not put much stock in the "scientific tests" of bee against bee. really not valid. the bee traveling the farthest from its adapted locale is most likely to loose.

so if you do not want them 3 queen change the address to mine 

GG


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## GregB

tpope said:


> It has caused much thought about changing my ways and perhaps leading to treatment


Welcome to the Club!
Alike most any political party, we too need to have a faction (of limited treatments).
Like, you know, one can not afford to be as radical in some places due to the local political climate.
Large parts of America are neither deep red or deep blue, but rather.... purple-ish.
LOL


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## tpope

That's a can of worms there GregV.... Makes me wanna be trout fishing..


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## William Bagwell

AR1 said:


> Sorry to hear of the troubles. Isolated hives certainly appear to control mites better, in my very limited experience.


Agree on both points. My tpope bees are gentle, productive and draw much straighter comb than my Dunwoody bees. Not sure if it is control, tolerance or a mixture but they do OK here. Still relatively isolated, however his may change soon as several hundred acres near by has been cut up into ~10 acre hobby farms. Not seen any new hives yet...

One of the (two known) old neighbors who had bees last year has none this year. Drive past his hives on the way to and from work and nothing. Last year could see them flying if the sun was shining.


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## AR1

William Bagwell said:


> Agree on both points. My tpope bees are gentle, productive and draw much straighter comb than my Dunwoody bees. Not sure if it is control, tolerance or a mixture but they do OK here. Still relatively isolated, however his may change soon as several hundred acres near by has been cut up into ~10 acre hobby farms. Not seen any new hives yet...
> 
> One of the (two known) old neighbors who had bees last year has none this year. Drive past his hives on the way to and from work and nothing. Last year could see them flying if the sun was shining.


10 acre hobby farms are basically illegal here. Minimum acreage to put a new house on is 40. It was sold as a farm protection measure, but in fact it has worked out that only very rich people can build houses in rural areas, so the land is being chopped up into 40 acre parcels and huge homes are being built. The gubmint, knowingly or no, is trying hard to force people into high-density living.


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## William Bagwell

Interesting, glad they do not have that rule here or we would not have our five acre hobby farm.

Even with the potential bee 'neighbors', gladly take 10 acre hobby farms over subdivisions any day. Or worse, high density cluster homes! Live very near the line between two counties and subdivisions are legal in both. No idea what the minimum lot size is in either but pretty sure it is less in the less rural county just south of me.


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## crofter

Gray Goose said:


> HI Crofter, Any bee "imported" and then tested against a local bee that this keeper has had for several years, will likely fail. IF YOU got him to send his "Ukrainian" bees to you to test against your they would likely loose. Or against mine, bees adapt, any bee in time would work, just keep making increase from the survivors, if you have any....
> 
> that's why I do not put much stock in the "scientific tests" of bee against bee. really not valid. the bee traveling the farthest from its adapted locale is most likely to loose.
> 
> so if you do not want them 3 queen change the address to mine
> 
> GG


I had to chase the thread back a bit to see what you were referring to. My number has not come up yet for the three buckfast queens from Ferguson Apiaries. I did receive 2 BF queens imported from Italy. One died before release (this type of queen cage has had problems for other users too) the other is doing well but nothing remarkable. 

For many of us our sampling numbers are too small to be conclusive; both for good results or bad. Local conditions and management practices can weed out some gross incompatibility issues but is no guarantee of development of general survivability. Too finely tuned knocks out resilience. Perfection is the enemy of practicality!
With my small numbers I question whether trying to select for the best might be more a negative than trying to include as much variability as I have to work with.
Just had virgins accepted from my first round of queen grafting this year. The trick of installing already emerged virgins along with the empty queen cell and leftover jelly sure seems to be a keeper!

Should have started this game 20 years sooner.


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## Gray Goose

Thanks for the tip
*Just had virgins accepted from my first round of queen grafting this year. The trick of installing already emerged virgins along with the empty queen cell and leftover jelly sure seems to be a keeper!* 

always looking for a trick up my sleve.

GG


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## Litsinger

crofter said:


> Should have started this game 20 years sooner.


Frank:

Glad to see your reply. I've missed reading your insights.

Best of success to you with the rest of your season.

Russ


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## tpope

Oh how I love raising Queens in July. Zero from the first two tries.


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## tpope

Today I learned why my first two grafts were built for a short period and then torn down short of my harvest date. I tried a third time and got a decent take. Today was time to pull cells and make nucs. I found that my bees had used the feed to draw comb on several of the cells. Then I noticed that there were eggs there too! Gonna have to find the little rogue... maybe banish her to a nuc.
Seeing good amounts of pollen coming in. Bright orange from Sumac is most prevalent. Also have a very bright yellow in small amounts that I don't know the source..


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## William Bagwell

Happy to see you making progress!

Had planed to try some practice grafting this year. Not going to happen with with the mandatory over time at work...

Think I nipped a bit of robbing before it went too far yesterday evening. Noticed a lot of furious activity when all others were calm. Unlikely to be orientation flights that late, so I replaced the entrance reducer. This morning all was calm and saw pollen going in.

In hind site probably should not have pulled the reducers on the two big over wintered hives that swarmed this year. Not yet built back up nor bearding like most of the smaller hives.


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## tpope

William, you need to just do it. It's not hard. The bees will do their part if they feel like making a queen.

I have seen no evidence of robbing this dearth. Got a small flow with Sumac. I did put robbing screens on the mating nucs this round since I am feeding them with either frame or hive top feeders.

Forgot to add yesterday... I checked the nucs that I had brought from the out apiary for my first round of grafts that I found I had no cells to place... All have a laying queen now.


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## tpope

Checked some mating nucs today. I found great results, but the queens had just started laying. One was so pissed off that I plucked her from the comb and marked her that she few off! Shtuff! I picked her up outta the grasses for her to just fly away again.. I might ought to start marking while I hold instead of using the Korean marking cage. These young queens are still full of flight during their first week of laying.


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## AR1

tpope said:


> Checked some mating nucs today. I found great results, but the queens had just started laying. One was so pissed off that I plucked her from the comb and marked her that she few off! Shtuff! I picked her up outta the grasses for her to just fly away again.. I might ought to start marking while I hold instead of using the Korean marking cage. These young queens are still full of flight during their first week of laying.


Keep a butterfly net handy?


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## tpope

AR1 said:


> Keep a butterfly net handy?


I'll probably just wait a bit longer to check for egg laying. The queens I checked that started laying earlier were more settled and didn't try to fly.


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## tpope

Well to update the thread, the queen that flew did return. 
We had a dearth from mid June until almost the start of goldenrod this year. Some minor flows that the bees tried to forage when the rain allowed flowers to produce pollen and nectar. Thusly I had some of the worst robbing I have seen.
Next year I will be using robbing screens on all nucs.


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## lily69972

Thanks for sharing your experience, it is very useful.


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