# Whats your average date for the start of queenrearing



## BIGHONEY56 (Sep 1, 2011)

Will be rearing queens this year and was wondering when is your typical first day of grafting? I tried it last year for the first time later in the year and only a couple grafts didn't take, I am In Wisconsin so im guessing the date will be around late April early May. Its been kinda a warm March so far this year so maybe the bees can get a jump start and build up faster. Just hope we dont get a long cold snap now.


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## kilocharlie (Dec 27, 2010)

The average is not the date to start!

I watch the flyout rate. When the bees are really coming and going, they are approaching swarm strength. I want this - swarming impulse added to the queen rearing effort really helps. 

I look in the box to check for brood nest area that is being back-filled with honey. If I see back-filling in the brood nest, I remove 1 or 2 frames and replace them with empty frames. This delays swarming. 

If I fear the nectar/pollen flow is running out, I may go ahead with the queen rearing procedure, just move the bees into 8-frame equipment, or add "hive dummies" (wooden boxes the size and shape of comb frames) to a 10-frame box. 

I really need 6 strong colonies to begin making queens, one of which may include the breeder queen, whose hive is NOT the cell builder colony, but may be used as a support colony, donating capped brood to the cell builder, as well as providing young larvae for grafting.


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## WBVC (Apr 25, 2013)

Can you expand on "I really need 6 strong colonies to begin making Queens"

How do utilize those 6 strong colonies for your Queen rearing?

It may sound like a stupid question...but this will be my first year trying this. I already have a few hives with lots of bee and pollen gathering activity. Some slower hives and some dubiously slow hives that I suspect may now be Queenless. I have seen some drone brood but no drones on the porch. I also see that the most active hives are packing in burr comb in the feed spacer area...with nectar and/or drone comb.

Walts paper said to learn when "white wax" production starts in your area. Does this new burr comb count as white wax production? It is a light cream color but not blue white like snow.

Does anyone know when "white wax" production routinely appears in the Pacific Northwest?

Thanks


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## captwillie (May 7, 2012)

I want to see drones before I start grafting. Without enough drones the queens can't properly mate. Last yr I started in early May. This yr? we'll see.


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## drlonzo (Apr 15, 2014)

Without drones in the air, you won't get any queens mated, and the drones need to be mature. If you put in drone foundation and get the bees to use it and have drone brood ready, then wait till it starts emerging before grafting. This will ensure they are mature and you have enough to do the job.


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## BigBlackBirds (Aug 26, 2011)

Hi BigHoney56
i raised queens for many years in Michigan but roughly 120 miles south of where you are located. So the weather is somewhat similar. I was looking at some of my records just last week. Late april and early may is about the earliest we ever started but I will say that is just a date to consider. In fact, the entire month of May wasn't the best queen rearing and mating time. I'd graft virtually every week in may but my records show way more failures in that month from lack of cell building, to lack of cell acceptance to poor matings. The vast majority of my queens were raised in June year after year. The weather has settled and the drones available. 

I have alot of people tell me May theoretically should be the best but after doing it for so many years my response is that you will get lucky in years and have ok weather in may but I sure wouldnt bank on being successful with that month in the long run this far north. on the flip side, once you get past about the first few days of July there is very little time for the cells to be built and virgins to mate and for a colony to make up strength for winter without you providing lots of resources. pretty small window of opportunity


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## BIGHONEY56 (Sep 1, 2011)

Thanks all for the info, 
Im going to be watching for drone eggs, and plan to have queens mating about 39 days after (so the drones are mature). hopefully the weather is good by then, its a chance I am willing to take I guess, If the queens don't mate well should I combine with the ones that do so they can get strong before the flow? Because I could have another batch of cells for the ones, that didnt mate well, but by then I think they wouldnt have enough time to build up for the start of the flow which starts around beginning of June. 

Then around mid july I plan on splitting these hives up into nucs and overwintering them as double stacked nucs, hope to have about 60 double stacked nucs going into winter if goes to plan. Again the ones that don't mate well will probably be combined with the weaker ones. I have drawn comb for all these nucs, I think this will be ample time for them to get built up for the winter. At the same time I don't want them to get to strong so might experiment with some given all drawn comb for the second box and some mixed with pierco frames undrawn.

Thanks again


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## BigBlackBirds (Aug 26, 2011)

Just a couple of thoughts:
1) I normally would graft multiple days in a row each week from early May thru June which gives you a little protection for when things go bad. Normally I'd graft Tuesday, Weds and Thursday each week. It might not be an option for you but I think I'd try for at least a second batch of cells. worst case you don't need them and you have just worn out a colony to raise them. 
2) I normally didn't care much what the colonies did for that specific year. My biggest goal was to raise those colonies for the following year as they wouldn't need much in way of treatments and wintering success would be 95%. Those that were mated early would make 2 or 3 supers in a good year. But those that were grafted late in June didn't mate until July and would be doing good to winter in one deep box. did it this way to avoid needing to make the long haul to winter in florida. if you really want to raise them for a June flow you will have to bank on good weather early. 
3) so i always had hundreds of nucs in some stage from mating to failure. anything that failed was combined with those that were good which would get them upto speed way quicker. and i put tremendous selection pressure on all of them so anything that didn't progress in a way i was hoping for was scrapped and combined.
4) I'd be concerned with your July plan. Maybe your flows are way different but I'd think they will overflow beyond a 5 frame nuc between July and end of the season. maybe you could tear them down to 2 frames nucs like we use to do when splitting in florida in the spring. I tried wintering as nucs and it stunk. I know lots of people that use the same plan and I haven't personally seen anyone do it successfully around here. that would be the reason i push them all into at least single deep for winter.

just my experience so it might not work for you but hopefully you can find something useful from it


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## BIGHONEY56 (Sep 1, 2011)

BigBlackBirds,

Yes I am thinking when I do my splits they will be 2 brood frame splits with 4 frames total, then later they will get a nuc super with another 4 frames, so they will be overwintering with 8 frames (4 0ver 4). The nucs you did, were they 5 frame nucs? Ive been doing a lot of research, and I'm goin to try to overwinter like Mike Palmer does.

Thanks


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

March 15


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## drlonzo (Apr 15, 2014)

sqkcrk said:


> March 15


Mark - Did you graft in NY or SC?


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

May 10


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

Michael Palmer said:


> May 10


The way things are going for us this year May is looking pretty good. Expecting a "snowy mix" tonight! Bizarre Spring this year.


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## rfgreenwell (Feb 14, 2010)

May 1


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## jonathan (Nov 3, 2009)

End April in a very good year but usually early to mid May.
Re the drones, you need to do the math. 
Drones take 24 days to emerge and another 2 weeks to become sexually mature.
Grafted queens take 12 days to emerge and another week or so to start mating flights.
For early success you have to have these two variables lined up.
If you graft on May 1st your first virgins will be taking mating flights around may 20 so you need queens in drone producer colonies laying up drone cells from about April 12th.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

drlonzo said:


> Mark - Did you graft in NY or SC?


I don't graft. But my bees and I are in SC. I get queen cells from a friend of mine, Lynn Barton. I'm going to check my earliest splits Sunday afternoon. I made them 2 weeks ago. Lynn caught queens today for his first go round. 78% successful.


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## Dave1958 (Mar 25, 2013)

curious as some in my area go in a double deep( most common), but I have talked to some that go with a single deep. How much weight do you try to achieve in a single, and roughly how big cluster. I've had major winter losses and am open to suggestions. Going to try Michael Palmers type of interfering this year.


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## BigBlackBirds (Aug 26, 2011)

Hi
In response to the 4 vs 5 frame question. Answer is both. I started with 4 frame nucs that were probably built a touch too small. To the point it was hard to squeeze cells between frames or use a screened cage to protected newly mated queens under. So ended up building 5 framers with a touch of spare room which were so much easier to manipulate frames, etc. 

However, I think 8 frames could be a different story. That is pretty close to 10 frames and I can see it providing enough stores IF you use a nice conservative type of stock that regulates to weather, doesn't keep big balls of unnecessary bees, etc. 

The upside I found of making those colonies in summer was that they would outrun the mite population and need no treatment for winter and be strong for spring---assuming weather was good in late summers and fall for them to build up. I wouldn't expect to have more than 2-3% winter loss with them if you can get everything to come together. Then you have less pressure to worry about rebuilding things come spring.


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## Moon (May 7, 2011)

In the past I typically wait until about the middle of May, however; this year it's been so warm here, I've had to start feeding so early, the colonies are building up early. Honestly all I'm waiting for is to start seeing drone cells and I'm going to begin grafting.


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