# Incorporating Nucs in a backyard apiary



## Capricorn (Apr 20, 2009)

I'm starting to. I'm looking at having enough nucs going into winter to recoup losses on my production colony winter dead outs. If I end up with extra over wintered nucs I think I'll sell them. Then I plan to rebuild my nuc population by catching a few swarms and possibly by making splits right before the main flow hits.

I think you need to define what your goals are for your backyard apiary though... If you want to just keep two main hives, then I might have 2-4 nucs going. You can keep your nucs weak by robbing frames of brood or even splitting them.

My goal for the next few years is to run 4 hives for honey production and then keep enough nucs around to replace winter dead outs and ideally sell a few nucs in the spring each year. So I might want to go into winter with my 4 main colonies, plus 6 nucs.


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## hondo (Mar 14, 2009)

rharlow said:


> So, I just got done watching Michael Palmer's presentation to the PWRBA this past April (see wintering nuc thread). Thank you Mike!The presentation was very enlightening and left me wanting for more information. Looking forward to hear Mike speak at our Annual.
> 
> Were you able to view this presentation on the web or did you have to purchase the video? Thank you.


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## timgoodin (Mar 10, 2007)

I too very much enjoyed the videos.

http://www.vimeo.com/23178333 

and Part 2
http://www.vimeo.com/23234196


I had to watch them later at night when the site was not so busy or my internet was not so busy.

I am only a 4th year beekeeper, first year started with two hives, second year went to 12 (bought queens), third year went to 25 (used swarm cells). This year I increased using the examples described in the video's and also in the book Increase Essentials and am right now at 40 hives (grafted and swarm cells) and nucs. I'm curious to see how they winter this year. I plan to try to overwinter several of them as 5 frame deep nucs. In the past I got them expanded or combined them into 8 frame boxes before winter got here and fed, fed, fed. 

I love the idea of bee bombs and with multiple hives it's easy to borrow a frame of brood here or there. 

rharlow, if I were you I'd start a couple of nucs next spring, if you need them you can utilize them. If not give them or sell them to a beginner or a beekeeping friend. The experience you get from managing them is very valueable. 

I really enjoyed the videos and the book listed above, if anyone is interested in bee breeding I'd recommend both.

Tim


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## rharlow (Mar 20, 2011)

Refreshing a thread I had started. I'm still having a hard time trying to figure out how to incorporate Mike Palmer's strategy (and for that matter Brother Adam's) into a small backyard apiary. My key sticking point is this:

Brother Adam states that in order of priority "First, we must have a bee which is able to meet the demands of modern bee-keeping".

And, so therefore, he spends a great deal of time and energy "creating" a "good" bee - the Buckfast. 

In a large apiary, one can produce queens, and with a large quantity of hives, be reasonably assured that the queen will mate with one of the drones from his apiary. 

But in a small backyard apiary with maybe two or three hives, one can produce queens, but one cannot be reasonably sure that the queen is mating with who she is supposed to. And thus your focus on picking the "right" queens to produce is all for naught after a couple of generations. Am I missing something?

Is there a minimum number of hives needed in order to gain some control over who your virgin queens are mating with?

So, in a small apiary, is the only thing I can do is raise queens, and leave the rest ot fate?

As a side note, wish I had read Brother Adam's book before I got some russians, as he states: "Of all the qualities a strain may posses, there is probably none more important than a disinclination to swarm!" (exclamation, my emphasis). Leaning towards NWC, although I'd go with Buckfast if I could get them from Canada.


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## TWall (May 19, 2010)

Small-scale queen breeders are always going to be at the mercy of what other colonies are producing drones locally.

One way to incorporate overwintering nucs and staying small is to use nucs to replace queens. It is pretty welll accepted that these days summer bred queens are the most productive next year. You can over-winter nucs to replace dead-outs. You can also requeen hives by killing the "old" queen and combing the nuc to requeen the hive.

The queens in the nucs could be ones you bred. Or, ones you purchase from a preferred source.

Tom


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## mac (May 1, 2005)

rharlow said:


> But in a small backyard apiary with maybe two or three hives, one can produce queens, but one cannot be reasonably sure that the queen is mating with who she is supposed to./QUOTE] I would say you are right but you are also assuming there a lot of other bee colonies in your area you might be the only one. I have read where hives are set up to be drone producers by inserting drone foundation into hives to maximize drone production. You could let your hives swarm thereby increasing your bee’s genetics in your area.


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

rharlow said:


> So, in a small apiary, is the only thing I can do is raise queens, and leave the rest ot fate?


In a small apiary, I wouldn't attempt to raise my own queens...over time. Find and support local queen producers. Don't let queen rearing be the reason for not raising your own nucleus colonies. As the demand increases for locally produced queens, and more states and local bee associations start up queen rearing projects, you should have access to the queens you want. Just approach this nuc management plan one step at a time. Learn how to set up and winter nucleus colonies in your apiary first.


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

that's good advice mp. my local queen producer will have to get rid of this summer's queens early next spring to make up his mating nucs. time will tell how much for me to expect in terms of winter losses. last winter was my first, and four out of four colonies made it.


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## rharlow (Mar 20, 2011)

Raising my own nucs is a given, as I'm overwintering one now, and hope to overwinter at least two next year. But it was the queen given to the Nuc that I was concerned with. So, purchasing a couple of queens each year, if needed, is what I should plan for? That actually makes more sense, genetics wise, although I was looking forward to trying my hand at grafting.

My thought was to run three hives and two nucs, with the worst of the three being the source bees for the two nucs. Upon overwintering, assuming 100% success, the two Nucs would be used requeen the two worst hives, with the hive queens swapped into the nucs to await their death at such a time that I can acquire a good northern queen locally? If less than 100% overwinter, then Nucs would be used to requeen or build back to three hives, and then a new Nuc would be created in summer and populated with local northern queen.

Does that sound like an initial plan (until the bees screw it up!!)


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

I would try to get to the point where you wintered a couple or few extra...just to build up and use as brood factories for making your new nucs. Don't be concerned with having too many. You can always sell a couple after your production colonies are requeened and strong and you still have more than enough to make up this year's.


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

rharlow said:


> Does that sound like an initial plan (until the bees screw it up!!)


Do they? Or is it we that screw it up?


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## KQ6AR (May 13, 2008)

We had a few too many last spring, & sold them to local beekeepers. The difficult thing can be keeping them small. 
The ones we have going into winter are 2 boxes tall, they have 10 frames each.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

KQ6AR said:


> The ones we have going into winter are 2 boxes tall, they have 10 frames each.


How is that a nuc?


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## TWall (May 19, 2010)

Acebird said:


> How is that a nuc?


It's a 5-frame nuc with a 5-frame super on top.

I had a 5-frame nuc with two 5-frame medium supers on it last winter. I didn't want to disturb the brood chamber late in the year so let them keeping building up.

Tom


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

KQ6AR said:


> The ones we have going into winter are 2 boxes tall, they have 10 frames each.


I have just a handfull of single story nucs going into winter this year, but 350+ like yours but 8 frame, 4 over 4. Single story nucs are excellent and winter well, but they take a lot of management to keep them in their box. Adding a nuc super above really reduces the work needed when there are already so many chores to do.


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## Adam Foster Collins (Nov 4, 2009)

How 'bout single 8 frame mediums? I guess that's about a 5 frame deep isn't it?

Adam


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

Michael Palmer said:


> Adding a nuc super above really reduces the work needed when there are already so many chores to do.


OK then why would you ever do it any other way?


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## oblib (Oct 28, 2011)

MP, I'm starting out beekeeping next year by buying 3 local nucs. Been really considering to just keep making up more nucs from those all year and seeing how many strong 4over 4 nucs i have by winter and winter them over and make production colonies out of them the next year. Good plan or bad plan?

Edit: ofc I will be buying local queens to put into any nucs I make up.


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

Acebird said:


> OK then why would you ever do it any other way?


Conservation of equipment. Also...The nucs for expanding upwards need to be made earlier in the season so they can build enough population to draw out the foundation I give them. Making them in mid-June works well but early on the main flow here. So your maybe losing production. Later made nucs mid-July and early August are after the main flow and it's easy to find colonies to donatew brood and bees without losing production.

So...I now start my nucs from overwintered nucs early enough so they can draw out 4 frames of foundation. And, when I have 4 or 5 hundred nucs to manage, having earlier made nucs expanded up and not needing the extra management time I can make later nucs and keep them on 4 combs. Both options work well and it's really a matter of how much time you have for management and how late in the season you make them.


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

oblib said:


> MP, I'm starting out beekeeping next year by buying 3 local nucs. Been really considering to just keep making up more nucs from those all year and seeing how many strong 4over 4 nucs i have by winter and winter them over and make production colonies out of them the next year. Good plan or bad plan?
> 
> Edit: ofc I will be buying local queens to put into any nucs I make up.


This will be your first year with bees? Yes, I think your plan will work. Will you install your bought nucs in 10 frame equipment and then break up into nucs? You could leave them in nuc boxes, add nuc supers above, and harvest brood and bees periodically as they fill the space with brood and bees. I can probably make 10:1 this way using comb. With foundation, the process will be held back, but still possible. Do you have a local mentor that can advise you in what your seeing?


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## oblib (Oct 28, 2011)

Yep first year with bees. I'm going with all 8 frame mediums and figured i would split back into nucs with mated queen every time they filled 3 boxes. I've not found a mentor yet but the inspector for my area live about 15 miles from me so I'm hoping to get to tag along with him some if/when he has time to spare.

The more I think about it the better I like the nuc super method you talk about above. I don't have drawn comb so no way I gonna get 10:1 but I'm curious as to how many I can get my first year without killing them all off by doing something stupid.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

Michael Palmer said:


> This will be your first year with bees? Yes, I think your plan will work.


Let's be serious. What do you think the success / failure rate would be for:
1 a new beek, no mentor?
2 a beek with 2 years minimal experience, no mentor?
3 Anyone with a mentor?

Probably not a fair question ... For a back yard beek with no commercial interest is it better (defined as bee health not net dollars) to raise nucs / queens or buy from someone like yourself in the long run who knows what their doing?


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## mac (May 1, 2005)

Dude, ya do know that some people can really, really, really learn how to do things from reading books don’t ya. Not everyone needs a mentor to be successful at something. Don’t see anywhere that success rate was mentioned. Question was is this a good plan. Answer : I think it will work.” Knowledge is the easiest thing you can give that doesn’t cost money.” Your tag line. Lots of knowledge for the taking if ya can read.It will be a good learning excerize no matter the success rate.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

mac said:


> Question was is this a good plan. Answer : I think it will work.”


Well in this case the answer is avoiding the question. I am looking for answers. If you don't have the answers to my questions then I will keep looking.


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

oblib,

my state inspector is an experienced beekeeper himself, and was very helpful to me this year.

by focusing on raising bees and making increase in your first year, you will simplify things by not having to be concerned about when and how much to harvest, and all that goes along with honey production. not to mention not having to purchase an extractor, decapping knife ect.

i can tell by your posts that you have done a lot of homework and put a lot of thought into this. welcome to beekeeping and good luck!


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## Gypsi (Mar 27, 2011)

Ace,

I bought a hive from my mentor. She insisted the only place to set up my hive was under my big elm tree, about 9 inches off the trunk. Which meant that hive saw no sun from the time the leaves came on until it was dead. She told me to feed hbh in sugar water in a boardman feeder.

All of these practices were working for her, I saw her setup when I took her eqpt back and picked up 2 frames of bees in a deep and a super. She has little bitty mesquite trees which allow filtered light and don't draw moths as badly. She is 60 miles into nowhere surrounded by ranch land with no robber bees. 

I made more progress WITHOUT a mentor, just getting on Beesource, than I made with one. 
I got up to 7 frames of comb and bees before I got robbed out. 

Gypsi


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## oblib (Oct 28, 2011)

Squarepeg,
You got my reasoning right on. Only trying to learn this first year by keeping everything in nucs. Thinking it will be easier to see if they have enough stores for winter in only nucs. By keeping good records of what each nuc has going into winter, then what is left in the spring I think I will gain a good understanding of what I would need in a full size hive for my exact location. Aslo thinking that by keeping them as nucs instead of 3 hives to compare and realize one is acting/looking wierd i should by mid summer have at least 6 prob 9 nucs to compare to each other and none of which will be deeper than 2 stories of 4 frames each so that I can easily go thru the whole chamber. 

Acebird, I still don't know if it is a "good" plan, but at the worst I screw it all up lose 3 nucs and gain a ton of experiance in my first year. Best case I end up going into winter with good experiance and 25 to 30 strong nucs. The actual outcome will prob be somewhere in the middle and if I end up with 10 nucs going into winter I will consider it a success with a 3fold increase and a lot of experiance gained.

Those are my thought, and that is my plan. BTW, when do we start praying for good weather in the spring?:lpf:


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## Gypsi (Mar 27, 2011)

Start praying for good weather now. Texas lakes are still 17 ft below normal, and one lake is about 2 ft from the pumps, before a couple of cities have zero water...


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

Acebird said:


> Let's be serious. What do you think the success / failure rate would be for:
> 1 a new beek, no mentor?
> 2 a beek with 2 years minimal experience, no mentor?
> 3 Anyone with a mentor?
> ...


Serious? Well think about it. A beekeeper who has never kept bees wants to build up nucleus colonies to make more nucleus colonies. Hard tellin' not knowin' but I assume someone that has never had bees might not understand the cycle of a colony, what the difference between a strong colony and an average colony, what chalk looks like, if a queen is producing enough brood for future nuc making...do I have to go on?

Learning how to keep bees is a process of failures and successes. The idea of having a mentor is to help you make less mistakes...the mentor has already made them. Keeping bees for two seasons means you got your feet wet. With only a few colonies, a beekeeper could make one mistake a year that would result in colony failure. How many years does it take to get it right...learning only from your mistakes?

I'm not saying it can't be done...I did it. But then I've been at it almost 40 years. And guess what...I still make stupid mistakes and am still learning. But that's the beauty of keeping bees.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

Actually, I am serious. Although I could guess the percentages on my first three questions my last question is most important to me.

There are commercial people who produce honey and pollinate crops but they don’t take the time to learn how to winter nucs or maybe even raise queens. They have many years at doing what they do and are very successful at it otherwise they wouldn’t be doing it anymore.

I have two concerns. Is it better for me to raise my own stock and or is it better for the bee population if I raise my own stock when it is unlikely that I know enough or want to spend the effort it may take? What is the effect of a back yard beekeeper just loosing hives vs. what is the effect of a back yard bee keeper raising bad queens / genetics?

I got my feet wet, you bet. Should I dive in or just keep wading? When is it safe?


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

Acebird said:


> There are commercial people who produce honey and pollinate crops but they don’t take the time to learn how to winter nucs or maybe even raise queens. They have many years at doing what they do and are very successful at it otherwise they wouldn’t be doing it anymore.
> 
> I have two concerns. Is it better for me to raise my own stock and or is it better for the bee population if I raise my own stock when it is unlikely that I know enough or want to spend the effort it may take? What is the effect of a back yard beekeeper just loosing hives vs. what is the effect of a back yard bee keeper raising bad queens / genetics?
> 
> I got my feet wet, you bet. Should I dive in or just keep wading? When is it safe?


And how many of those commercial honey producer/pollinators migrate south to keep their bees alive?

Over time, if you only have a small backyard apiary, you should leave the raising of queens to someone who has the skills and the bee resources to do the job right. 

The backyard beekeeper will continue to lose bees whether or not they raise good or bad stocks. Same for large commercial operations, sideline operations...everyone loses bees. The important thing in my opinion is to learn how to incorporate wintering nucleus colonies into your operation...no matter if you have 2 colonies or 2000...so you have bees to replace your losses without resorting to packages.


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

Ace, A tremendous amount depends on how much experience the mentor has. A tremendous amount depends on how much the beginning beekeeper is willing to invest in reading and studying and asking questions just like these. A tremendous amount depends on the quality of the genetics you start with.

With all that said, A beginning beekeeper with no experience and no mentor is going in with a huge handicap. My suggestion is to not even try this tactic unless there is no other choice. A beekeeper with 2 years experience who is willing to learn and has some idea how to manage bees will probably get the nuc process down pat but will lose many of them in the winter. A newbee with a very experienced mentor who happens to have lots of experience running nucs will probably get 90% or more success. Don't expect 100% overwintering, it rarely happens in a cold climate. Do expect to make mistakes, it goes with learning. If you watch the videos of MP, pay careful attention to the absconding problem he has enountered. If I kept bees here in Alabama the way he does, I would have zilch at the end of summer because of absconding. That doesn't mean he is wrong, it just says that I have to adapt to my local climate just like you will have to adapt to yours. You can always post pics and ask questions here on beesource so other beekeepers can offer advice.

I will repeat something that has already been posted recommending reading. I strongly advise reading all you can and finding all the beekeeping videos that you can to get a head start.

DarJones


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## Daniel Y (Sep 12, 2011)

Ace, to give your questions some serious thought. My answers concern myself and my past experiences at learning things
What do you think the success / failure rate would be for:
1 a new beek, no mentor?
Fairly unless you consider the folks on this group and other sources as mentors. otherwise I would never have thought of the nucs in the first place. I am very good at getting things done the first time. it requires a lot of time to do it though. A lot depends on the quality of the information though. I also have a good track record for noticing good instruction from bad.

2 a beek with 2 years minimal experience, no mentor?
Less than the 1 year. Think I have it figured out by now and start making more mistakes.

3 Anyone with a mentor?
A mentor may go either way. bad mentor bad results, a busy mentor that cannot really take the time to do the job right you would be better off without. improved the odds of mistakes do to lack of experience.

Truth is learn about the system and give it a shot. I do see that people are intimidated by the idea. Even the videos I have watched mention "Just go do it" several times over. Seems there is a hump people need to push through to take it on.

My question. What do you loose if a nuc fails? Time, effort, confidence maybe. and then you can go buy the package you where going to buy anyway.

Increased management. From what I can tell you have to tend to a nuc far more frequently but the amount of time needed is small. For the most part it seems to be removing frames of brood to prevent the nuc from swarming. Just keep em making babies and keep em fed. Some information I have read say that they become the source for your other hives rather than a burden. Sort of think of an extra queen producing brood for yoru production hives.

As for me I don't think it is a good idea to keep buying bees that are not surviving every year. There is information out there that says a hive nuc or not that over wintered is better. Something like the queen does not even get her game on until the second year. So maybe some unexpected results on the good side from the effort.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

Michael Palmer said:


> Over time, if you only have a small backyard apiary, you should leave the raising of queens to someone who has the skills and the bee resources to do the job right.


That was the answer I was looking for and it also agrees with what I thought was the safe approach.



> The backyard beekeeper will continue to lose bees whether or not they raise good or bad stocks. Same for large commercial operations, sideline operations...everyone loses bees. The important thing in my opinion is to learn how to incorporate wintering nucleus colonies into your operation...no matter if you have 2 colonies or 2000...so you have bees to replace your losses without resorting to packages.


I feel packages from anywhere is the worst way for a beekeeper to start out. I am sure this will upset a lot of people but I believe you should need a permit to sell them and a permit to buy them (in other words, regulated). Shipping bees all over the country is a vehicle for spreading disease.

Michael if I understand your last paragraph correctly you are advising me to raise nucs or winter them but buy the queens for these nucs? That leaves out splitting hives as in a walk away split, correct?


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

Acebird said:


> Michael if I understand your last paragraph correctly you are advising me to raise nucs or winter them but buy the queens for these nucs? That leaves out splitting hives as in a walk away split, correct?


Yes, I guess it does. I never really liked walk away splits. With the way I split up non-producing colonies...I wouldn't want them to raise the new queen from the old queen's larvae.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

OK I see your point but my colonies are producing and I could choose the better of the two. Is that a better approach for me?


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

Yeah, I guess.


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## libhart (Apr 22, 2010)

As he says, walk-away splits for Mr. Palmer's methods and operation just wouldn't lead to what he's seeking. IMHO though a walk-away split in a nuc, or rather a stick-around-and-watch split in a nuc, is an awesome thing for a backyard beekeeper. Pulling a few frames from a strong hive, or from a few strong hives even, and putting them in a nuc is a great way for a backyard beekeeper to have a locally raised queen and to gain the experience and knowledge that goes along with watching the natural process of the bees raising an emergency queen. If the queen fails, add another frame of brood and let them try again, or maybe by that time you're a little gun-shy and you recombine them. Either way you've not lost much and you've gained some up close experience. Best case scenario is that you now have an emergency queen for your main hives should you need her. You have a comb and brood factory to help your other hives. And if you feel your new queen is doing well, you could choose to try to winter the nuc. If they survive, great, you can turn them into a full hive to replace a deadout or let them raise gobs of young for your other hives, maybe even make a new stick-around-and-watch split from them. If they don't survive, bummer, but you now have some good extra comb to give to your survivors or that swarm you collect in the spring.


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## mac (May 1, 2005)

“Knowledge is the easiest thing you can give that doesn’t cost money.” So now you have gleaned a bunch of knowledge from these fine folks. If not applied a bee haver you will be. Be a bee keeper not a haver. Raise a queen or 2 and share your knowledge with someone. (George Imirie’s statements about beekeeper or bee haver which are you???)


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

I am not Pop Pie but I am what I am.

The only thing making me gun shy is splitting a hive and having the queenless one go testy. That would force me to do something right away for liability issues. I am not very good at finding the queen (that isn't marked) so it could mean the end of the hive if I can't move it out quickly. Of course I would need a volunteer to take it besides.


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## ldaxon (Apr 14, 2010)

I, too, have a 3 hive apiary in my back yard and after seeing MP's talk, plan to always have one, possibly two nucs in the future (too late to get one off the ground this year). My purpose will be to 1) keep the nuc queen as a back up and 2) also use the nuc as a brood factory if I have a week hive or just want to build up a hive or two for stronger production just before the flow. I was toying with the idea of running a two queen hive but now I think have a nuc or two sounds better. It just makes sense to me, as a small hobbyist, to have a nuc or two on hand as a management resource.


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## minz (Jan 15, 2011)

Well it already paid off for me. I made a nuc in August (used a fancy store bought queen from somebody other than the bee club for a change). Last month two of my hives were robbed out. That leaves me with my nuc and one strong hive. I have so much gear that I put my nuc into a deep with a division board feeder. Does the size matter? I moved the feeder so that I have a full 5 frames (feeder takes up just under 2 frames worth) and put empty plastic on the other side to fill the empty space.


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## tree_entz (Jan 11, 2006)

Well, i'm glad i came across this thread. Being the backyard beek myself for the past 8 years i've been thrown to the mat in the bee dojo a bunch of times. And that's just learning! I've made splits a number of times but MPs talk really made me think more about the 'apiary' and less about 'hives'. That is...what can I generate from the resources I have? i'm tired of shelling out $$ for sub-par...risky packages. For the same money you could buy a lot of hive equipment! 

I really liking the mindset of using the resources of your less productive colonies as a means for generating new hives....rather than taking away resources from you best. When you thin your carrots, do you pull out the best ones first? No....you harvest the runts first. 

That leads into my my dilemma regarding genetics. I have had a terrible time sourcing queens over the year, especially trying to find them when the timing is right for your yard. And, as discussed, controlling mating for the backyard operation is also a challenge. I chuckled at the one person's comment about letting your bees swarm as a means to improve genetic opportunity in an open mating yard: I remember at my old yard being asked one time what breed my bees were...and I thought about it for a minute and said 'well there's Italians..Carnolians...some of Kirk's bees....and whatever swarms I didn't manage to catch over the years'. 
But that gets me thinking. Lets make an assumption of a fairly isolated yard. I understand that allowing the bees to raise a queen lengthens the cycle of the nuc buildup, but would also have the potential for many mating opportunities even within one season (depending on how many nucs your are building up). The new queens have as equal opportunity to mate with drones from any hive (including your highly productive hives), right? Would introducing new queens of good genetics improve your population/'apiary' over time?

So here are some scenarios with the backyard/hobby beekeeper in mind (let me know how far off I am, i'm sure i'm leave holes to fill  )
Assumptions: 
-'isolated' yard
-existing overwintered hives of unknown but (observed) productive genetics
-Open mating will occur and genetic pedigree will not be 100% controlled.

Goals:
-Diminish purchases of package bees
-Avoid yearly purchase of mated queens
-Improve genetics of our bee population/apiary

Scenario (and this will break the rules a bit initially):
Spring, one hive is lingering in production and its resources are divided into 2 five-frame nucs. Old queen is removed, and Mated queens of good genetics are purchased and introduced into these nucs and allowed to build and then nucs from these are allowed to increase. Several then created from each of these and allowed to mate openly. Mating options are drones from your newly purchased queens or your observed good producing existing hives. (Not bad IMO)

Alternatively, one could use a portion of this scenario where resources are harvested from hives of the newly purchased queens to make nucs/mating nucs and moved to an isolated mating/nuc yard for the season, evaluated for production, and then brought back to the yard for wintering. 

The following season you have numerous queens and options to re-queen existing production hives, create more production hives, more nucs, etc and you've started to improve your population's genetics. 

Thoughts? Fail? Please remember the goals in mind of reducing outside dependencies and that we're talking about solutions/possibilities for the backyard level beekeeper. 

z


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## ldaxon (Apr 14, 2010)

I thought a virgin queen will not mate with a drone from her own hive, but some of the posters here talk like she will inbred with her own brother. (I know, I know, if there are no other drones around, she might have to mate with drones from her hive -half brothers-, but that is not the usual course). Also, I've read a queen can/will fly up to 5 or 6 miles to find a DCA so I think the chances of her having to mate with her own half brothers are minimal.

But what if you have say 3 hives in your back yard apiary and through splits/supersedure have raised all 3 queens from one initial package. (I have never bought a queen). Will a new supersedure/split queen mate with a drone from one of my other two hives where the relationship might be more like aunt to nephew? or half cousins?

I know genetic diversity is good, but I thought most apiaries get that by the fact that a virgin queen is likely to mate with 10-15 different drones from God-knows where so that the bulk of the worker bees are half-sisters and any new queen they raise will have only 1/2 their genes. Then by the time that new queen mates with a bunch of new/different drones, the gene pool is diluted again by at least 1/2 and so on. So why concern about requeening to avoid inbreeding?


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## libhart (Apr 22, 2010)

Hi tree_entz,

Well, IMHO (and the H is humble ), what you're describing clearly moves on from the realm of "backyard" beekeeper if you're now moving bees into an isolated mating yard. By definition, most backyard beekeepers have just that, their backyard, that's it. What you're describing clearly puts you into a new classification and after 8 years you're probably ready to start doing that kind of thing (which is really cool btw). But for a backyard beekeeper who exists in his/her backyard, I still think stick-around-and-watch splits from strong hives is a good thing. For your carrot reference, true you pull the runts if what you're after is carrots. If what you're after is the seeds, then you take them from the big ones. And in this case I say we're after the seeds.

I guess maybe a slight change on your idea would be to take a foundering hive and split up it's brood frames and nurse bees into two (or more) sets and give each set a frame of very young larvae and eggs from a productive, strong hive. You could do as many sets as the weak hive will give you (in pairs) and/or as many frames from strong hives as you're comfortable taking from those. The the new split can be checked every day to ensure that the bees are using a larva from that frame to raise their new queen. I guess another way is to remove the queen from the weaker hive and wait ~4 1/2 days and cut out queen cells while you're doing the split, they'd have to raise a queen from the strong-hive frame you give them. This won't be bullet proof, but bees never are. To your point about the $$ spent buying bees being used to buy equipment, the money to buy *and ship* a queen can be used other places as well.

I think I'd call this "advanced backyard beekeeping" and as I wrote above, I think moving hives to isolated yards and such is definitely a step beyond that.


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## tree_entz (Jan 11, 2006)

Thanks, and i think all of your points are valid



libhart said:


> I guess maybe a slight change on your idea would be to take a foundering hive and split up it's brood frames and nurse bees into two (or more) sets and give each set a frame of very young larvae and eggs from a productive, strong hive. You could do as many sets as the weak hive will give you (in pairs) and/or as many frames from strong hives as you're comfortable taking from those. The the new split can be checked every day to ensure that the bees are using a larva from that frame to raise their new queen. I guess another way is to remove the queen from the weaker hive and wait ~4 1/2 days and cut out queen cells while you're doing the split, they'd have to raise a queen from the strong-hive frame you give them. This won't be bullet proof, but bees never are. To your point about the $$ spent buying bees being used to buy equipment, the money to buy *and ship* a queen can be used other places as well.


So, could this method here be incorporated into the backyard operation? The term 'founding hive' was what i was struggling to come up with and that works well for this discussion(i kept focusing on something like a 'mother ship' haha!). In this case, a founding hive 'could' be based on a purchased queen of good genetic stock. Not that seasons are endless, but would this work? Or do we hit the wall of what ldaxon said about queens not mating from drones within their hive (or possibly not even mate from other splits/nucs you've made from your 'founding hive'?)? 

My proposed plan (whether a separate mating yard or all within the same yard) all depends on a new queen being able to at the very least mate with a sister nuc [same generation of splits from the founding hive].


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## libhart (Apr 22, 2010)

I should get off my grammatical high horse sometimes.  I was using the Webster def. of the word "founding", to mean struggling or set back. So the founding hive is the weak one you'll split. Then ensure the queen comes from eggs on the frame from the mother ship.

You're absolutely right to point out that my suggestion doesn't address mating at all, it's totally open mating. I think a backyard beekeeper must expect that. You might get some genetics of your other hives, but you might not, and you have to be willing to accept that, unless you're driving them out to the middle of the boonies where you somehow "know" there are no hives, even feral hives, within that X mile radius that the queen will fly to mate. I definitely see that genetic plan in what you're proposing, but to avoid artificial insemination, queen breeders go to great lengths to not only have isolated yards, but to prompt the other hives to produce copius amounts of drones thus flooding the area with their known genetics. I think your plan is good and you should definitely try it if you're up to the challenge, but I wouldn't expect to get the matings you expect most of the time. I'm not basing this on real experience though, just on "the Force"...aka my gut and the fact that nature is nature and she'll do as she wishes.


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## tree_entz (Jan 11, 2006)

I still hope to understand this in the context of the proposed backyard situation. I guess i need to research and find out if the bee-raised queens from the mother hive can mate among those nucs (regardless of the location). it would seem that nuc-raising (when open mating is used) is really allowing for more 'breeding opportunities' and therefore increasing the likely hood that the desired mating pattern is occurring at least part of the time. This may not be satisfactory at the queen/colony level, but at the apiary level, i'm fine with that.

Thanks again!


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## Omie (Nov 10, 2009)

I started this year with a new (bought) nuc, and a full size hive that survived the winter.
I made splits and nucs this Spring and Summer, lost one queenless nuc, and now I have 3 full sized hives and two 5 frame nucs to go into winter with. I'm _thrilled_ with all the things I learned this year by making splits, moving cells and frames of eggs, making nucs, and swapping resources around between my hives.
It was AWESOME to create new colonies on my own and watch them hit the ground running. 
I have high hopes for having at least two surviving colonies next Spring, as opposed to my so-so odds if I had stayed with only the two hives I started the year with.
It's been an incredibly rewarding experience this year. I plan to create some extra nucs/splits every year now, then consolidate the best ones back each Fall to whatever number of colonies I want to go into winter with. I have very limited space in my backyard, plus neighbors all around me so I have to be very careful. But you can stay small even if you make extra nucs- nucs take up almost no space, can be kept limited to 5 frames, and don't have to become permanent hives.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

Omie said:


> But you can stay small even if you make extra nucs- nucs take up almost no space, can be kept limited to 5 frames, and don't have to become permanent hives.


My gut feeling is if you continue to produce nucs from nucs you will develop queens that are great at producing nucs but not worth a hoot for producing honey. Just a feeling.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

If you continually split a nuc you will continue the characteristics of the parent colony, along w/ whatever the virgin queen produced by the nuc mates w/. I don't think there is a nuc producing gene.

And, there is nothing that says that just because you wish to keep a nuc going thru the summer, that doesn't mean that you have to split the nucs you have, thereby producing more nucs. You could simply rob a frame of brood and a frame of honey from it every now and then. That would keep the nuc in a growing state, w/out swarming.


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## Omie (Nov 10, 2009)

sqkcrk said:


> And, there is nothing that says that just because you wish to keep a nuc going thru the summer, that doesn't mean that you have to split the nucs you have, thereby producing more nucs. You could simply rob a frame of brood and a frame of honey from it every now and then. That would keep the nuc in a growing state, w/out swarming.


That's what I'm talking about. Making Spring nucs and keeping them small all summer by periodically taking out a frame of eggs, comb, or brood to use elsewhere, and then deciding in the Fall whether you want to try to overwinter the nucs or break them down and combine them with your other hives. I'm not talking about 'splitting nucs continually'. It's also great to have those extra queens on hand in case you need them. 
That's what I did this year. I'm very small backyard scale. From the one full survivor hive at my house this Spring, I made another full hive plus 3 nucs. One nuc never raised a queen and eventually got shaken out. My two thriving nucs drew quite a few deep frames of new brood comb for me all summer as well, and donated frames of eggs and brood several times. Nucs really seem to work hard!
From all this I now have two healthy double deep hives and two 5-frame nucs that I bundled together to see if they can overwinter. If not, no great loss. If either of the nucs makes it, then I have a head start in the Spring. Then down at my friend's house 1/2 mile away, I located my one purchased nuc this Spring, which is now a double deep hive ready for winter. I hope to get honey from my survivor colonies (knock on wood) next Spring.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

How do you know you aren't propagating a disease though out your apiary?


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

There could be a chance of that. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't do it.


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## Roland (Dec 14, 2008)

Acebird wrote:
How do you know you aren't propagating a disease though out your apiary?

An ability to perceive the pending development of disease is needed. See the warning signs. Or yearly sterilize all of your equipment.

Tree enz - the only pitfall I see in your plan is that purchased queens do not seem to winter nearly as well as queens that have been purchased, and then survived a winter.( I know that sounds crazy, but think about it). The solution would be a one year screening process for all new genetic material in another isolated yard(from the first yard) . 
We rate all of our hives for honey production, gentleness, hygienic, etc. The best hive is the "STAR" hive(it gets a big lumber crayon star), and most of the new queens in the yard will be her daughters. The next year, ussually another hive gets the star.

Crazy Roland


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## Omie (Nov 10, 2009)

Acebird said:


> How do you know you aren't propagating a disease though out your apiary?


_WTHeck_ ? Everyone is at risk of 'propagating disease' every time they buy a package or a nuc, every time they make a split or move a queen cell, every time they go from one hive to another with the same gloves, hive tool, or use comb or frames or boxes from one year to the next. To tell you the truth, I'm more worried about buying infected or infested bees from someone else than I am about making a split or nuc from my own thriving hive at home.
How do you know you aren't propagating disease when handling your bees?- as Roland already said, you should know how to recognize the symptoms of bee diseases and infestations. At the very least, you should be able to tell if your bees are not doing well. If not, then your apiary is in trouble whether you make your own splits and nucs or not.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

Roland said:


> We rate all of our hives for honey production, gentleness, hygienic, etc. The best hive is the "STAR" hive(it gets a big lumber crayon star), and most of the new queens in the yard will be her daughters. The next year, ussually another hive gets the star.
> 
> Crazy Roland


Just thinking back ... Every attempt that man has taken to create a superior race has failed. I am wondering if that wouldn't happen with bees. Natural selection creates a complete mixture of genes. The mix that doesn't work dies off. The mix that does work lives on but they are still mixed and are not susceptible to the same demise between each other. If one gets sick for some reason they all don't get sick because they are different.


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## Roland (Dec 14, 2008)

Well, it seemed to pay off thru the 50's ,60's and 70's. Our bees where different than what you could buy, packages where seldom used to cover winter losses. Then the mites came and that line was lost. It worked before, so I believe it may work again.

Crazy Roland


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## larrymn (Sep 3, 2011)

so it is possible to winter bees in a nuc? you would treat it as a reg hive but it would be smallerright? you would have to wrap and do anything else just like a reg hive right? 2 or 3 boxes high for winter?


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