# Efficacy of different procedures inducing supercedure.



## AR Beekeeper (Sep 25, 2008)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*

My experience is that in managing honey bees shortcuts will usually cause problems. If these are packages that you started last spring they will probably start swarm or supersedure cells on this year's spring nectar flow.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*



AR Beekeeper said:


> My experience is that in managing honey bees shortcuts will usually cause problems. If these are packages that you started last spring they will probably start swarm or supersedure cells on this year's spring nectar flow.


Will be this spring 2019 packages.


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*

Do you draw a hard line between quality of queens from induced emergency cells, and those from eggs deliberately laid in purpose built queen cups? I and many others have been quite satisfied with queen quality when cells are started using double screen division board. One such design is the Snelgrove Board which I use.


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## mbear (May 18, 2017)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*

I am curious as to why you want to do this? 
Do you think that the "local queen" will be better? Because it sounds like you want to have your new package make a new queen. 
How would this be better than the one that came with the bees?


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## little_john (Aug 4, 2014)

I've found that even the presence of a single QX can sometimes induce supersedure cells if there are viable larvae above it - but if you really want to ensure that supersedure cells (and not emergency cells) are drawn, then extend the path length between a Q+ve brood box and the target larvae - whether these be grafts, or a comb of BIAS - thusly:



(click on the above thumbnail to enlarge - it's a bit big to post 'as is') 
LJ


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## Saltybee (Feb 9, 2012)

Not sure what you mean by local queens. Package cells mated with local drones? Will be a lot of package drones in the neighborhood too.
If you could get local brood, late enough packages for local drones a queenless package on brood would get you farther.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*



crofter said:


> Do you draw a hard line between quality of queens from induced emergency cells, and those from eggs deliberately laid in purpose built queen cups? I and many others have been quite satisfied with queen quality when cells are started using double screen division board. One such design is the Snelgrove Board which I use.


Once the cells are being drawn, I plan to replace them with queen cells that I make from local stock as I have noticed package queens, while potentially excellent quality I believe they get sent far too early and thus fail. I also prefer stock from production hives that I know have actually overwintered in central Illinois. It is not a line being extended, I grab queens from fellow beeks whose production hives perform excellently. Once the supercedure process was started, I planned to replace the cell with my local cell.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*



mbear said:


> I am curious as to why you want to do this?
> Do you think that the "local queen" will be better? Because it sounds like you want to have your new package make a new queen.
> How would this be better than the one that came with the bees?


Yep, I do prefer local queens bred under local conditions with fellow hives that overwintered to produce viable healthy young queens whose development is not interrupted by the package business.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

little_john said:


> I've found that even the presence of a single QX can sometimes induce supersedure cells if there are viable larvae above it - but if you really want to ensure that supersedure cells (and not emergency cells) are drawn, then extend the path length between a Q+ve brood box and the target larvae - whether these be grafts, or a comb of BIAS - thusly:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I guess that would work, but it isn't a for certain. I know when I clip the antennae, that hive will go into supercedure, I have done it in the past, just not on this scale. Also, if I go through that much trouble, I would just make a quick mating nuc then after queen is mated and laying, pinch the original. Which I am not against, just tryin to shave off some equipment and time.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

Saltybee said:


> Not sure what you mean by local queens. Package cells mated with local drones? Will be a lot of package drones in the neighborhood too.
> If you could get local brood, late enough packages for local drones a queenless package on brood would get you farther.


Local queen cell(graft from overwintered production hive after initial spring evaluation) mated with local drones from local overwintered hives in early April/May/June. I have no problem with package queens that people want to keep. The ones that survive are normally excellent and great producers. Again, once you survive a winter in Illinois, have dealt with the **** hive beetle bombs from reckless beeks, varroa, rotten weather, etc... you are probably gonna be worth keepin around for drones.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

Thank you for the continued interest.


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## ruthiesbees (Aug 27, 2013)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*



Bee_Engineer said:


> Once the cells are being drawn, I plan to replace them with queen cells that I make from local stock as I have noticed package queens, while potentially excellent quality I believe they get sent far too early and thus fail. I also prefer stock from production hives that I know have actually overwintered in central Illinois. It is not a line being extended, I grab queens from fellow beeks whose production hives perform excellently. Once the supercedure process was started, I planned to replace the cell with my local cell.


If you plan to replace the package bees queen cells with ones you have grafted, why even go to the trouble of getting the package to start queen cells? Yank the package queen and plant your capped cell.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*



ruthiesbees said:


> If you plan to replace the package bees queen cells with ones you have grafted, why even go to the trouble of getting the package to start queen cells? Yank the package queen and plant your capped cell.


Ideally the goal is to replace the queen without any break in brood laying. You are correct that this is an option. We chose not to use it.


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*



Bee_Engineer said:


> *Once the cells are being drawn, I plan to replace them with queen cells that I make from local stock* as I have noticed package queens, while potentially excellent quality I believe they get sent far too early and thus fail. I also prefer stock from production hives that I know have actually overwintered in central Illinois. It is not a line being extended, I grab queens from fellow beeks whose production hives perform excellently. Once the supercedure process was started, I planned to replace the cell with my local cell.


I'm confused as to the whole point of the supersedure? If the bold text above is your plan, what is the point of inducing the supersedure? Without more information, it seems like a pointless endeavor. My suggestion is (if package queen is producing well) simply allow her to build up the colony and then requeen once conditions permit and when surplus bees are available in your apiary. If the package queen is not to your standards, then donate her to a local beekeeper who might be able to utilize her.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*

>I've found that even the presence of a single QX can sometimes induce supersedure cells if there are viable larvae above it

Me too. If you want to make it happen for sure put a double screen between them and then after the queens are well along, remove the double screen and replace it with a queen excluder.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*



AstroBee said:


> I'm confused as to the whole point of the supersedure? If the bold text above is your plan, what is the point of inducing the supersedure? Without more information, it seems like a pointless endeavor. My suggestion is (if package queen is producing well) simply allow her to build up the colony and then requeen once conditions permit and when surplus bees are available in your apiary. If the package queen is not to your standards, then donate her to a local beekeeper who might be able to utilize her.


OK, the point of supercedure is to allow the hive to continue to lay without a brood break using minimal resources. It is not a pointless endeavor. Currently I must commit a small mating nuc and the resources(bees, frame, feed) therein to produce a mated, laying queen. Once the queen is laying, I can pinch the original queen and immediately combine the laying queen without fear of rejection. There is a tremendous amount of work and time involved to get this to happen. Supercedure allows two things to happen. 1. The original colony is used for the mating nuc and self evaluates the queen. 2. For a short time there is a 2 queen laying colony that helps the colony along. 

Regardless, while I have induced supercedure, I am asking the community the most efficacious way to perform and expect a colony response.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*



Michael Bush said:


> >I've found that even the presence of a single QX can sometimes induce supersedure cells if there are viable larvae above it
> 
> Me too. If you want to make it happen for sure put a double screen between them and then after the queens are well along, remove the double screen and replace it with a queen excluder.


Yes sir, this is an option, but one I'd rather not enjoin as I have not made the double screen boards to perform this and I want to make sure the colony kills off the old queen as well, save me a step.


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*



Michael Bush said:


> >I've found that even the presence of a single QX can sometimes induce supersedure cells if there are viable larvae above it
> 
> Me too. If you want to make it happen for sure put a double screen between them and then after the queens are well along, remove the double screen and replace it with a queen excluder.


Technically, that would not be a supercedure, rather an emergency queen.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*

>Technically, that would not be a supercedure, rather an emergency queen.

Sort of. They can still SMELL the queen. Just having an excluder between them almost always works and they can still exchange QMP by trophallaxis yet the pheromones are low enough to cause them to raise a queen. Are these emergency queens? I don't think so. But yes, without the ability to share QMP by trophallaxis is more of a sure thing. I think the fact that they can smell a queen leads them to believe she is just failing because they are still getting the QMP by mouth. You could make the case for either supersedure or emergency under those circumstances. The way it transpires though, leads me to consider it more supersedure than emergency.


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*



Bee_Engineer said:


> O It is not a pointless endeavor.




I was referencing the *Once the cells are being drawn, I plan to replace them with queen cells that I make from local stock * comment you made. 




Bee_Engineer said:


> There is a tremendous amount of work and time involved to get this to happen.


Making and mating a single queen? OK, if you say so....


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*



Michael Bush said:


> The way it transpires though, leads me to consider it more supersedure than emergency.


I like to draw the line on intention and the raw material the bees begin with, kind of like a swarm cell. The bees fully intend to replace the queen and make the appropriate sized cells to make that happen *before* the egg is laid. In the scenario that you suggest the bees are simply given worker sized cells and they must rework the cells to build queen cells. To me that's an emergency cell. True supercedure cells are clearly very different than any emergency cells, and I fully suspect that those produced above will be emergency in shape.


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## little_john (Aug 4, 2014)

If the object of the exercise is to re-queen a colony 'on the fly', without a break in brood-laying, then simply raise a queen above (or below) your queen-right hive, then - once she's shown herself to be a good layer - allow her access to the full hive.

There's a 1971-2 paper describing such a method (93% success rate): 
REQUEENING HONEY BEE COLONIES WITHOUT DEQUEENING By I. W. FORSTER 
(https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00288233.1972.10421270)

'best
LJ


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

I think Snelgrove estimated that approximately 85% of the time it will be the young queen takes the crown. If I want to be certain, I put the bees with the old queen through a shaker box with queen excluder. M Palmer and others have mentioned how common it is to have multiple queens in a colony; not many of us continue queen hunting after we have found the first one!

Maybe I missed the part about why it is so important to eliminate the original queen?


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

little_john said:


> If the object of the exercise is to re-queen a colony 'on the fly', without a break in brood-laying, then simply raise a queen above (or below) your queen-right hive, then - once she's shown herself to be a good layer - allow her access to the full hive.
> 
> There's a 1971-2 paper describing such a method (93% success rate):
> REQUEENING HONEY BEE COLONIES WITHOUT DEQUEENING By I. W. FORSTER
> ...


yep, it appears most have settled on some variant of the snelgrove method.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

Many of the package queens fail. We are just trying to get locally made queens in there preemptively.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

Regardless, I was hoping someone had some experience forcing supercedure on a mass scale by maiming the queen. It appears however, this is not the case.


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

No experience, but you can look at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0022191081900779

"queen bee is unable to deposit the non-volatile secretions from tarsal glands along the comb edges and that the deficiency of the foot-print pheromone triggers the construction of swarming cups along the non-inhibited areas"

Removal of the tarsal glands from hind feet may produce your desired outcome. May require very good eye sight and precision clipping, but "could be done". During II procedure, I can clearly see tarsal glands and is one of my GO, NO-GO measures prior to insemination.


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

Here's a better reference: https://www.researchgate.net/public...ted_honeybee_queens_that_have_bodily_injuries

This reference breaks down supercedure rates as a function of type of injury.


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## Saltybee (Feb 9, 2012)

What's the chance of intentional injury induced supersedure inducing a 2nd supersedure?
I can see the local QC queen being immediately superseded by a hive raised package supersedure queen.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

AstroBee said:


> Here's a better reference: https://www.researchgate.net/public...ted_honeybee_queens_that_have_bodily_injuries
> 
> This reference breaks down supercedure rates as a function of type of injury.


 *As many as 83.3% of queens with injured antennae were supersedured.
*

very nice, not sure how you dug it up, but kudos sir! The struggle is real.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

Saltybee said:


> What's the chance of intentional injury induced supersedure inducing a 2nd supersedure?
> I can see the local QC queen being immediately superseded by a hive raised package supersedure queen.


IDK


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

AstroBee said:


> Here's a better reference: https://www.researchgate.net/public...ted_honeybee_queens_that_have_bodily_injuries
> 
> This reference breaks down supercedure rates as a function of type of injury.


Thanks for that link; will have to update my memory in regard to supercedure resulting from antenna damage. It appears that brood rearing suffers considerably before supercedure is put in motion by the workers. Seems like perhaps not an economical method of requeeening.


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

crofter said:


> It appears that brood rearing suffers considerably before supercedure is put in motion by the workers.


Absolutely. That was my big take away from that paper too. 



crofter said:


> Seems like perhaps not an economical method of requeeening.


Again, totally agree, if you're trying to build up a colony you certainly don't want to diminish the queen's productivity.


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## Bee_Engineer (Jun 28, 2016)

AstroBee said:


> Absolutely. That was my big take away from that paper too.
> 
> 
> 
> Again, totally agree, if you're trying to build up a colony you certainly don't want to diminish the queen's productivity.


I did not realize that the brood would be reduced so heavily. Guess I better make plans for the snelgrove or somethin similar! lol

Maiming the queen will indeed induce supercedure, but at the cost of 3 fr of brood? meh, not worth it.

Thanks for the interest and consideration. I believe inducing supercedure while effective, has unseen consequences for the brood nest I had not considered. I will not be entertaining this process any longer. Well, that isn't entirely true... I might play with this a bit just for fun n games.


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## Cloverdale (Mar 26, 2012)

Thanks for all the links.


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## v-beebud (Apr 6, 2017)

*Re: Efficacy of inducing supercedure*

Good information on this thread.


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