# I'm pumped!



## GaryG74 (Apr 9, 2014)

Congratulations on the new queens! Post some pics if you get a chance.


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## McBee7 (Dec 25, 2013)

Congratulations Brad. I've got a couple of queens due to emerge this week that I raised myself, and am very anxious also. Would love to see some pics of your queens .

==McBee7==


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## Brad Bee (Apr 15, 2013)

Thanks. Hopefully I can get some pictures tomorrow. I hope some of the pros will comment on how they introduce virgins into the hive. I'm going to install them first thing in the morning.


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## Tenbears (May 15, 2012)

Great Brad, Exciting when you accomplish a milestone in bee keeping isn't it? When I first started rearing queen I did the marshmallow install to let the bees release her. Today I place the queen cells in the breeding nucs prior to hatching.


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## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

I roller cage them, release after 24 hours once the bees get used to her. Some people run them into the entrance with smoke, never worked for me. Some dab some honey on them and seem to get good acceptance that way. I guess a marshmallow works well, don't have to go back to release. They tend to shrink somewhat as they harden up and get ready for mating.


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## Brad Bee (Apr 15, 2013)

I would much have preferred to put the cells in the nucs before they hatched but I didn't get the mating nucs made up in time to do that. It's been a crazy week, just not enough hours in the day.

At any rate, I think things went well. I left out to work the bees before Tenbears and JRG13 replied. When I got started my mating nucs had much fewer bees in them than they did last night when I made them. I don't fully understand that, other than there was nothing to bond them with the nucs since there was empty deep combs and only one capped honey frame in with them. I completely broke down the cell builder hive into the nucs and removed it from the stand. I then tore down a dink hive and took 5 of the frames from it to put into the nucs. I moved it to a different spot in the bee yard to keep the bees from flying back to it. Even still, I lost a lot of bees from the mating nucs. I didn't add any bees since I didn't have any others that were queenless to put in the nucs. With both hives removed from where they originally sat, there was mass chaos in the yard as darkness approached. Bees were flying everywhere. They weren't happy either.  I had on my bee jacket and got stung on the hands several times. My dad was watching what I was doing from a distance and he and his dog both got stung. They both retreated, but the dog was smarter than either one of us. He went all the way back to the house. 

I only had one unhatched cell left to put in a nuc so I put it in the first one. I took the frame that held the roller caged queens and put one on top of each nuc. I decided to use no smoke but instead to take a spray bottle filled sugar water. I had put a gracious amount of lemon juice in the bottle with the syrup. I decided to try a direct release with the first hatched queen. I sprayed her down with sugar water so she couldn't fly when I released her. I also decided to spray all the bees in the hive with sugar water. When I released her, she walked off on the frame and the bees started cleaning her up. I watched her for a couple of minutes and they never acted any way other than accepting towards her. I tried it again with the 2nd on and had the same results. After putting the 2nd queen in the hive I noticed that the bees from the other mating nucs were coming out of the nucs and going to the queens sitting on top of the nucs. They were all over the cages, surrounding it, and were fanning Nasonov. I took that as a great sign from the bees and kept on direct releasing. I spent the next few hours going through other hives and pulled enough frames of dark capped brood to put one in each box. I shook all the bees from each frame when I robbed them from the donor hives. When I got back to the mating nucs bees were fanning on the landing board just outside the entrance on most of them. I'm not sure if they are fanning for straggler homeless bees, or what. Surely none of the queens have gone off on a mating flight yet. Four of the queens were hatched yesterday when I checked them. They could be 48 hours old, but were likely in the 24-36 hour age. I know the others were less than 14 hours post hatch.

If took a video of the bees surrounding the roller cages and took a couple pictures of the first two queens. I'll try to post both. EDIT: It's hard for me to see my phone in the sun, through my veil, so the picture of the queen is pretty pitiful, but it's the only one I have.

Yes Tenbears, it is exciting to accomplish these milestones.


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## WBVC (Apr 25, 2013)

Great..please post photos and document what it is like to introduce virgins...and how many end up laying well.

What did you make up your mating Nucs with? And will you simply expand those into the Queens permanent hives?


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## Brad Bee (Apr 15, 2013)

WBVC said:


> Great..please post photos and document what it is like to introduce virgins...and how many end up laying well.


Will do.



> What did you make up your mating Nucs with? And will you simply expand those into the Queens permanent hives?


I made 7 of them up from the bees in the cell builder. Since I only had 10 cells, I didn't put the CB over a queen right hive. I pulled apart another hive sitting in the same yard to make up the other 3 nucs. I had put that hive on the split list earlier in the year. After introducing the virgins, I went back and put a frame of capped brood into the nucs. Just the frame and brood, no bees on them.

Yes I will expand them into 5 over 5 nucs to over winter.


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## crocodilu911 (Apr 17, 2015)

awesome Brad. i just introduced my virgin queens in on sunday, but i had them in the cages, since i just made the nucs sunday morning. i made them above queen excluder, then moved them to my new location, and introduced the queens in cage that night. i will go look tomorrow, and if they did not got them out of the cage, i will release them. great job on the queen raising and introducing. next time, if you want better bee retension on your nucs, you might need to move them away. i would sugest preparing them 1 day ahead, with brood and extra bees from your existing hives, and then mouving them away for 2 days , then bring them back. if you have a cool basement, place them in there, keep your virigins in cage, and then 2 days later bring out in the sun, and release. i moved mine 30 mi away, i had a friend who was kind enough to lend me his back yard for my nucs 
with the honey flow that we had here, my nucs had 4-5 frames of honmey in them....heavy heavy heavy.


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## Kamon A. Reynolds (Apr 15, 2012)

Well shoot now your breaking ground on some crazy cheap increase potential. Try not to freak out in a good way haha


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

Brad Bee said:


> Thanks. Hopefully I can get some pictures tomorrow. I hope some of the pros will comment on how they introduce virgins into the hive. I'm going to install them first thing in the morning.


This guy dips them in honey water and direct releases them into teeny tiny little hives then leaves them closed up for a day or three while they ship to an island to be mated with an isolated population of drones...


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## Brad Bee (Apr 15, 2013)

I have no way to know for sure until I check for laying queens, but I think the introduction went well. There was NO hostility shown towards the virgins in any nuc. When I check for laying queens, if I find some missing, I won't know if they didn't return from their mating flight, or were killed by the bees. I read about dipping them in honey, and I didn't want to take a risk of one flying off so I just sprayed the queen down with lemon sugar water, then sprayed the bees in the nuc. I put enough lemon juice in the sugar water that I could smell lemons when I sprayed it on the bees. That might have helped with the introductions, I don't know.

All the nucs have bees fanning at the entrance. I don't know if that means anything about whether they have a queen or not.


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## Dubhe (Jul 19, 2007)

So come on Brad, don't keep us waiting- how are they laying?


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