# New queen, almost made the same mistake!



## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Hi, All!

I almost made the same mistake like last time. That is to combine what I thought was a queen less hive
with a queen right nuc. What happened was when I inspected the queen less hive 2 days ago, I did not see the virgin
queen in there. Thinking that she might be another MIA queen on her mating flight, I proceeded to combine the queen right nuc
with the hive. 
Tonight on a hive inspection, the bottom hive where the virgin queen was sent many workers through the tiny
hole to kill off the upper nuc's bees where the orange laying queen and her workers are. Now from my queen rearing experience, if 
they are killing each others then it must be, as I suspected, that there is a laying queen in the bottom hive. So I open up
the bottom hive to do a thorough inspection frame by frame. Then I found the MIA virgin queen which is laying now with
a big fat abdomen. I didn't know that a virgin queen can be missing in action for a day or 2 out there. And now she suddenly
appeared in the hive and is laying too. Once I found the egg in the cells then I knew there is a queen in there somewhere. 
Caught and marked her after giving the hive a 2 minutes dose of OAV on the home made stationary oav gadget that has a 100% effective kill.
This issue also happened the last time with a new orange color mated queen that got killed the same way.
So no more same mistakes learning from my previous experience. Now I have a mutt Cordovan/carnis new laying queen.
Glad I removed the orange color queen so she is safe now. 

Mutt, marked laying queen:


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## Chemguy (Nov 26, 2012)

I had a near miss this year, too.

I had a nuc with a marked queen, but boy oh boy was she small. She muddled along but never did produce much brood. Separately, I made up a nuc from a booming hive and gave them a mated queen, left the new nuc alone for 3 weeks with the intent to combine.

3 weeks later, and after a vacation, I started to get ready to combine but couldn't find the little marked queen, and there were no brood, larvae or eggs. The population had dwindled. I almost went ahead, then something told me to look very closely. That something was the voice of experience that I have heard from many others. Sure enough, there was a new and unmarked (very big) queen roaming the frames. No eggs or larvae, but it was only a matter of time. Because my goal was to introduce new genetics throughout my yard (VSH), and because I wasn't confident that the self-requeened colony would build up well for winter, I removed her and went along with the combination. They're booming now.

So, I experienced and have now learned what I have heard many, many times....ALWAYS look for the queen when combining, even if you think that there is no queen.

On a side note, some IT folk are fond of the acronym PICNIC, which stands for Problem In Chair, Not In Computer. I'm sure that there could be a beekeeping version of that saying, and that it has applied to me more than once.


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## aunt betty (May 4, 2015)

Today I found something different. Doing a weekly check and found the queen in the bottom box and had noticed that gee there are a lot of eggs. On the 14th frame in on a two deep hive I found the queen but it looked funny so I looked closer and it's two queens, one riding the other piggyback. (trying to kill the other)
They both were so long and enormously fat that they couldn't sting each other. Caught the unmarked one and may put her into a hive that I think is without queen or has a sick one. Wish I would have taken a picture but I was just glad to separate them and catch one.

Been using decorative paint pens from Rustoleum to mark queens and get them at Menards. It seems to stay on.


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## texanbelchers (Aug 4, 2014)

Nice save. Now, what is this stationary OAV device?


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Almost 4-6 months ago, if I could still remember this, there was a bet on BS to invent the most
low cost, simple and effective OAV unit. So I took the challenge and invented a low cost stationary OAV gadget using
everyday household items we have available. It was so effective at killing the mites that I thought this invention was too disruptive to
all the old timers selling the standard OAV unit on the market today. So I asked if they would like to continue doing business which they do in response.
After that I just hinted at this new invention because releasing the simple plan on BS will cause their business to close for sure. A $7 dollars light weight unit compare to the
$100 dollars bulky electric unit is a huge difference. Talking about disruptive technology, this is it!


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## tanksbees (Jun 16, 2014)

Let me guess, a hot plate with an empty super placed around it?


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## texanbelchers (Aug 4, 2014)

He was talking about a candle in one post I found, but then he referenced his grand idea.

We (I) have hijacked this thread. Sorry.


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Remember, this grand idea of mine doesn't use
any bulky connection making it very light and
portable too. So the hot plate method might work. But
how to get the vapor up into the hive area?

If it is using a candle idea then can you help me to improved on the
next version 2.0 set up. What is the secret to it? How will it work?
If it is a candle then how to contain the fire? Let me know when you got that one iron out.
Surely, you don't want the whole hive to catch on fire. Risking the $200 dollars hive for a $100 oav unit is
not worth it then. Then the neighbor will call the police and fire trucks for sure. Safety first, o.k.! Oh, poor little bees.

And since this thread is already side-tracked, it is alright to
discuss my grand idea without giving its secret away. Maybe you can figured it all out and make
your own home-made OAV invention too. Then you can publish it without
my concern for the other OAV sellers here.


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## tanksbees (Jun 16, 2014)

So $7 - you need a heat source. Has to be electricity because a can or tank of fuel and requisite hoses and regulator would be more than $7.

Portable, no bulky connections - must be battery powered. Some sort of battery powered heating device. Has to get stupid hot, so probably some sort of imported Chinese product. Large sized batteries would add a lot to the price, so probably powered from a car battery.

12 volt coffee pot, thermos, hair dryer, or maybe a peltier cooler?

You said "stationery" so that's why I was thinking hive body on the ground with a heater of some sorts inside. But then you said "portable", hmmm


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

beepro said:


> So I took the challenge and invented a low cost stationary OAV gadget using
> everyday household items we have available. , this is it/QUOTE]
> 
> Humm, your thinking is too complicated for this set up. My thinking is much more simple.
> ...


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## GaryG74 (Apr 9, 2014)

Really nice photos of the queen, beepro. Most of mine look like that, mutts but a nice darker color.


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Thanks, Gary for bringing this post back on track. We have the regular Italians, Minnesota hygienics, carnis and
Cordovan bees here. I keep the survivor Cordovan queens with 90% carnis drones out there. The F2 and F3 generation Cordovan/carnis mix will
give off some interesting chocolate color queens. The drones are all Cordovan color and some carnis pure black. Like you I have some 80% carnis and 10% Italians queens. 
They are a bit darker never the less very good elegant gentle laying queens as I only keep the
good ones to head my hives. Make sure they are the big fat cells with lots of RJ in it. I saw one Cordovan, a smaller virgin queen yesterday in a nuc hive and another bigger virgin mutt carnis/Italians cross. Five more queen cells are developing inside the nuc hives now. Cannot wait to see what color they are once hatched.

Laying carnis/Italians mutt queen:


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## BeeAttitudes (Dec 6, 2014)

Just so I understand, if you combine a hive with a mature, mated queen with a hive that has a virgin queen.........the virgin queen will kill the mature, mated queen?


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

There are many factors at play here. It all depend on the
number of older bees and the newly hatched young bees. There are
many tricks of the trade that I've discovered while doing my little queen
bee experiments.
So to answer your question it is a big YES most of the time but depending on
which hive is the strongest. Also, the state of the hive at that time. Many times the reverse is true. If the virgin wanders into the mated stronger hive then the 
virgin will get killed by balling. So which hive is the stronger one?
If the queen less, now virgin hive is stronger they will killed the
mated queen either by the older bees or the virgin queen.
If the mated queen is weaker than the queen less hive (no virgin) then
they will also killed the mated queen hive. Now if you combine them properly
by giving them plenty of time gradually then it will be a successful combine. 
If the virgin find the mated queen even though the workers had accepted the mated
queen then she will killed the mated queen. This is the case most of the time since the virgin queen is more 
agile and the mated queen is rather clumsy and heavy. In a strong mated queen hive, the virgin will get killed before
she find the mated queen by the worker bees.
And if you combine a virgin or mated queen with a new frame of bees from a different
hive then the foreign worker bees will killed the queen either way. There are many cases that I have learned from in 
my little queen bee experiments. although many are unintentional. Keep in mind that I have spent many hours through out the seasons on my experiments. 
Many queens had died because of my ignorant. You can repeat these experiments if you like to compare the results against mine. 
But it would be a very expensive one. Each queen loss is $25 bucks!


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