# New Queen Rearing System from ABJ Dec2013 p 1279



## KevinR (Apr 30, 2010)

Has anyone seen a source for this new system?


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## Myron Denny (Sep 27, 2009)

I could not retrieve your message. Will you please send it to: [email protected]


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## KevinR (Apr 30, 2010)

Pins








Back of foundation








Front of foundation








Frame


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## KevinR (Apr 30, 2010)

Curious for a source on the above and the price tag... Seems like it could be a worthwhile option compared to the nicot/jenter. It's 512 cells vs the 110. You would need to built a frame with a back cover, but I'd think it would be possible to just drop the frame into a breeder hive with a queen that is limited to lay on 2-3 frames. Just replace the outside 2 frames with two of these.. come back 3 days later for 1024 non-grafted queen cells...

Much better in my opinion that dealing with nicot/jenter in trying to capture the queen and dealing with that... 

Thoughts??


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

KevinR said:


> Thoughts??


Graft.


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## KevinR (Apr 30, 2010)

I agree... I don't know if I could graft 512 grafts in the time that it would take me to snap off the little pin holders... but maybe...

Always end up rolling one here and there, or smacking them against the wall... *shrugs*

Just thought it was a neat idea, if the price is right and I can find it.. Might give it a shot...


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

Interesting. Grafting and making your own wax queen cups is so cheap and easy I just don't see this going much of anywhere.


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## KevinR (Apr 30, 2010)

It would have to be priced correctly... I'm assuming they sell enough nicots and jenters to offset the injection molding costs.. Those appear to be less ideal than this... IMO....

If the cups and inserts work out to be the same price or less than the JZBZ cups and the foundation is less than 20 bucks.. I'd send them money to check it out...

Only real downside that I see, is what to do with the bees larva in the surrounding cells, but I guess you could just them keep growing and insert new inserts every 3 days... *shrugs*


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## Joseph Clemens (Feb 12, 2005)

I have a bone spur in my neck that affects my hands, causing them to twitch and the feeling in my fingers to fluctuate. Grafting is still, so easy, I don't even consider other ways of doing it.


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## KevinR (Apr 30, 2010)

I never said I was anti grafting... 

But....

How long would it take you to graft 512 larvas? At 1 second per that's 8 minutes, I expect that you can't graft them that fast. I know I can't... I don't know if I could locate perfect ones on the comb at one second per... Say it's 5 seconds per, that's 42 minutes to graft the same number.. 85 minutes at 10 seconds per graft... 

Personally, I expect that I'm probably somewhere between 5 and 15 seconds per graft... depending how good of a pattern the queen left me on the frame. The more hunting you have to do, the longer it takes...

I wonder how fast the people are that graft raise 100-200k cells per year... Would be interesting to compare..

Again, I'm not anti grafting.. I have 50 Chinese tools laying in a bag beside my keyboard waiting to get started in the spring... I just wonder if this is a "practical" solution.


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

Well, you're never going to need to graft 512 larvae, and the device will never, on its best day, have 512 larvae of the proper age. But, if you want to play with it, then do it. My take on these devices is, you do all the setup work for your cell building, and the grafting part is only a tiny part of the whole. If there are no larvae of the correct age in your plastic cell bases, all the setup work is for naught.


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## KevinR (Apr 30, 2010)

Why would you assume that? I know that people, including myself place a frame into a a hive where the queen is restricted to laying on the 3 frames she's given.. I put in a empty frame and come back 3 days later... This "should" have similar results.

I assumed that you did something similar to have a known starting point on larva. Do you just eyeball the larva or do you try to control it more?

As for the 500 grafts... I won't need that anytime soon, but I'd like to be there at some point. I'd quit my day job as soon as I'm making and selling 400 queens a week. *grins* I'd just do IT consulting in the winter months or spend time in the woods chasing bambi.

I doubt this is a silver bullet for making queens... I just believe it could be a step up from the nicot/jenter. It may suck like an open chest wound....


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## Joseph Clemens (Feb 12, 2005)

If I were going to start, even 200 cells, or more, per batch, I'd never "plan" to get them all from a single mother queen (MQ). I like to limit cell batches to 100 or fewer from a single MQ, at any one time. Perhaps many more are possible, or even practical, but it seems much easier, and requires less intensive management, to keep MQs in nuc size colonies, and pull frames of hatching eggs, for grafting (replacing them with empty comb). Since I predominantly use medium size frames, 100 grafts, per MQ, per batch, is a much easier, upper limit.


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## dirt road (Jan 4, 2011)

I have a lot of respect for MP and J Clemens' experience and knowledge. That said, I think it might be interesting to hear from someone who actually knows a bit about the product, perhaps with a little less negativity and more of an open mind towards the idea. Wonder if Jenter and Nicot got this reaction when they were introduced?
I am not affiliated with, nor do I use any of the three "systems" mentioned..
The OP asked a straight-forward question.

"Has anyone seen a source for this new system?"


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## Joseph Clemens (Feb 12, 2005)

I tried searching for the product, without success. I don't have access to the ABJ article, perhaps there is a clue there, that would assist this search.

I wasn't trying to be negative about this product, or the several other products and techniques for raising queens, without grafting. I'll be the first to admit that I avoided raising my own queens for at least three decades, because I assumed that the process, including grafting, would be beyond my ability. I didn't attempt using graftless products, since they are outside my budgets reach. I got desperate enough to attempt grafting, because I couldn't afford the queens I needed.

My very first grafts, were into natural queen cells. I dequeened a strong colony and waited until they had a nice group of queen cells started. I then eliminated all the cells except a dozen on one frame, that were well formed and spaced on the comb. Then I selected my donor comb of just hatching eggs, and as I removed each resident larva, I replaced her by grafting from the donor comb. Afterwards I replaced the comb in the hive. I had 100% success with this method, placing the cells after they were ripe, into their own queenless nucs, where the cells emerged and the virgins mated and established their own colonies.


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

I wonder how the bees are going to draw out this frame. The Jenter has a short simulated drawn comb section that is placed over the grid, so no comb needs to be built prior to the queen's laying. This design is almost exactly like bare plastic foundation, which will require some amount of comb to be built prior to the queen laying. I just wonder what issues will occur initially and in the long term with such a frame. I agree, if its cheap give it a shot.

I have the Jenter system and pretty much every grafting tool available. I consider myself reasonably proficient at grafting, but when the Jenter system works it works exceptionally well. I wonder if there have been any studies done on the quality of queens from both grafting vs the various on-grafting systems. The thing that comes to mind with the Jenter (and similar) is that there is nearly zero disturbance to the larvae during transfer. The only diisturbance is the required 90 deg rotation, with no disturbance to the RJ pool or placement of the larvae within the RJ. Perhaps master grafters can approach zero disturbance, but I suspect that the bulk of us couldn't make such a claim. The question is does the "zero disturbance" of these systems result in better queens? I realize that the bulk of the success comes from the cell builder colony, mating nucs, and drone saturation, but if small tweaks could provide measurable improvements, why not?


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## KevinR (Apr 30, 2010)

I was looking at it from a pure speed standpoint. With the nicot/jenter you are "suppose" to capture and force the queen into the 110 cell area to lay, then you have to release her later.

My thoughts on this product is that it's a foundation that is placed into a normal hive to be drawn out in a normal way. It would just only have one side.. Assuming it's cheap enough, you could in theory get a couple to rotate out.

It's my assumption that I could drop the frame into a queen breeder colony, come back 3 days later and collect the larva.. I know Joseph had some concerns over grafting 512 cells from the same queen. I wonder if this is really an issue, if your trying to put out 100-500+ queens a week. You could just go between your breeder queens on a rotational basis.. I'd also expect that not all of the 512 would be used. i.e. the queen didn't lay the larva on the center/bottom and the larva is disturbed when the plug is removed.

This would allow 5 times the amount of cell/plugs to select from. Allow the queen to remain free and laying. I "think" that the plugs should be reusable, since the "cell" would remain part of the comb.

I sent an email to ABJ for more information on the product, but it remains to be seen if I get a response. Worst case, I think this might be something to be tested on the 3d printer.


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## Myron Denny (Sep 27, 2009)

The "Fatbeeman" has a queen youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RDmhMqMIW8&list=PL6EED6684E5F97742
I want to try this method in the spring.


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## KevinR (Apr 30, 2010)

Yea, I believe that is how most of the large queen breeders do, or something similar... I did this in a 5 frame nuc... But I didn't rotate the combs.. I just put in a new comb and took the old one.. I did it this way to keep the nuc's population from exploding..

You have your 5-10 breeder queen/hives. You just drop a empty/drawn comb in the hive 3 days before you want to graft.. That's my general plan that I'm working toward.


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