# Queen rearing: 100 per month



## hedges (May 18, 2013)

My three flags that go up immediately are:
1. Typical losses during nuptuals hover more around the 30% range.
2. It takes a good 4-5 weeks minimum to see a good laying pattern and know that you have a well mated queen (it doesn't take many people getting drone-laying queens to ruin your business).
3. According to a woman I worked with who had taken an extension class on queen rearing from Marla Spivak, one of the biggest, most common and most serious issues small-scale queen-rearers have is with ensuring genetic diversity. While your projections do account for a large enough number of hives to promote diversity, I thought it worth repeating because if you're not careful those hives won't give you what you need.

To truly reach the numbers you're looking for, you'll probably need closer to 120-130 nucs and a similar increase in your other equipment.


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## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

If you're open mating, you will hopefully get natural diversity. I was talking about this exact set up a couple months ago and the conclusion was you need about 4 times the mating boxes of the amount of queens you want to produce a week. During peak season, you can have eggs in about 11 days, evaluate capped brood 10 days later, that's about 3 weeks, but what hedges says, a 4-5 week occupation of the mating nucs is more likely. Getting started is the most cost in terms of $$ and bees. 
Also, always run a back up. I would have two starters for each batch, give them 30 cells each, don't put ur weekly chickens in one basket so to say. Pick the best cells to go forward, harvest the rest for jelly or use to make ur own increases. If you can make your own boxes, make 6 frame boxes, and use a divider for 3 frame mating nucs, I had good success with a few this year I tried. Good for mating, but I found divided boxes weren't ideal for making nucs, mainly the part where you separate them into their own equipment....


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## BernhardHeuvel (Mar 13, 2013)

I am not a large scale queen breeder, but I like full strength queens produced by the method of Brother Adam. As described in his book: "Beekeeping At Buckfast Abbey with a section on mead making", Brother Adam (Author)

He starts a swarm fever by packing two supers full of capped brood onto a colony, removing the queen, break cells ten days later, waits another three days (hive is packed with young bees) and then introduces the grafted cells. 11 days later the cells get caged.

Approx 1,500 young bees are needed per cell, less nurse bees means less cells are accepted. Because of all the bees emerging from the capped brood, the hive is ready to accept 60 cells. With this method 45 cells should be accepted minimum, but 55 cells are average. 

So you'd need 2 such hives each month plus all the donor hives for the capped comb. 

Brother Adam said queens should be born into paradise in order to be long-lived, strong and healthy. Means he used mating nucs with four combs (half Dadant size) to assure the best provisioning of the queen possible.

Just a hint. I really like the method and the results (on a smale scale).


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## hedges (May 18, 2013)

Yeah, it's worth noting that queen cells will actually be smaller when you oversaturate a hive with them. The bees will use less and less resources on them and you'll end up with small queens. 

We have a QRI (queen rearing initiative) in my county and it's very well run, but if I had a complaint it would be my skepticism that you should be putting so many cells into a single hive and assuming you can just flip it and reuse it.


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## merince (Jul 19, 2011)

I agree with the points of the posters above. Also don't forget to account for queen banks - you will need them if you get shipping delays but want to keep your grafting schedule.


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

hedges said:


> Yeah, it's worth noting that queen cells will actually be smaller when you oversaturate a hive with them. The bees will use less and less resources on them and you'll end up with small queens.


Sometimes small queen cells result in small queens, but not always. On Bee-l Allen Dick made a statement that the smaller cells are a consequence of less bees working the cells (I'd never heard this before)...but what if the queens inside the cells are plenty large? These are from one batch this season...there was plenty of jelly in the cups (you can see this through the plastic cell cups), and clearly the emerged queens don't appear "malnourished".
Note that these are all newly emerged virgins...less than an hour, and all photographed with the cell she emerged from.


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## hedges (May 18, 2013)

[edit] - Made an argument that was already taken as a given. Ignore that.

But the idea of manipulating hives, getting their pharyngeal glands primed and getting them all ready to feed queens is all around the idea that getting those grafted cells super-fed will result in bigger, better queens. Yes it's possible that small cells will have nice queens, but I've also observed a hive with too many grafts in it result in some smaller queens who didn't get fed as much.


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## rob brinkerhoff (Dec 25, 2012)

hedges said:


> 1. Typical losses during nuptuals hover more around the 30% range.
> 2. It takes a good 4-5 weeks minimum to see a good laying pattern and know that you have a well mated queen (it doesn't take many people getting drone-laying queens to ruin your business).
> 
> To truly reach the numbers you're looking for, you'll probably need closer to 120-130 nucs and a similar increase in your other equipment.


Okay, those are both good refinements that I underestimated and will definitely bump up the nuc count.



JRG13 said:


> If you're open mating, you will hopefully get natural diversity. I was talking about this exact set up a couple months ago and the conclusion was you need about 4 times the mating boxes of the amount of queens you want to produce a week. During peak season, you can have eggs in about 11 days, evaluate capped brood 10 days later, that's about 3 weeks, but what hedges says, a 4-5 week occupation of the mating nucs is more likely. Getting started is the most cost in terms of $$ and bees.


Good input and consistent with hedges. In terms of gear, nuc boxes are clearly the limiting factor. No wonders people use those mini mating nucs.



JRG13 said:


> Also, always run a back up. I would have two starters for each batch, give them 30 cells each, don't put ur weekly chickens in one basket so to say. Pick the best cells to go forward, harvest the rest for jelly or use to make ur own increases.


This makes a lot of sense to me. You have a back up, you can harvest RJ, you have cells for increase, and you have enough cells you can pick the best.


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## SRatcliff (Mar 19, 2011)

hedges said:


> 2. It takes a good 4-5 weeks minimum to see a good laying pattern and know that you have a well mated queen (it doesn't take many people getting drone-laying queens to ruin your business).
> .


I've been hearing a lot about this lately. Do you have any links to studies that talk about it taking 4-5 weeks to know if the queen is properly mated?


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## rob brinkerhoff (Dec 25, 2012)

merince said:


> I agree with the points of the posters above. Also don't forget to account for queen banks - you will need them if you get shipping delays but want to keep your grafting schedule.


I am guessing that that would equate to 1-2 double deep hives for the number of queens I am proposing? Allocate for two queen banks.


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## SRatcliff (Mar 19, 2011)

rob brinkerhoff said:


> I am guessing that that would equate to 1-2 double deep hives for the number of queens I am proposing? Allocate for two queen banks.


I'd say the more the merrier. Best not to keep all your eggs in one basket, eh?


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## rob brinkerhoff (Dec 25, 2012)

BernhardHeuvel said:


> I am not a large scale queen breeder, but I like full strength queens produced by the method of Brother Adam. As described in his book: "Beekeeping At Buckfast Abbey with a section on mead making", Brother Adam (Author)
> 
> He starts a swarm fever by packing two supers full of capped brood onto a colony, removing the queen, break cells ten days later, waits another three days (hive is packed with young bees) and then introduces the grafted cells. 11 days later the cells get caged.
> 
> ...




With that approach you'd basically generate a monthly batch of 100 cells all at the same time. If I remember correctly brother Adam's method was designed for one massive batch of cells once a year to go along with his management style. What your proposing is smaller batch higher frequency version. I do not have nearly enough experience to fathom what would be better for me, yet. With your method you'd have wait 3-4 weeks before you could graft and use the mating nucs again. Maybe your version uses less mating nucs than a rotation version but you do not get a weekly supply of queens....

Still going to need 100-130 nucs....


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## rob brinkerhoff (Dec 25, 2012)

deknow said:


> Sometimes small queen cells result in small queens, but not always. On Bee-l Allen Dick made a statement that the smaller cells are a consequence of less bees working the cells (I'd never heard this before)...but what if the queens inside the cells are plenty large? These are from one batch this season...there was plenty of jelly in the cups (you can see this through the plastic cell cups), and clearly the emerged queens don't appear "malnourished".
> Note that these are all newly emerged virgins...less than an hour, and all photographed with the cell she emerged from.


deknow, how did these queens perform?


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## merince (Jul 19, 2011)

rob brinkerhoff said:


> I am guessing that that would equate to 1-2 double deep hives for the number of queens I am proposing? Allocate for two queen banks.


Remember, that the queen banks need plenty of young nurse bees and open brood to take care of the queens properly (and they need to be kept away from the reigning queen) - treat them the same as the cell builders and account for 1 supporting hive each just in case.


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## Dominic (Jul 12, 2013)

What do the experts recommend as far as drone colony per mating nuc ratio go?


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## rob brinkerhoff (Dec 25, 2012)

merince said:


> Remember, that the queen banks need plenty of young nurse bees and open brood to take care of the queens properly (and they need to be kept away from the reigning queen) - treat them the same as the cell builders and account for 1 supporting hive each just in case.


Being able to reliably produce 100 robust queens per month is no little thing. You need lots and lots of bees! Starter, cell builders, mating nucs, nucs, drone colonies, mother queen colonies along with support honey colonies for food and pollen...


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## merince (Jul 19, 2011)

G M Doolittle recommends 2-3 drone colonies per queen rearing one. He also replaces all the drone brood in the "inferior" hives with the drones from his drone mothers. However, if you want to do drone flooding, you'll need to set those up on at least 4 sides of your mating apiary at least 3/4 miles away. So, about 8 at minimum (2 each E, W, N and S)


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## Broke-T (Jul 9, 2008)

I produced around 75-80 queens per week this year, so here are a few thoughts.

Please don't bank queens. You can sell faster than you can produce them and I think it really decreases the quality of the queen.

How many breeder queens do you plan on using. I try to graft from at least 4 or 5 each week so that if a customer gets 10 queens they will not be all sisters.

5 frame deep mating nucs is overkill. Thats going to take up a lot of resources. The bigger and stronger the nuc the harder it is to get them to accept the cell you give them. I use 3 frame mediums and thats a good size for me.

A well fed and populated cell builder can handle 45 cells easy. I use a queenless starter finisher and get great cells.

Always overgraft with multiple cell builders each week. Its a lot easier to throw away cells than to come up short. Don't ask how I know. 

I run a 3 week cycle. They are laying nicely by then and anything more you can't afford. Assuming a profit is one of your goals.

I will try to think of some more later,

Johnny


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## ryan (Apr 3, 2010)

I'd like to second what broke t said. When a cell doesn't produce a queen in a small mating nuc, it is a tolerable event. But losing 5-30% of your 5 frame hives every 3 weeks is painful. In my experience using 5 framers as mating nucs does not work out well. This crusty old beekeeper says build or buy a mating nuc you can tolerate.


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## rob brinkerhoff (Dec 25, 2012)

Broke-T said:


> You can sell faster than you can produce them and I think it really decreases the quality of the queen.


That would be nice, how long did it take you to build the reputation and clientele?



Broke-T said:


> How many breeder queens do you plan on using. I try to graft from at least 4 or 5 each week so that if a customer gets 10 queens they will not be all sisters.


Something for me to think about and good to know the quantity and method others are using. At this point I would try to pick from my best and use them as queen mothers before I'd invest in a high end breeder.



Broke-T said:


> 5 frame deep mating nucs is overkill. Thats going to take up a lot of resources. The bigger and stronger the nuc the harder it is to get them to accept the cell you give them. I use 3 frame mediums and thats a good size for me.


My thought process was this: I would stick to one frame size, the deep. Right now, I have 30 5-frame deep nuc boxes and 5 10-frame deep brood boxes converted into 3X3 mating nucs. I would use mostly 5-frame nucs with some deep 3x3. My rationale being that a 5-frame nuc would be able to weather a queenless period better and they would be more self sufficient. 

Plus the last batch of queens of the season would remain in the nucs for the winter (my area has mild winters) and I would have nucs and queens early in the spring. The 3X3's are easily converted in to 10 frame colonies.



ryan said:


> I'd like to second what broke t said. When a cell doesn't produce a queen in a small mating nuc, it is a tolerable event. But losing 5-30% of your 5 frame hives every 3 weeks is painful. In my experience using 5 framers as mating nucs does not work out well. This crusty old beekeeper says build or buy a mating nuc you can tolerate.


30% loss of of a 5-frame nuc is a frame and a half, which could be the same quantity of bees in a mini-mating nuc, which would be the complete loss of the nuc. I wonder if a good plan would be to use only 2-3 frames in the 5-frame nuc, add frames or a feeder as needed.



Broke-T said:


> A well fed and populated cell builder can handle 45 cells easy. I use a queenless starter finisher and get great cells.
> 
> Always overgraft with multiple cell builders each week. Its a lot easier to throw away cells than to come up short. Don't ask how I know.
> 
> I run a 3 week cycle. They are laying nicely by then and anything more you can't afford. Assuming a profit is one of your goals.


It will produce 45-cell all season, even through a dearth? Redundancy/backup with the cell-builders is a running theme. I would not have thought about that, but would have would have learned it quickly, I'd imagine. I think I will allocate for a 4-week cycle and then I will have room to experiment. 



Broke-T said:


> I will try to think of some more later,


I look forward to reading more.


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## ryan (Apr 3, 2010)

I meant you lose the whole 5 framer after being queenless for 21 days. It's a big box full of crabby old bees with no brood. Even when it works the hive is without eggs/larva 2 out of every 3 weeks. It's a funny deal. It never works the way I think it should. Perhaps you'll have better results. 

I like making up 3-5 framers for all the reasons listed. But not for repeated queen catching.


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## Broke-T (Jul 9, 2008)

We averaged around 75% takes this year on our mating nucs. Sometimes as high as 82% but as low as 50% on a bad week. 

The nucs that take usually have excess brood and that is removed and replaced with foundation. The misses are usually packed with honey so remove some of that and add the extra brood to keep them going.

The longer you make your cycle the longer the misses go without a queen and makes it harder to get them going again.

One frame size is nice. I have a lot of all medium hives to pull brood from to make up nucs. Finding a queen to cage in a 5 frame deep is also going to be a time killer.

I add a frame of capped brood and adhearing bees to the cell builder each week to keep it well populated with young nurse bees. I also feed if there is no nectar comming in.

Johnny


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## Joseph Clemens (Feb 12, 2005)

Rob,

Until now, I hadn't really spent lots of time working out a schedule. I try to keep at least one cell builder running, year-'round. Good for 15 to 45 cells, per batch. Adding frames of sealed/emerging brood, with nurse bees, and removing frames full of honey and replacing with pollen combs or empty comb, and relocating them so the older field bees are eliminated, to make room for more nurse bees. Making sure to always include eggs or young larvae on the frames (to suppress laying workers), and to be sure to frequently check for rogue queen cells and remove them. I've learned to shake the combs free of bees, or queen cells will be overlooked. One overlooked rouge queen cell will undo much hard work by both me and the bees.

I am working on a schedule, which I will share, when it is done. It will certainly help me to streamline my own operation, and maybe give you some ideas for yours.


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## rob brinkerhoff (Dec 25, 2012)

Thank you all for the great advice, this is the kind of info you don't find in the books. Right now I am like a sponge and am absorbing it all. I think it is going to take me several seasons to sort it all out and find what works best for me.


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## Jaseemtp (Nov 29, 2010)

I will be following this thread. Looking forward to doing something very similar to this in the spring. The exception is that I will be running mediums and not deeps.


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## Daniel Y (Sep 12, 2011)

I saved this on my computer from a past conversation on breeding schedules. Michael Bush shared this.
Quote:
I start my cell building in early May, and continue well into July, with the last queens ready in early August. We catch queens every 4 days through the season.

(Note: Queen rearing cannot begin until drones are flying. Drones also need to be old enough to be mature. I need to look up the appropriate age.)

I'm using a schedule designed by Webster, http://www.kirkwebster.com/index.php/5-early-summerqueen-rearing-beginsand published in the ABJ a number of years ago. It's an 8 day schedule, with one cell building chore completed each day. After 8 days, the cycle is repeated. It uses Brother Adam's cell building method.
(article) http://www.kirkwebster.com/index.php/5-early-summerqueen-rearing-begins
End Quote:

Now from the above I worked out a day by day schedule for a complete 38 day cycle.
Note one feature of this schedule is that it requires a single simple task on each day. or at least most of them.

My revision of Michaels breeding system from day 1 to day 38 complete with a new schedule starting every 4 days.
Day 1 Schedule A Set up Cell Builder - What size is a Cell Builder? What is it's function?
Day 2
Day 3
Day 4
Day 5 Schedule B Set up Cell Builder
Day 6 Schedule A Grafting comb in breeder - What is the breeder for?
Day 7
Day 8
Day 9 Schedule C Set up Cell Builder
Day 10 Schedule A Check CB for wild queen cells 
Schedule B Grafting comb in breeder
Day 11 Schedule A Graft - What equipment is needed for Grafting?
Day 12
Day 13 Schedule D Set up Cell Builder
Day 14 Schedule C Grafting comb in breeder
Schedule B Check CB for queen cells
Day 15 Schedule B Graft
Day 16 Schedule A Re-unite CB - What is Re-uniting?
Day 17 Schedule E Set up Cell Builder
Day 18 Schedule D Grafting comb in breeder
Schedule C Check CB for queen cells
Day 19 Schedule C Graft
Day 20 Schedule B Re-unite CB
Day 21 Schedule F Set up Cell Builder from Sch. A for second round
Schedule A Cells Ready 
Day 22 Schedule E Grafting comb in breeder
Schedule D Check CB for queen cells
Day 23 Schedule D Graft
Day 24 Schedule C Re-unite CB
Day 25 Schedule G Set up Cell Builder from Sch. B for second round
Schedule B Cells Ready
Day 26 Schedule F Grafting comb in breeder
Schedule E Check CB for queen cells
Day 27 Schedule E Graft
Day 28 Schedule D Re-unite CB
Day 29 Schedule H Set up Cell Builder from Sch. C for second round
Schedule C Cells Ready
Day 30 Schedule G Grafting comb in breeder
Schedule F Check CB for queen cells
Day 31 Schedule F Graft
Day 32 Schedule E Re-unite CB
Day 33 Schedule I Set up Cell Builder from Sch. D for second round
Schedule D Cells Ready
Day 34 Schedule H Grafting comb in breeder
Schedule G Check CB for queen cells
Day 35 Schedule G Graft
Day 36 Schedule F Re-unite CB
Day 37 Schedule J Set up Cell Builder from Sch. E for second round
Schedule A Mated Queens Ready
Schedule D Cells Ready
Day 38 Cells ready to re-cell mating nucs

On some of the days above I made note of special emphasis. For example on day 1 "set up cell builder" I made the note. What size is a Cell Builder? What is it's function? These are simply pints I added for special consideration. in other words give adequate attention to just what a cell builder colony needs to be. Watch carefully to see if yours is able to accomplish the job.


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## Broke-T (Jul 9, 2008)

I have a very simple schedule that is the same every week except the first.

Week one.
Wed. Set up cell builder
Friday. Graft

Week 2
Friday Pull week one cells and place in incubator.
Check cell builder for rogue queen cells.
Add frame of capped brood with adhearing bees.
Graft back into cell builder.
Monday Make up mating nucs.
Tuesday Move Queen cells from incubator to nucs.

Week 3
Friday Pull week two cells and place in incubator.
Check cell builder for rogue queen cells.
Add frame of capped brood with adhearing bees.
Graft back into cell builder.
Monday Make up mating nucs.
Tuesday Move Queen cells from incubator to nucs.

Week 4 
Friday Pull week three cells and place in incubator.
Check cell builder for rogue queen cells.
Add frame of capped brood with adhearing bees.
Graft back into cell builder.
Monday Make up mating nucs.
Tuesday Move Queen cells from incubator to nucs.

Week 5
Friday Pull week four cells and place in incubator.
Check cell builder for rogue queen cells.
Add frame of capped brood with adhearing bees.
Graft back into cell builder.
Monday Queens in first nucs are now 3 weeks old. Pull and cage queens.
Pull excess brood from hives with queens and give to misses to keep them going. 
Tuesday Move Queen cells from incubator to nucs.

You can set this up to graft any day of week but remember it will change when you pull queens and you need to pull early in week so you can ship to arrive before weekend.

Johnny


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## rkereid (Dec 20, 2009)

Broke-T said:


> I have a very simple schedule that is the same every week except the first.
> 
> Week one.
> .............
> ...


Johnny- thanks very much for the schedule. Makes it so much easier to visualize. 

Your queens were really good again this year. What total number of breeder queens do you keep?

Richard


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## Broke-T (Jul 9, 2008)

At one point this spring I had 7 and grafted from 5 each week. I am down to 5 right now but have a cpl coming in the spring.

Johnny


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