# Breeding and rasing bees for packages



## Honey-4-All (Dec 19, 2008)

vernonpurcell said:


> I was wondering if the large bee breeders used any systems for rearing bees in large quantity's other than splitting hives.


The bottom line is that "It takes bees to make bees" no matter what system one uses.


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## vernonpurcell (Jun 1, 2014)

Honey-4-All said:


> The bottom line is that "It takes bees to make bees" no matter what system one uses.


What an observation LMAO


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## burns375 (Jul 15, 2013)

Package production requires alot of bees. Producers rear queens, mate them and unite them with random bees shaken from hives. Its that simple, right?


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

burns375 said:


> Package production requires alot of bees. Producers rear queens, mate them and unite them with random bees shaken from hives. Its that simple, right?


Ha! Easier said than done.


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## drlonzo (Apr 15, 2014)

vernonpurcell said:


> I was wondering if the large bee breeders used any systems for rearing bees in large quantity's other than splitting hives.


If you're speaking of package production, most large scale producers start very early in the year feeding their bees constantly to get them to produce bees in quantity. Those bees then are shaken from the hive and used to make packages with the queens they raise or buy from breeders.

If you're speaking of making NUC's to sell, again sort of the same process only you pull complete frames to use bees/brood and either let them make a queen or drop a queen cell in. 

As Michael Palmer suggests, it's easier said than done.
It requires practice, patience, and lots of work to get it right. Responsible producers have many things other than just making bees to worry with, like getting the propper queen stock, evaluation of hives, etc. 

The best way to truly learn the entire process is to learn from a person that has already done it and knows what they are doing.


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## Honey-4-All (Dec 19, 2008)

vernonpurcell said:


> I was wondering if the large bee breeders used any systems for rearing bees in large quantity's other than splitting hives.


What exactly is the question? Still scratching my head...... 


Hate to play the dumb Yankee here but I guess I can go ahead and play the part while blaming the ignorance on the ever prevalent Turkey overdose occurring "across the pond" from you on this our 393rd Thanksgiving day. 

One of the few days each year in the US when the freeways are full of people merrily forgetting the cares of the world to reflect on the blessing we have been provided with. 




Are you asking how big beeks make up increase other than splits?

If so I would say that making them up with packages would be the most used alternative!


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## Mbeck (Apr 27, 2011)

I'm guessing.

He wants to know the exact methods employed by bee breeders ( those that raise and sell bees and queens) example.. You^^^ . How are hives managed to produce lots of brood continuously? 

Another guess. Your answer will involve talk of experience, hard work , proper nutrition, blah blah. If I may allow the tryptophan (a limiting amino acid) to do the talking I'd prefer to hear an easier way maybe a shortcut or about a magic bee potion.


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## kilocharlie (Dec 27, 2010)

Operations do vary, and there are many ways to make queens, and several ways to make drones.

One method, probably most common to larger operations, is that they use some version of Doolittle's method, grafting, as well as or instead of splitting, because it is faster than most other methods.

So many ways to skin a kitty cat, though.


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## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

Not sure of the question, when I split a hive, the quantity of bees per hive drops.....


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## burns375 (Jul 15, 2013)

Michael Palmer said:


> Ha! Easier said than done.


I don't know what your talking about....its a piece of cake michael???!!!!..... its so easy anybody can do it ....jk I was playing off purcells sarcasism in a previous "What an observation LMAO", apparently it didn't work

I can barely produce a handful of nucs let alone produce packages. The main challenge with packages, are they raised so early in the year everything has got to come happen like a well oil machine...that includes mother nature.


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

"Raising bees for packages..." Package producers seem to be a little bit on the secretive side when it comes to exactly how they do what they do - but I've wondered the same thing and I've been trying to glean what information I can on the subject for a long time. So here is what I *think *I know about producing bulk bees - queen production is pretty well covered in numerous threads in this forum.

I think that package producers and almond pollinators share a good bit of their practices - they both need large populations of bees as early as possible.

They tend to raise bees in areas with mild winters.

They feed lots of protein supplement to encourage brood production.

They do everything they can to have healthy bees and productive hives - especially manage diseases and parasites and ensure abundant nutrition.

The whole process begins months before bees are harvested.

There are apparently different methods used to harvest bulk bees - some operations find the queens before shaking bees - and I think a few use bee repellent and a smoker to push bees through a queen excluder. I know that both practices have been mentioned on beesource.

The bulk bees are weighed into a cage and packaged up along with a caged queen and a can of syrup.

I don't suspect that there is any real secret ingredient involved - basically keep your bees healthy and well fed - then feed all the pollen sub that is productive for your bees in your location. It's the same things I try to do to be able to split out spring nucs for sale. Basic as it sounds - it's still easier said than done.

I actually hope that some bee producers chime in to tell me what parts of this I have wrong.


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## kilocharlie (Dec 27, 2010)

You get a "peek" at the processes as of a number of years ago in Harry H. Laidlaw's book, Contemporary Queen Rearing, available through Dadant & Sons. Not explicitly for package production, but there is a number of setups that are not "back yard" operations.


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## vernonpurcell (Jun 1, 2014)

I am new to beekeeping.
What i noticed is that when I put my swarm that I had in early summer, into a fresh hive and new foundation, within 8 days they had drawn out all the brood comb and the supers, that got me thinking great wax production, now if you waited for the queen to lay it up, and then transfer it to another hive, and carried on the process, you would sacrifice honey production from that hive, but it could produce a lot of bees.


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## Honey-4-All (Dec 19, 2008)

vernonpurcell said:


> I am new to beekeeping.
> What i noticed is that when I put my swarm that I had in early summer, into a fresh hive and new foundation, *within 8 days they had drawn out all the brood comb and the supers,* ..............


How many tires did you bust carrying that thing home? WoW!!!!!!!!


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## kilocharlie (Dec 27, 2010)

David Laferney gives a few good guesses, and I would add, " First of all, become an excellent beekeeper." How do you know when you have become excellent? You end up with excess bees and honey (almost) every year.

I strongly agree with the part about treating diseases and pests. An IPM pest / disease program tends to give a beekeeper an apiary with more and larger colonies. I'd also recommend starting a yard of treatment-free bees for it's advantages in the long run AFTER you have established a strong apiary using IPM. As the game keeps changing, you don't know which method will pay off each year, or in the long run, so run both.

Many of the larger operations started a generation or more before the current operators, so the knowledge was handed down and expanded upon. A habit of producing excess bees tends to force one to come up with some method of obtaining profit from the excesses, and perhaps maximizing profit-to-effort ratio. 

To David's list, I'd also add some things brutally obvious: I'd almost guarantee you that they own a flatbed truck or 2 (or 5...); they also have at least one forklift; they have either shaker boxes or smoke-up systems (meant to include bee repellents); they keep detailed calendars and probably notebooks; they know when moving bees is cheaper than feeding bees and vicea-versa; they've tried lots of different ideas, and know what works best for them in many situations; they have mastered some form of queen rearing - most likely grafting.

Apologies for stating the obvious, but the ideas about great numbers of bees do tend to follow certain tendencies. I see almost zero large operations without the above-mentioned tendencies, nor any that formed up overnight an instant success.


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## cheezer32 (Feb 3, 2009)

Search on YouTube for, "a year in the life of an apiary" I think it's episodes 4.2 and 4.3 that go over queen rearing and package production. Very old series (1993 I think) but in m opinion one of the best complete series out there. I'd watch the whole series. I personal watch I all the time.


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## dsegrest (May 15, 2014)

Honey-4-All said:


> What exactly is the question? Still scratching my head......
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Are you sure that was turkey you were smoking.


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## vernonpurcell (Jun 1, 2014)

I dont smoke, but I think I will start, I need an ounce of what are you smoking


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## vernonpurcell (Jun 1, 2014)

Thanks a lot will look at them this evening


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## kilocharlie (Dec 27, 2010)

Who's that turkey smoking What? I Don't Know. He's on third, and I Don't Give A Darn is our shortstop, right, Abbott?


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## Sasha (Feb 22, 2005)

Do what they do when they swarm. They swarm when they have a lot of necatar and pollen comming in, and when there is a lot of brood. A good young queen with great brood pattern. Healthy bees, well managed varroa issues, no other diseases. I would want a lot of bees so would probably work with the yellow, Italian bee, which broods until they either die of hunger or swarm out. You might notice that I dont like the yellow bee too much.
In the end it is basic beekeeping. No matter what you do with bees, queen production, pollination, honey - it all comes to healthy numerous bees you want. For the rest, professional secrets, I doubt big players will easily reveal them online. I could be wrong of course.


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## vernonpurcell (Jun 1, 2014)

kilocharlie said:


> Who's that turkey smoking What? I Don't Know. He's on third, and I Don't Give A Darn is our shortstop, right, Abbott?


He only bought an 1/8 th


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## vernonpurcell (Jun 1, 2014)

Okay then, who is the biggest producer of package bees in the USA?


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## thebeemanuk (Oct 16, 2014)

I have read this thread and also the same on the UK forum.
Breeding Queens by the 1000s and producing Package bees. Each producer have there own systems in place and best practice to produce quality bees & Queens. These are really things that take years and not a few weeks or months nor can they be explained fully in a few paragraphs and would probably fill a library of books. As a starting point you need to start with bees lots of bees that you can start your selection process from. If you do not your criteria for selection yet that is the place you need to start.


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## vernonpurcell (Jun 1, 2014)

thebeemanuk said:


> I have read this thread and also the same on the UK forum.
> Breeding Queens by the 1000s and producing Package bees. Each producer have there own systems in place and best practice to produce quality bees & Queens. These are really things that take years and not a few weeks or months nor can they be explained fully in a few paragraphs and would probably fill a library of books. As a starting point you need to start with bees lots of bees that you can start your selection process from. If you do not your criteria for selection yet that is the place you need to start.


Hi Beeman, I have talked to you over the phone, a few weeks back, about buying queens from you.
Now I already have my own idea, but just because I thought about it, that doesn't make it the best system, but this is what I was thinking.
Purchase your queens
Put them in to 4 mating boxes, that I will make to form 1 brood box
Put 2 nuc boxes above the 4 mating hives with a excluder, these nucs will be able take a mating hive frames and regular frames, so I can bring up frames of brood, and keep the queens laying at full capacity, then change the mating hive to nucs, I will be able to bring the frames up over the excluder from the mating hive. Dont know if I make any sense?


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## thebeemanuk (Oct 16, 2014)

As clear as mud.
If its a case of making nucs as fast as you can but keeping costs low
how about doing simple splits in to 3 frame nucs and adding a virgin queen. When she is mated transfer the 3 frames to a five frame nuc or full size brood if the weather is on your side and feed feed feed. Do you have a large stock of bees to get started?


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## vernonpurcell (Jun 1, 2014)

I have only 2 hives, thats why I was going to use mating boxes, so as to use the smallest amount of bees to get the maximum number of mating hives out of them


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## thebeemanuk (Oct 16, 2014)

I would wait awhile and build up your hive numbers by doing splits until you have a firm foundation to start from. As all you would be doing is risking losing your 2 hives


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## vernonpurcell (Jun 1, 2014)

thebeemanuk said:


> I would wait awhile and build up your hive numbers by doing splits until you have a firm foundation to start from. As all you would be doing is risking losing your 2 hives


I was also thinking about buying some packages to boost the numbers up, I have just almost finished building my workshop and had my woodworking machines installed, bit cold at the moment no heating in it yet, what the weather up by you like at the moment, we are at 4 degrees here at Gatwick


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## Phoebee (Jan 29, 2014)

vernonpurcell said:


> I am new to beekeeping.
> What i noticed is that when I put my swarm that I had in early summer, into a fresh hive and new foundation, within 8 days they had drawn out all the brood comb and the supers, that got me thinking great wax production, now if you waited for the queen to lay it up, and then transfer it to another hive, and carried on the process, you would sacrifice honey production from that hive, but it could produce a lot of bees.


The difference with a swarm is that it was the bees' idea. They gouged on honey, slimmed down the old queen to fly, and are otherwise single-hive-mindedly intent on setting up a new home. The swarm wants to deposit all that honey in their crops into comb, so they have to build fast. 

Package bees were happily doing their bee thing when somebody unceremoniously shook them into a box and stuck some strange caged queen in with them. Fortunately they usually adapt to the trick. They are starting without actual honey to store. 

I personally prefer nucs.


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## kilocharlie (Dec 27, 2010)

Congrats on setting up shop, VP! That's a BIG step in the right direction. If you figure out a way to heat it, and spend the winter making equipment, you'll be able to take advantage of any positives (splits, swarms, free colonies, closeout prices, etc.) that the bees or other beekeepers give you.

I have to agree with Phoebee of Manassas, VA, though. Nuc's sure increase faster than packages do, and the percentage of successful colonies are usually better, too. Plus, they don't miss early nectar/pollen flows because they build up so much more quickly. It's a BIG difference in a bad year - nuc's grow to 50,000 bees before summer and make it through the next winter in good numbers, ready for production. Packages stumble, get going to 30,000 bees at the end of summer and have to be fed and care for, the weak ones end up getting combined with stronger colonies. Lots of them aren't there next spring.

I like buying a whole colony best of all. I get lots of equipment in the deal, I can breed from them right away, I can split them or make nuc's, and use enough bees for the increaser colonies, as appropriate for my area. I may make 1 whole colony into 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6 increaser nuc's, depending on the nectar flow, time of year, etc. It usually works out cheaper than buying that many nuc's, especially larger colonies. I do have to have the equipment ready, though.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>The difference with a swarm is that it was the bees' idea. They gouged on honey, slimmed down the old queen to fly, and are otherwise single-hive-mindedly intent on setting up a new home. The swarm wants to deposit all that honey in their crops into comb, so they have to build fast. 

I think Deknow said something on the lines of: "a swarm is like you and your friends get together and move to the country to start an organic farm and grow your own food. A package is like a busload of strangers breaks down in a remote area and they have to grow their own food or starve..."


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## shinbone (Jul 5, 2011)

Michael Bush said:


> >I think Deknow said something on the lines of: "a swarm is like you and your friends get together and move to the country to start an organic farm and grow your own food. A package is like a busload of strangers breaks down in a remote area and they have to grow their own food or starve..."


Awesome!


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## mbc (Mar 22, 2014)

thebeemanuk said:


> I have read this thread and also the same on the UK forum


Link?
Afaik most packages in the UK are imported, and that source might dry up with shb in Italy now.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Awesome!

I think he said it slightly better than my poor attempt to quote him... but I think the picture fits. Maybe he will chime in.


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## thebeemanuk (Oct 16, 2014)

mbc said:


> Link?
> Afaik most packages in the UK are imported, and that source might dry up with shb in Italy now.



Yippeeeee  To the part about the source drying up


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## mbc (Mar 22, 2014)

thebeemanuk said:


> Yippeeeee  To the part about the source drying up


Well yes, if it happens.
I wander if this will create an opening for a uk supplier to force their bees early enough to shake packages in time for apple pollination, the earliest I've done it is at winter sown, spring flowering osr(canola) petal fall, already too late to pollinate apples.


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## mbc (Mar 22, 2014)

Honey-4-All said:


> The bottom line is that "It takes bees to make bees" no matter what system one uses.


This. 
Bees need a critical mass to be able to expand to their potential, split them below this critical mass and you set them back. For my bees in my conditions they need to have about six frames of brood with ample coverage of bees to be able to accelerate at will, given ample nutrition.


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

I think it was Sam Comfort who said that.



Michael Bush said:


> >The difference with a swarm is that it was the bees' idea. They gouged on honey, slimmed down the old queen to fly, and are otherwise single-hive-mindedly intent on setting up a new home. The swarm wants to deposit all that honey in their crops into comb, so they have to build fast.
> 
> I think Deknow said something on the lines of: "a swarm is like you and your friends get together and move to the country to start an organic farm and grow your own food. A package is like a busload of strangers breaks down in a remote area and they have to grow their own food or starve..."


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## vernonpurcell (Jun 1, 2014)

Kilocharlie, just installing the AC unit for you, put a few other pictures up aswell.


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## Eduardo Gomes (Nov 10, 2014)

Michael Bush said:


> I think Deknow said something on the lines of: "a swarm is like you and your friends get together and move to the country to start an organic farm and grow your own food. A package is like a busload of strangers breaks down in a remote area and they have to grow their own food or starve..."


At the human level : the same difference between a team and a gathering . Very good analogy Michael Bush.
Implications?? (I think it will be a very hot debate).


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>I think it was Sam Comfort who said that.

Yes, and I'm pretty sure he said he was quoting you... but maybe it was his.


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