# Should I replace Queens?



## lisascenic (Mar 11, 2010)

I'm a newbie, but I subscribe to the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" school of thought. 

It helps that we have a mild climate, and that the bees have a pretty easy life in this part of the country.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

I'm an oldbee and I couldn't agree more w/ the newbee. Fix what's broken. You'll spend less money and time. There may be some beekeepers who requeen annually. suttonbee, do you do that w/ your queencell applications? But I've never been around them. 

Requeen the poor ones.


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

I wonder...with all the talk about queens not lasting even a year. With the "experts" telling us to replace every queen every year...

How will we select for queens that do last 2 or 3 years or more if we replace every queen every year?


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Good question Mike. We won't. But we should, shouldn't we. At least the better ones. We don't need to prolong the poor ones do we? Unless there is a benefit to the genetic diversity, which is something that we are hearing these days.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

I certainly dont claim to be "an expert" on this but every queen is replaced every spring in our operation because its cheap, easy, convenient and the brood break is an excellent tool for varroa control. We rarely see drone layers any more. The question, in my mind, is really more about will she last another 12 months than it is about how shes doing today.


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## Rick 1456 (Jun 22, 2010)

"In the wild" will/can a queen last 2 to 3 years??? The mother queen swarms in the spring,,,leaving her genetics + behind,,,,assuming the hive is happy with her(the mother),,,,,they grow,,,,in theory/possibly,,,they could swarm again,,,if not then,,,,then spring,,,,,,the original mother queen would leave with the swarm and leave her genes+ behind again. Again, in theory, this could go on for 2 to three years,, add infinitum:scratch: Am I correct? 
If that is a good thing,,,I assume it is,,are we eliminating that trait by re queening "cause we can,,,cause it's easy,cause it is cost effective, cause it is efficient,cause its cheap,, etc etc,,,,,," I'm not condemning,,,I'm asking
The thing that goes with that,,,is ,,the drone population from those yearly queens. What's happening there? Like I said,,,I'm asking.

Rick SoMd


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## swarm_trapper (Jun 19, 2003)

Jim how are you replacing your queens?


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## cow pollinater (Dec 5, 2007)

Michael Palmer said:


> How will we select for queens that do last 2 or 3 years or more if we replace every queen every year?


The same way we do it with dairy cows... "we"(dairyman/beekeeper) won't... We'll ask YOU (queen breeder/AI stud) to do it for us and provide us with the resulting queens. The industry will change when the bees allow it on a consistant and reliable basis. Until then we'll re-queen every year. 
One of the things that the beekeeping industry should learn from other types of livestock is how they handle genetic improvement(nutrition would be the other biggie). With cattle there is a "young sire" program where new blood gets tested. Constant comunication between the genetic supplier and the customer about every aspect of the offspring tells us wheather or not we are making improvement or making more of the same. Customers are willing to change management as the cattle allow them to but they need confirmation that the cattle/genetics will perform.


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## Birdman (May 8, 2009)

Beeweaver has one year old breeder queens for 3000.00 DOLLARS. Would a person replace her every year. I would use her tell she could draw soical securty:lpf::lpf::lpf:
If I had a large number of hives I would. That way you know you have a fresh young queen to start the year.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

swarm_trapper said:


> Jim how are you replacing your queens?


While making spring splits we kill the old queens and put in a new cell a couple days later. We try to maintain as much genetic diversity as we can by selecting some of our best and mixing in some breeders from outside our outfit.... but not at 3 grand each nothing against B Weaver. Why not just buy a hundred or so from them and select from them if you really think their genetics are that much better?


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

So, youare finding the queens in each of your, how many hives?, and killing them? Sounds like alot of work. But I guess it works for you.


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## Rick 1456 (Jun 22, 2010)

Are you replacing with artificially inseminated queens? If not,,,I'm not sure your cattle //bees is 100% on. Just MO. Would you breed your cattle to a "happen chance" bull from the wild?? A lot of the queen production is open mating. I see your point ref. "until then" . I'm just not sure the bee industry will arrive where the cattle are in the same way.

Rick SoMd


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## jeff123fish (Jul 3, 2007)

Michael Palmer said:


> I wonder...with all the talk about queens not lasting even a year. With the "experts" telling us to replace every queen every year...
> 
> How will we select for queens that do last 2 or 3 years or more if we replace every queen every year?


I'm not big time heck I'm barely small time but the only queens that I graft from have to have survived atleast 1 winter along with all of the other traits that we all look for.

For me if they can't survive a winter then the rest is useless


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## Roland (Dec 14, 2008)

We replace queens when we feel she is failing. The "Bull of the Woods" claimed (from the 60's) that the best queens where those with a year of experience. We keep a crude record on the back of the brood chamber, and it sure appears that the queens are not living as long as they used to. I wish I knew why. 

Roland Diehnelt
Linden Apiary


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## Beeslave (Feb 6, 2009)

There are to many contaminents coming into the hive and being fed to the queen. That affects her ability to produce eggs so she fails.


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## alpha6 (May 12, 2008)

I replace every other year in the spring and also do a late summer requeening to anything that isn't up to par. Seems to work well and I get two seasons out of the queen. Works well for us. We are starting to do more cell requeening in honey supers in the late summer also. This has worked well and we will expand as we get our cell production up.


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## Elwood (Apr 8, 2009)

I would have to be a lot more committed to find every single queen and replace her in the fall. Besides, some of our best queens this year were on their second year. Queens cells in the supers sounds intriguing though, might give it a try.


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## gregstahlman (Oct 7, 2009)

half of our outfit is new queens and the other half are one year old queens. we rotate our queens every other year and it works well for us. in these modern times of bouncing bees cross country, hives are under alot of stress. personally, i don't think it matters what breed or stock you are running, these conditions are still harsh on a queen. one could avoid many problems by keeping new queen rotation in your outfit.


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## suttonbeeman (Aug 22, 2003)

Roland my theory is long term exposure to mitesides(especially flavinuate and chomphus). I use to requeen about 60% a yr when I wasnt migratory and double queened hives. I usually removed old queen and put her in nuc box..when she got 3 plus years bye bye. NOw with queens at 20 dollars, I purchase some for stock but use cells...replace failing or unde rperforming queens and requeen about 40-50% a year. To requeen using cell I place cell in hive in cell protector in second box....usually have about 80% success. I determined this by requeening dark bees with yellow and visa versa..about 80% of time 6 weeks later color was changing in hatching brood.


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## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

Historically we've replaced as many sd we could every year. This year we've still got a pretty good shot at replacing them all before winter sets in. My crew is pretty good so in 8 hours each guy can find 40-50 queens in doubles. Anything less than that and the process becomes impossible, overwhelming. I prefer young queens, I thought everybody would, they just perform better.

Sutton: What do you do with the 20% that fail when using queen cells to replace the old queens?

It doesn't really matter how you cut it beekeeping is work.

Jean-Marc


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## Roland (Dec 14, 2008)

Sutton, interesting theory that I can not confirm. We run non co mingled, OLD wood and wax, (that had miticides used)some from the 40's, and newer, all less than 4 years old wood and wax(with no use of miticides). They are completely segregated, in different yards. We keep them separate at all time, even in the extracting room. I have not noticed any significant difference in queen longevity, but I will now look for one. I do not mind when a queen dies, but when she stops laying, and kills all attempts to requeen, I get perturbed. Seems like a larger than normal queen losses this year, like last, usually twords the end of the second batch of brood. It usually also coincides with a damp spell.

Roland Diehnelt


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## Johnny (Sep 7, 2007)

Wow, thanks for all the great info! Well, I'm gonna go ahead and leave them till spring. I'll add cells around March or April. That sound about right? 

That's what I did this year, but only about 50% took cause of bad weather. I think.?:scratch:

Thanks 
John


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Don't add queen cells to your hives until you see emerging drones in your colonies for a week. I think that is the recommended time. Who will they mate w/ if you don't have drones?


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## Johnny (Sep 7, 2007)

Ya there was definitely drones. It was right after almond and they were pretty strong. I put them in plum, and forecast showed nice weather. So I went ahead and dumped 36 cells in and of course all of a sudden they started showing wind and rain. So bees weren't flying much, that's why I blame mother nature. 

But all that rain made for a good summer. So kind of a win lose I guess. Anyway thanks again everyone.

John


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