# what books are recommended for queen rearing



## beegeek (Jan 8, 2010)

Next year I like to start queering what books or dvd your other literature is recommended
thank you


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## bendriftin (Nov 1, 2010)

Well I have purchased only a few books on the subject but the best thing I purchased so far has been a queen rearing DVD. Here is the link https://kelleybees.com/Products/Detail/?id=33323331333533383334 Really a good one to get.


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## wildbeekeeper (Jul 3, 2010)

Dr. Larry Connor, Queen Rearing Essentials


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## Specialkayme (Sep 4, 2005)

I would say Queen Rearing Essentials as well. I find his writing somewhat scattered, and somewhat difficult to put into a formulaic way, but it's the best book I've seen on the subject so far (at least at an introductory level).


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

A basic overview:
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesqueenrearing.htm

A video of a presentation of the overview:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZhV9pBCT-g

A bunch of classic queen rearing books you can read for free:
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesoldbooks.htm

One of my favorites:
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesbetterqueens.htm

The book if you want to buy it instead of reading it for free:
http://www.amazon.com/Better-Queens...=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1310528401&sr=1-1

Another of my favorites:
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesqueenrearingsimplified.htm

The book if you want to buy it instead of reading it for free:
http://www.amazon.com/Queen-Rearing...=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1310614777&sr=1-1

If you just want a few good queens:
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesafewgoodqueens.htm


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## Moon (May 7, 2011)

Michael I hope this isn't to big of a request but is there anyway I could talk you to putting the literature you have on your site into *.PDF format? The majority of my free time for leisurely reading is while I'm at work and I've been taking an e-reader that I just load PDF files onto and read while there. If not I completely understand but figured there was no hurt in asking. Thanks =)


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

I have compiled a book, Classic Queen Rearing Compendium, which is available in book form on Amazon and for sale as a pdf download on my publishing site: www.xstarpublishing.com

It has Pellet's Practical Queen Rearing, as well as Smith (both books), Doolittle, Alley, Miller and Hopkins.


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## Adam Foster Collins (Nov 4, 2009)

I'm reading Smiths "Better Queens" and am enjoying it. I really like the writing styles in the older works. 

Adam


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

_Queen Rearing and Bee Breeding_ by Laidlaw and Page


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>I have compiled a book, Classic Queen Rearing Compendium, which is available in book form on Amazon and for sale as a pdf download

My mistake... I only have it as epub right now, which I think works better for ebooks, but I will try to get the pdf there sometime this next week.


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## Intheswamp (Jul 5, 2011)

beegeek said:


> Next year I like to start _queering_ what books or dvd your other literature is recommended
> thank you


Er, well I don't read those books. :lookout: But as for _queen_ rearing I'm also reading Jay Smith's "Better Queens". It's good information. Definitely gives you a better understanding of what can make the difference between a queen and a very good queen. 

I'm reading Connors "Increase Essentials" (Not "Queen Rearing Essentials") and it's good, too. Different. I'm just getting into the nuc forming area of the book. It's kind of clunky reading, but good information in it.

Ed


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## Daniel Y (Sep 12, 2011)

I read Doolittle's Science of Queen Rearing a couple of weeks ago. and that has primarily been what I have in mind when I read others mention Grafting. I started reading Queen Rearing Simplified and got far enough to understand that Doolittle's methods where the foundation of what Jay Smith was doing at the time of that writing. I just finished Better Queens, and it seems to me Jay pretty much dismantled Doolittles techniques after having done nothing but praise them in his earlier book.
First this leaves me suspicious of Jays opinion of a good method even in his second book. It also seems to me, Although I could be wrong and it is only my impression, that his technique in Better Queens has not been widely adopted.
Basically I am sensing a void between what Jay wrote in 1949 and what is being practiced today. I suspect several things may be in play.
1. Jay's techniques in Better Queens are more complicated and may not have been as readily accepted.
2. Doolittles methods do produce laying queens and that they may still be inferior is not recognize.
3. Jay Smiths methods have in time been proven to be inferior or unreliable themselves.
4. I am just not aware of current methods that would still be called grafting although they are not necessarily Doolittle's methods.

I did find the evidence he presents that bees can be a variable degree of development toward a queen very interesting. It did cause me to wonder if common rearing techniques in us today are not producing queens that are only marginally laying queens. I have seen comments of breeders having high numbers of drone laying queens in particular years etc. Jay's presentation on what could be the cause of some of these problems was enlightening.

My biggest question is has more evidence supported his claims since 1949? Has his technique had a significant impact on Queen Rearing that is just not apparent to me do to lack of knowledge of current methods in use? I admit I don't know much about the details of what is considered Queen rearing or grafting as it is applied today.


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## Lost Bee (Oct 9, 2011)

Here is a link to the entire book called "Better Queens" by Jay Smith's in Pdf format.

http://apimo.dk/programs/special/Better_Queens_by_Jay_Smith.pdf

In the following link you will get more free books on queen rearing. 
They are old but I'm sure you'll like some of them, I do. This archive
can be searched for all kinds of stuff. Try it out.

http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=queen rearing

All of this should keep you reading for a long while.

Happy To Help Out


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>1. Jay's techniques in Better Queens are more complicated and may not have been as readily accepted.

I don't think it's "more complicated" but you can graft about as fast as you can destroy larvae and you don't have to wax it to a bar. But Jay was not the only one doing this method nor the first. 
This, is the actual Hopkins method (or more accurately the Joseph M. Brooks method), which Hopkins wrote about 63 years before Jay Smith did. Which is really only the Alley method with new comb. I have no doubt Smith came up with it himself after observing emergency cells on new comb compared to emergency cells on old comb, but the main concept is a rehash of the Alley method with new comb and a cell bar. Of course there are many details that Smith had refined over the years, but the basic concept, as Jay Smith says, is just the Alley method with new comb. Between the original "Hopkins" method and the "Alley Method" I would guess that tens of thousands of queens were raised with this basic method. Plus variations of it such as the Davis method that uses drone comb for queen cells.

>2. Doolittles methods do produce laying queens and that they may still be inferior is not recognize.

Smith's point is that Doolittle's method will produce good queens, but not the best queens. You can sell good queens. You can also sell better queens.

>3. Jay Smiths methods have in time been proven to be inferior or unreliable themselves.

Considering the number of people who have used a similar system and/or written about similar systems, that obviously is not true. But with plastic queen cups and available cell bars etc. it is a simple matter to do grafting without a lot of labor involved. Not that the "Better Queens method" is labor intensive, but the equipment is not already made for you. Also, I think waxing the combs onto the bars is a bit more labor and most people who want to get the same results (all the royal jelly and no manipulation of the larvae) do the Hopkins method (the one that is also called the "Case method" and is in the 1911 version of The Australasian Bee Manual, as opposed to the one that Hopkins wrote about in the 1886 version of The Australasian Bee Manual") or they buy a graftless kit which will also transfer the larvae with all of it's royal jelly and no possible damage to the larvae (Jenter, Cupralarvae, Nicot etc.).

>4. I am just not aware of current methods that would still be called grafting although they are not necessarily Doolittle's methods.

There are many variations of queen rearing that involve grafting or don't involve grafting.

>I did find the evidence he presents that bees can be a variable degree of development toward a queen very interesting. It did cause me to wonder if common rearing techniques in us today are not producing queens that are only marginally laying queens. I have seen comments of breeders having high numbers of drone laying queens in particular years etc. Jay's presentation on what could be the cause of some of these problems was enlightening.

Agreed. I have heard no one saying that the quality of queens has been going up...

>My biggest question is has more evidence supported his claims since 1949?

By 1949 he was 78 and I don't know how many more years he was raising queens.


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## beebreeder (Nov 24, 2009)

I am surprised that nobody has mentioned steve tabers book on rearing superbees.
kev


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

Michael Bush;725005
Smith's point is that Doolittle's method will produce good queens said:


> Easily said, but only opinion. How did he or we measure the difference between good queens and the "best" queens, since not every queen is good or best...and show that the difference is in the cell building technique?


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Easily said, but only opinion.

True, but an opinion based on raising thousands of queens a year for many decades using both techniques.


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