# Can I raise a queen in a single queenright hive, before splitting, without grafting?



## KQ6AR (May 13, 2008)

You need more separation than a queen excluder. I've heard of people having success using an excluder full honey super another excluder. then the queenless split.
It would be easier to put a piece of plywood between the boxes, & provide a top entrance.


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## AmericasBeekeeper (Jan 24, 2010)

A Cloake board is another option to get them started working queen cells. Once they are started they will keep going. That is a normal "finisher" hive configuration - queen and sealed brood in the lower super, queen excluder, honey supers if any between the brood supers, uncapped brood and queen cells in uppermost super. The only problem I have ever seen, and it happened twice, there were two mated queens, one in the lower brood super and one in the upper brood super to kill all the queen cells. Double queen excluders do nothing to stop that disaster. Jamaican beekeepers made 25 queens on their first attempt. http://americasbeekeeper.org/Jamaica_Teaching_Trip.htm


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## 100 td (Apr 3, 2011)

I ask because of this from Grant in the first part of the mentioned thread


Grant said:


> Never say never.
> 
> Here's how to make it work. Put a queen excluder in your hive. Make sure the queen(s) are all below and place all your open brood above. The nurse bees will move up to take care of the open brood. And they will make queen cells.
> 
> ...


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

No guarantees, but every time I've put an excluder in between two brood boxes, both of which have an entrance, I've ended up with a laying queen in each.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

Mike: Are you saying that you are first roughly following the procedure that 100td layed out (a queen in one half, a cell in the other) or are you saying that simply putting an excluder between two boxes of brood has resulted in an extra queen every time you have tried it?


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## ashb82 (Apr 22, 2010)

Michael Bush said:


> No guarantees, but every time I've put an excluder in between two brood boxes, both of which have an entrance, I've ended up with a laying queen in each.


what is the success rate of this method


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## 100 td (Apr 3, 2011)

Michael Bush said:


> No guarantees, but every time I've put an excluder in between two brood boxes, both of which have an entrance, I've ended up with a laying queen in each.


Michael, what do you think of my first post, is it possible? *Only 1 entrance*, hang some cells from a top frame, will they make queens?

With regard to your above statement, having 2 entrances is really like doing a walkaway split, is it not?
Maybe that's what I'm doing in some fashion as well?
I thought about the method (in my first post) as a way of splitting but still having resources coming in etc so no real change to the hive, just the hope that the upper box may cap a couple of queencells so when I split they wouldn't be queenless for weeks and the queen would mate and be be laying pronto.


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## Joseph Clemens (Feb 12, 2005)

A double screen board should also work quite well, I've used them to turn one colony into two, many times.

One important consideration is that the part that gets to raise their new queen should be very well populated and supplied with plenty of resources to get the job done.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

I'm not understanding what the trigger is that causes the hive to begin raising cells.


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

The low concentration of queen pheromone in the brood area theoretically triggers supercedure behavior even though there is a good queen in the next box.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>or are you saying that simply putting an excluder between two boxes of brood has resulted in an extra queen every time you have tried it? 

Yes.

>what is the success rate of this method 

I've done it five or six times and so far it's 100%

>Michael, what do you think of my first post, is it possible? 
>Only 1 entrance, hang some cells from a top frame, will they make queens?

I'm not clear why you don't want another entrance. 
If you wait 4 weeks with the cells in a box with no entrance you'll have drone laying queens when they finally mate.

Why not prop the top so she can fly? You don't need cells, they will make them. I don't know how long it takes bees separated by an excluder to decide they need a queen. Obviously within four days, but it could be that long or less. have not done detailed observations on the exact sequence. In ever case I was either trying to get brood to emerge and remove the combs without the queen laying in them, or trying to make it easier to find larvae for grafting or to confine a queen in a Jenter. I was not watching when they started queen cells, I only observed that they raised a queen in the other box and I ended up with two queen hives in every case.

>I'm not understanding what the trigger is that causes the hive to begin raising cells. 

I assume the bees in the part of the brood nest that no longer has a queen, think the queen is either gone or failing because they don't sense her there or have enough pheromones in that area of the hive. It was not my intent to get them to raise a queen in any of the cases where they did. I was my intention to confine the queen in a smaller space for other reasons. Yet they did.

I can't say there isn't some genetics involved, although I don't think so. I do try to breed from stock that can do a graceful, seamless supersedure. Bees that can sense a failing queen and raise a daughter and later dispose of the mother so there is a seamless supersedure with no break in brood rearing.


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## 100 td (Apr 3, 2011)

Michael Bush said:


> >
> >Michael, what do you think of my first post, is it possible?
> >Only 1 entrance, hang some cells from a top frame, will they make queens?
> 
> ...


I just wanted to slip an excluder in between the 2 boxes, and 1 or 2 days before the new queen cells hatch, split the hive in half. I expected the WHOLE hive to be attended by foragers during the time the queen was made up until I split the hive?


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

Interesting, I have to believe this is pretty condition specific though. We have, on occasion, inserted excluders in big doubles to simplify queen finding and splitting and I dont recall seeing this but I will give it another try and see what percentage I get. Also, perhaps, try a few double excluders with a box in between to see if this increases the incidence.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>I just wanted to slip an excluder in between the 2 boxes, and 1 or 2 days before the new queen cells hatch, split the hive in half. I expected the WHOLE hive to be attended by foragers during the time the queen was made up until I split the hive? 

Assuming you put the excluder in and split it 10 days later, this might work. But I'm not clear when they decided to make queens in mine. It could be as short as 24 hours and as long as four days. And in hot weather they could emerge in as short as 14 1/2 days (from hatching or 11 days from queenlessness) (as long as 18 or so in cold weather). So waiting any longer than ten days (it takes 3 1/2 days to hatch) could result in an emerged queen.

If you just put in the excluder and you wait four weeks, they have not only a queen, but a laying queen and brood.


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## 100 td (Apr 3, 2011)

Michael Bush said:


> Assuming you put the excluder in and split it 10 days later, this might work. But I'm not clear when they decided to make queens in mine. It could be as short as 24 hours and as long as four days. And in hot weather they could emerge in as short as 14 1/2 days (from hatching or 11 days from queenlessness) (as long as 18 or so in cold weather). So waiting any longer than ten days (it takes 3 1/2 days to hatch) could result in an emerged queen.


Sounds good, and possible.....



Michael Bush said:


> If you just put in the excluder and you wait four weeks, they have not only a queen, but a laying queen and brood.


With this method I would need to make a top entrance so she can fly and mate. Would there be any fighting across the excluder?


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>With this method I would need to make a top entrance so she can fly and mate.

Two shingle shims make an elegant one. Any old stick makes a crude one...

> Would there be any fighting across the excluder? 

I have never seen any.


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## 100 td (Apr 3, 2011)

Many thanks to all those who have replied, and special thanks to *Michael Bush.*
It *"appears"* that my initial scenario* may* (or may not) work, but other methods have been raised which may/will also work.
I would like to try my initial method of cutting and hanging cells, but due to time constraints, monitoring and travel to my hive(not in my backyard), I may go with a "split without a split" (Per MB) and let them make their own if they can!
Not sure yet, (I'd actually like to try both!)
However, I am very keen on my original proposal
I will go and see about aquiring an excluder tomorrow hopefully.
Thankyou all for your time and effort, please continue the discussion as I'm sure I will have many more Q's to ask.


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## DRAKOS (Oct 17, 2011)

Michael Bush said:


> >
> 
> If you just put in the excluder and you wait four weeks, they have not only a queen, but a laying queen and brood.


I tried this method , twice last year, because I thought it was an easy way to double my hives.
But in both cases I ended with queenlesses hives.
What could it be wrong?


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>What could it be wrong? 

I don't see how you can end up queenless. I can see how you end up with still only one queen. I am doing it during the start of queen rearing season (which is pretty much swarm season) and that may have an effect on things.


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## DRAKOS (Oct 17, 2011)

They were two-deep hives , with the excluder between the two deeps.
There was not a third deep, between the two deeps with the brood.
At first I saw four caped queen cells in every uper deep with brood.
Four weeks later, the queen cells were uncaped, and there was not any brood , up or down.
I waited another two weeks, but again no brood. So I made the two deep hives , singles, and gave to each single, a frame of fresh brood and larva from another hive. Four weeks later I had a new queen laying in each hive.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

Maybe the virgin returned to the wrong hive, killed the old queen and died in the fight? I don't have any better theories, but it seems like an unlikely outcome.


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## DRAKOS (Oct 17, 2011)

Thank you very much for your answer.
I will try the method again this spring.


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## Daniel Y (Sep 12, 2011)

Well I started to post a link to a video where Pat and Jim Haskell did a presentation or class on nucs, splits queen rearing etc. It was a Vimeo video and now requires a password to view. In it they covered making a nuc in much the same way you are talking about here.
It bugs me that I can't see the video now because this was the number one method I was considering using when and if I get to the point of making a new colony. The bees where actually allowed to pass through the queen excluder and function as one hive as the second queen was reared and mated. the nuc was actually a fully functioning hive of its' own before it was moved.


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## 100 td (Apr 3, 2011)

An update on this, I placed an excluder between the 2 boxes, moved most brood and eggs to upper box on one side with pollen and honey to fill rest of box, bottom box had queen and brood on other side, then pollen/honey.
Gave the upper an upper entrance, they capped a couple of queen cells and I thought all was good. Went back and checked a couple of weeks later and found top box full of honey, open Q cells, no upper queen. I would like to try it again, but will probably put a super in between, Queen in bottom with excluder, then honey super, then excluder then brood/eggs on top with upper entrance.
One thing I noticed, they didn't use the upper entrance even though it was wide open. So maybe some bees tore down the Q cells as they were coming in past the queen to get to the top box?


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

The virgin probably went back in the bottom instead of the top. Entrances in opposite directions are helpful.


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## tanksbees (Jun 16, 2014)

3 years later, and i'm curious what the success rate has been with this method.

This seems like a very easy way to raise queens, with little disruption to the colony.

Has anyone experimented further with putting a QE between brood boxes?


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

DRAKOS said:


> I tried this method , twice last year, because I thought it was an easy way to double my hives.
> But in both cases I ended with queenlesses hives.
> What could it be wrong?


It's possible that the virgin slipped through the excluder and killed the old queen and then failed to return from mating.

For 2 years I've been waiting till the main flow is mostly over and using honey robber to push the bees down - then inserting the excluder. It works great - i get lots of foundation drawn out, and any brood above the excluder emerges and the comb gets backfilled with honey.

But, often when there is fresh brood 2-3 boxes above the excluder insertion point they raise a queen. I should inspect for queen cells (when I do they are usually really prime) within 10 days, but sometimes I don't, and by the time I pull honey I have a new queen and some really pretty brood where I hoped to have honey. The old queen is always gone by then, and the honey crop from that hive is greatly diminished.

I think if the process was managed better you could get new queens raised under ideal conditions and a full honey crop.


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