# WHEN to mark a new queen.



## GregB (Dec 26, 2017)

little_john said:


> .. 100% success with re-introduction into 3- or 5-frame nucs with full-size frames, and yet 100% failure - i.e. queens being killed - when re-introducing them back into half-frame mating nucs.
> ..........WHEN of marking. Any thoughts ?
> LJ


I would not ask the preconceived WHEN question which then drives you into a tunnel.

I would rather ask the WHY question because this is what you are really after, I believe.
The WHY does include WHEN, just to clarify. 
Nothing is lost.

And so, one possible "why":
- it is entirely possible that the significantly smaller volume of the half-frame mating nuc creates environment where the smell of the marking paint is strong enough (even after some drying) to trigger aggressive response against the smell source (the marked queen); full size frame nucs are large enough to allow for sufficient dissipation of the smell to not create any issues.

So here you have it.


----------



## psm1212 (Feb 9, 2016)

Are they balling her immediately when you release her back into the mini-nuc?


----------



## grozzie2 (Jun 3, 2011)

I have been doing weekly rounds, just populating one 4-way mating quad each round.

Last year I dilligently marked every queen in the mating nucs as soon as I saw eggs. I had zero problems with marking, and every queen that went thru the cycle ended up in larger colonies without issues.

This year, I refreshed the marks on all the wintered queens in the 4-ways, I had no issues with those other than the one that grew out so fast they swarmed before I got to harvesting the queen and adding a cell.

My first round, I marked 4 queens when I found eggs in the quadrant, same day I was placing cells in another 4 way. A week later when I went to harvest the queens, 3 out of 4 were missing and they had a fresh cell on the go. Exact same experience with the second round in another 4 way, a week after marking 3 out of 4 were missing. I was using the same technique, and the same pen as last year, I mark everything with white cuz it's just easier to find queen with a white mark. Third round I was gunshy, did not mark them in the mating nucs. I used a new pen and marked them after they had spent a week in the 5 frame split we were growing out. A week later, 3 out of 4 of those 5 framers had fresh cells and no queen.

I stopped marking queens at that point. I have no idea what was different from last year, where I had no problems at all.


----------



## Clayton Huestis (Jan 6, 2013)

Do you mind sharing what paint you are marking with?


----------



## little_john (Aug 4, 2014)

psm1212 said:


> Are they balling her immediately when you release her back into the mini-nuc?


Not exactly - they're not actually 'balling' the queens at all, in the true sense.

It was while re-introducing one, that after all the usual touching and smelling and so forth, which looked to be perfectly ok for acceptance - the queen began to descend down between the frames - only she then appeared to have got 'stuck there'. By the time I'd pulled a frame or two out to check - she was dead, with just two or three bees gripping her and stinging away. The rest of the bees seemed completely non-plussed about the whole event.

So - I then decided it might be wise to check one I installed 'next door' an hour before - which appeared to have been fully accepted - she had just walked in unmolested - with bees greeting her, and so on ...
But - couldn't find her on the frames. Then saw her on the floor with - again - just two or three bees gripping her dead body and inflicting their rage upon her.

What Greg has suggested is certainly plausible, but I was also wondering whether a newly-made colony tolerates a queen meandering about, but hasn't yet fully adjusted to her particular mix of pheromones - and so when she's removed and re-introduced, they then view her as being an intruder ? (perhaps the smaller colony size somehow amplifies this perception - much as Greg suggests) So - is it paint, or the process ? (or a bit of both ?)

Next time I stock those mini-nucs, I'll mark half of the queens, and put the other half through exactly the same process (same time out of the hive etc) but just not physically mark them. That might help to un-muddy the waters.

Thanks all for taking an interest ...
LJ


----------



## little_john (Aug 4, 2014)

Clayton Huestis said:


> Do you mind sharing what paint you are marking with?


Blue nail varnish - I've always used it. That and white automotive cellulose paint. Never had a problem before now - and no problems with nucs other than these half-framers I'm trying for the first time this year. It's a puzzle - hence this thread.

*Grozzie* - you've told a useful story there. Think I might stop marking too, until I can make some sense of what's going on ... thanks.

LJ


----------



## grozzie2 (Jun 3, 2011)

Clayton Huestis said:


> Do you mind sharing what paint you are marking with?


I was using an automotive touch up pen, oil based that I picked up at the auto parts store (Lordco in our area). The thing that got me wondering, I used the pen last year, no problems. Used the exact same pen this year, endless problems, so I went and bought a new one. Even with the new one, I was having the same problem. It was getting late in the season, and I needed those queens, so I stopped marking.

Now here's the issue, since I stopped marking and I'm not in the nucs every week, I cant say for sure anymore if the queens I placed are still there, or if they too have been superceeded.

Was my problem to do with marking ? Or was I producing sub-standard cells this year, and the bees were superceeding right away ?

The other part of my system I plan to re-visit for next year. This year I was using a cloak board setup and did 6 rounds using the same starter/finisher.

I know my queen production this year did not work out well for us, but I cannot say for sure it was to do with marking, it could have been any step in the process. One thing I can say with certainty, going to approach it differently next year. I tried to do things with minimal resources this time around due to a shortage of strong colonies this spring, we had a bear incident in the bee yard last fall. I've got numbers back up and will make different plans this winter for how we approach things next season.


----------



## psm1212 (Feb 9, 2016)

Thanks LJ. I ask because last year I marked a queen in a production hive and, when I set her back on the top of the frames, they immediately balled her. I rescued her, waited about 20 minutes and reintroduced her, only for them to ball her again. Never happened before or since. The only thing I can figure that MIGHT have caused it was that I had pulled her out of the hive and marked her in a marking tube and left her out while I went back into the hive to get a sample for an alcohol wash. Altogether, I probably had her out of the hive for around 15 minutes. Maybe that was too long. I don't know.


----------



## Clayton Huestis (Jan 6, 2013)

I'm guessing its not a changed formula to the paint???? I've always used testors model paint. Never had any issues. Thinking it is a pheromone issue possibly. I'd try:

1. Smoke the nucs hard and add the queen back.
2. Cage the queens for a few hours , check for aggression. Direct release if it looks ok.
3. Re-evaluate if these don't help for some other source of problem.


----------



## GregB (Dec 26, 2017)

Well, here is another thought...

If you (I mean anyone in the thread) catch the queen with your fingers, did you ever consider that your fingers could be smelling like.... I donno, garlic?

Seriously, I never observed in any video of a keeper washing the hands with soap BEFORE touching that queen.
And I also mean - do you ever consider washing your hands between working different hives?
I bet - not.

So you work one hive; then other hive; then other hive. 
Catch a queen there, grab a frame here.
Splatter some foreign bee smell onto the newly marked queen.
I just don't know, but the darn bugs can smell really, really well.
Food for thought.

Another reason to use catchers and/or push-in cages. 
At least they don't smell like "garlic", I would hope.


----------



## psm1212 (Feb 9, 2016)

Very good point Greg. However, those spongy catchers could also absorb the smells of the previous queen that you had in there if you are marking several queens that day. I make it a point to smoke mine after every use, but I don't know how much good that really does. I can catch the queen with my fingers, but my fingers are not nimble enough to hold her with one hand and paint her with the other. My many attempts have led to some comical results. I use the plunger.


----------



## grozzie2 (Jun 3, 2011)

GregV said:


> Seriously, I never observed in any video of a keeper washing the hands with soap BEFORE touching that queen.


I wear gloves when pulling frames to find the queen, not because I'm worried about getting stung, but to keep my fingers clear of propolis etc. Once I have the frame with queen in my left hand, off comes the right glove, then move the frame to right and off comes the left glove. I'm catching queens with relatively clean fingers this way. That is a bit of a change from last year, last year I didn't use gloves handling the mating nucs, and often by the time I get to finding / marking the 4th queen fingers were sticky with propolis, and I was struggling to handle a queen correctly like that.


----------



## Kamon A. Reynolds (Apr 15, 2012)

We use Langstroth deep frames for mating nucs 2-3 with a frame feeder. I mark queens with the posca pen and haven't had any issues. I have just been marking laying queens though. The paint has no noticable odor in the pen perhaps there is something up with the paint? I do know bigger colonies are less agreeable to introduce a queen to but I consider anything smaller than a 5 frame nuc game for virgin introductions. Out of curiosity what breed of bee are you working with?


----------



## little_john (Aug 4, 2014)

Tennessee's Bees LLC said:


> Out of curiosity what breed of bee are you working with?


Tennessee - thanks for that question - I had started to write a very long-winded reply explaining why I have such a varied mix of genetics here right now - when I suddenly realised that this MAY be the underlying cause of the problem ...

It isn't the smaller size of frame or smaller size of colony (well, at least not directly) - but it's what I'm stocking those nucs with !

When stocking the larger 5-frame (full frame) boxes - because they are so large, I shake-off nurse bees from several colonies together - and so each nuc box automatically ends up being stocked with a mixture of nurse bees. But - because the mini-nuc boxes are small and require so few bees, I've been stocking them from just a single hive.

Now, seeing this from the bees point-of-view - if a bee keeps coming across other bees which have a different smell from what they're used to - this must cause some uncertainty (i.e. are they in the right hive etc ?), and so they duly adopt a lower, less assertive profile, as it were, and hope that their presence is tolerated. Such bees are far less likely (I would have thought) to molest a suspect queen 'on sight'. (Or should that be 'on smell' ?)

But - if bees are 'amongst their own', then presumably they will still (as a group) be conditioned to the smell of their former queen - and - should any APPARENTLY foreign queen then enter the hive, they will be far more likely to attack her. The only reason they haven't molested the existing queen prior to marking, is that she entered the hive either as a q/cell or as a young pheromone-less virgin - but they may have had only a few days to become accustomed to her smell - compared with two weeks or so of their former queen.

Well - it's a theory ... 
LJ


----------



## GregB (Dec 26, 2017)

little_john said:


> . but it's what I'm stocking those nucs with !..
> 
> I've been stocking them from just a single hive.
> 
> ...


Here you go - another good, potential WHY. 


Booming commercial packaging business in US shows well that a pile of random, mixed, confused bees, in general, will take a random queen fine. 
Otherwise, this business model would not exist.


----------



## Kamon A. Reynolds (Apr 15, 2012)

GregV said:


> Here you go - another good, potential WHY.
> 
> 
> Booming commercial packaging business in US shows well that a pile of random, mixed, confused bees, in general, will take a random queen fine.
> Otherwise, this business model would not exist.


Yes but many feel introducing Russians into italians is harder that Italian Italian. I don't know for a fact just what I hear.


----------



## GregB (Dec 26, 2017)

Tennessee's Bees LLC said:


> Yes but many feel introducing Russians into italians is harder that Italian Italian. I don't know for a fact just what I hear.


Notice - you exactly refer to the LJ's problem.
Don't you see it?
Try intro an Italian queen to a coherent, existing, queen-less Russian colony and we watch. 
Or vice versa.
That is what the typical complaints are about. 

Again, an pile of random, shook, queen-less bees from multiple sources <> a coherent, existing colony (or a pile of bees sourced from such colony).
Multi-sourcing is different from single-sourcing.


----------



## Lauri (Feb 1, 2012)

little_john said:


> Blue nail varnish


I think you just answered your own question. Gluing disks on with super glue will net the same effect of immediate balling, when using Tight Bond ll wood glue to glue on disks has no issues with reintroduction back onto the hive.

I've marked thousands of queens with no issues. I use a Uniposka pen. Not sure why folks try to use everything under the sun to avoid these pens. They work great, paint has no ill effects on queen or acceptance and paint has great longevity when applied to the thorax as long as it is not sticky or too furry as a newly emerged virgin's can be.
I order my pen sets from Amazon and get the finer point than Mann Lake sells. 

https://www.amazon.com/Uni-posca-Pa...1532297034&sr=8-2&keywords=uniposca+paint+pen


----------



## little_john (Aug 4, 2014)

You seem to have missed the point - I've been using blue nail varnish and white automotive touch-up paint for many years - and have never had a problem until now. The only thing which has changed this year is that I'm trialling a smaller size of nucleus box for the first time, which I've been stocking from single hives rather than multiples.

If you're happy using those pens, that's fine - I really do not like them - and will be sticking to what I know works (usually). As for employing a wood glue to attach metal disks ? I don't think that's a very good idea. Cyanoacrylate gel is the preferred method of attachment used in research labs.

Also - if you read one of my earlier replies - the queens were not 'balled' in the usual sense of the term (i.e. killed by heat) - but simply attacked and stung by a relatively small number of bees.
'best,
LJ


----------



## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

I always mark a laying queen when I see her and have never seen one killed by the bees as a result. I would look at a different paint. I don't use nail polish. I prefer enamel pens from Testors, but settle for POSCA pens sometimes because they come in bright colors. Florescent yellow is easier to see than just yellow... The enamel gets removed by the bees less. the POSCA pens often get rubbed down to just a little color around the edges left...


----------



## Gray Goose (Sep 4, 2018)

Hi The Marking IMO is creating the issue, the paint may or may not be the issue. I have had better luck introducing queens when I mix the bees, IE I will order 6 or so Queens and take my smallest 4 hives and make them into "fodder" I make a point to put at least 1 frame from each into each hive I am making up in a Food, Brood, Brood, Food pattern. IE food frames on the outside and brood frames in the middle. So with that said I think you surmised the difference that the bigger nucs had multi bee sources, and the little ones had 1 source. Also Unless you wash your hands between markings the second queen will have some first queen smells on her and the 3rd will have 1st and 2nd queen smells. So the single source mini NUCs may have less tolerance to the "different" hive smell on the bees from your hands, when holding the queen to mark and let dry.

maybe have some alcohol wipes and try to clean off the fingers in between markings, or Mix the bees in the Mini Nucs. Good test may be to mark 1 queen only and see if it is the mixing of queen smells. Not sure a 1 queen marking day works for you but it would be a test.

also I read somewhere 2 different sources of bees fight and they are often finding that in their world. robbing for example. 3 or more sources of bees are confused and just mull around a bit as there are no genetic pre build habits for that scenario. It has worked well for me when Introducing new queens. "well we do not have a queen but those "others" do so we join them" but they are all "others" and do not know it. 

good luck 
Gray Goose


----------



## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

I've been marking queens for >15 years and never lost one as a result of marking. I had one balled about 10 years ago, but she survived. This includes Styrofoam mini nucs too. I see no difference between full-sized and mini frames. I use the sharpie oil based pens. No noticeable smell with these pens.


----------



## GregB (Dec 26, 2017)

Pretty sure all my amateur queen markings worked out just fine - no losses.
Used the push-in cage to nail the queen down (gently).
Marked.
Kept her under the cage for ~ 1 minute.
Released.

PS: in some hives bees really wanted to remove that fresh marking right away - I just smoked the bees and the queen in the cage, and that I feel masked the marker smell (if any).


----------



## whiskers (Aug 28, 2011)

Just guessing, but what if you keep the queens out for a bit longer, until the colony starts to feel queenless, perhaps then they will be more likely to accept a queen that doesn't smell quite right. Of course if you wait too long they might start a cell, and you don't want that either.
Bill


----------



## GregB (Dec 26, 2017)

I have done even more queen markings by now..
Using that push-in cage.
Keeping her under the cage for few mins - a non-issue (I even put the frame with the queen under cage back while I am working other things; then release her when I have a chance later). 
All good..

Beginning to think that many (most?) of the queen losses post-marking have to do with the keeper's directly handling the queens.
Then you are talking of higher chances of foreign smells introduced, releasing queen too quickly, and queen damage.


----------

