# What are Pros and Cons of Nicot vs Grafting



## okbees (Nov 3, 2010)

I am relatively new to beekeeping but, I am starting on queen rearing this year....i chose grafting for a couple of reasons....first it forces me to further learn on my bees, like age of larvae and handling frames without gloves, and i don't have to risk injuring the queen by putting her in the NICOT system to lay. The second reason is that grafting setup was much cheaper, and if it didnt work out for me, then I can always go up to the Nicot system and use a lot of the items i purchased for grafting. Just my logic and hope this helps.


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## WLK (Apr 12, 2011)

Great way to learn and not spend a lot of money in the process, but grafting on a large scale seems to be very labor intensive; am I missing something?


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## okbees (Nov 3, 2010)

i think that taking a morning and grafting cells would be quicker than setting up the NICOT on one day...then going out and removing the system, and taking the cells out and putting them in frames and putting in NUCs to grow. I just took a calm nice morning and played with the grafting for a couple of hours and hope to see good results. I am happy with creating only 100 queens a year, which is only 2 full grafting frames (50 on each). Again....I am new to queen rearing, and definitely don't know everything about queen rearing....and would appreciate any other thoughts.


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## trainwrecker (May 23, 2010)

i have a nicot,got it this year, but i can seem to get them to turn eggs to larva. the queen will even overlay. the workers will clean up and she will lay again. i finally turned her loose and she laying like crazy as usual.


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## jdpro5010 (Mar 22, 2007)

I use the Nicot system. I prefer it to grafting at this time. I don't graft enough to be real good at it. I do still do some grafting to "play" some, but my success rate is a lot better with the Nicot. I also find the Nicot simple and easy to use.


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

WLK said:


> then why do most people graft, or do they?


Yesterday was grafting day. I grafted from a new breeder..a Carni from a batch of daughters I raised whose mother came from a well known breeder. Nice strong yard, but almost every colony had queen cells, this when the rest of the operation has nice strong colonies and no cells. # 17was a very strong colony. 12 frames of brood and the original 2009 green dot. One of the top producers among sisters last year, and needed nearly no fall feed. Never had any cells last summer in her first production year. Two heavy supers so far this year on the spring flow. A beautiful pattern and no cells...even in her second year! I was able to find her...3 story colony and 3 supers..and get her in my breeder box. I marked a couple frames with appropriately aged larvae and took the nuc to my cell building yard. That evening I was able to graft 3 cell bar frames...135 cups...into waiting cell builders. 

Could I have done this with any plastic...all ya gotta do is queen rearing system? Just my very biased opinion.


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## SPRUCE BEE (Mar 14, 2009)

Michael,

Your 5 vsh girls (from either breeder #34 or #38?) I got from you last year are doing great for me considering the weather out west this year. I'm waiting to see how they do with queen cells as the blackberry flow starts her in the next two weeks before I commit to grafting from them. Good luck with #17! Oh yea, hand-grafting #1

SB


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

Advantages to Nicot etc.:
o If you are a newbee you get to see exactly what the right age larvae looks like as you know when they were laid.
o If your eyesight isn't so good you don't have to be able to see the larvae (mine isn't the greatest)
o If you are not very coordinated (and I'm not) you don't have to be able to pick up something very tiny and down inside a cell without damaging it. You just move the plugs.

Advantages to grafting:
o If the queen didn't lay in the Nicot cage and I'm on a schedule, I don't have any larvae the right age unless I go find some and graft (or do the Better Queens method).
o If I was too busy to confine the queen four days ago, I can just graft.
o If the queen mother is in an outyard, I don't have to make two trips, one to confine her, and another to transfer larvae.
o I don't have to buy a queen rearing kit.


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

I don't know about the nicot system, but when I first tried grafting it was frustrating and I was affraid I might no be able to do it because of my sight. However it isn't as hard as it seemed, and after only a few tries I'm succesful about 80%. 

Now I have one of those Optivisors and my eyesight is no longer a factor. Great product. 

By all means try whatever you like, but it isn't as hard to learn grafting as you might think at first.


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

Michael Palmer said:


> Could I have done this with any plastic...all ya gotta do is queen rearing system? Just my very biased opinion.


Not trying to be argumentative, but I guess I don't understand what you did that really couldn't have been done with the NICOT/Jenter system with minimal upfront planning. You did say 135 cups, where these systems (from memory) are only about 90 cells, and of course you can't just open a hive and start making queens. As mentioned by MB, the NICOT/Jenter systems do require two trips, one to confine the queen and the other to pull the plugs. I've run the Jenter system several times this year and have had good results. For me, it realy takes the guess work out of the process - very systematic.


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## JohnBeeMan (Feb 24, 2004)

I think it depends on your goals.

MP is in bee business as an occupation. Some others are 'sideliners' and some of us are just hobbyist.

As a hobbyist I like trying different methods just for the 'fun-of-it'. I have a Nicot system that I use at times. I also try grafting into: homemade wax cups, nicot brown cups and jzbz cups. I have tried dry grafting, priming with water, sugar water, and honey (next comes yogurt). Success rate not very good but I get enough queens for my needs.

Like a jack-of-all trades, have done a lot but expert at none.


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## rrussell6870 (May 14, 2009)

David makes a great point here. It's not as hard as is seems. Try try and try again. The beauty of grafting is that you can graft whenever you want, wherever you want. Nicot limits your abilities and requires you to take a laying queen off-line for a while. Grafting is one of my favorite things about bee keeping. A cold glass of tea under a shade tree in the bee yard can turn a long day into a relaxing break. Just give it a shot... find what works best for you and go for it.


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