# Bee Experiments.



## fafrd (Aug 22, 2009)

Very interesting set of experiments, DRUR. I hope you will keep us posted as the results unfold...

I saw your comment on your experience with horizontal 2-queen colonies and them being 'hard to work' and I had a couple questions for you:

1/ Can you explain the configuration you used for your horizontal 2-queen colonies? Was it smilar to the 'Tower' configuration described in this BetterBee article or did you use something different?

http://www.betterbee.com/resources/images/dronereport.pdf

2/ Can you say a bit more about why these horizontal 2-queen hives were 'hard to work'? Was it only becasue of the increased honey production and both the need to keep up with the bees as far as supering as well as the 'supers-to-the-sky' phenomenon and the difficulty of managing such a tall hive, or was there something more specific to managing the two queen configuration (as opposed to a massive hive with only one queen)?

I am building a couple of double wide hives and am planning on running one of them as a one-queen hive and the other as a two-queen hive. To help in reducing the height of the supers, I am planning to use 3 6-frame deep supers per row (11" wide each for a total width of 33", same as the doublewide hive body). 

Any benefit you can give me from you earlier experience with horizontal 2-queen hives would be greatly appeciated, as I have no interest in re-learning old lessons. Most of the literature concerning 2-queen systems is based on the vertical configuration and I am convnced that a horizontal 2-queen configuration should be much easier to manage if properly planned.


best regards,

-fafrd


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

fafrd said:


> I hope you will keep us posted as the results unfold...


I inted to, that is why I started this thread.



fafrd said:


> 1/ Can you explain the configuration you used for your horizontal 2-queen colonies?


Bottom with lower entrance, 2 deeps (1st queen brood box), 2 metal queen excluders (with wooden borders, I doubt 2 plastic would keep the queens apart), 2 deeps (2nd queen brood box), queen excluder, honey supers. I staggered the first honey super allowing the bees to enter between the upper queen excluder and first super. Three honey supers is a minimum. I harvested when the super was fully capped/sealed, and then replaced pronto.



fafrd said:


> Was it smilar to the 'Tower' configuration described in this BetterBee article or did you use something different?
> 
> http://www.betterbee.com/resources/images/dronereport.pdf


No, the one in the BetterBee article would be the only way I would consider a two queen system now, and I have certainly imagined one like this article.



fafrd said:


> 2/ Can you say a bit more about why these horizontal 2-queen hives were 'hard to work'? Was it only becasue of the increased honey production and both the need to keep up with the bees as far as supering as well as the 'supers-to-the-sky' phenomenon and the difficulty of managing such a tall hive, or was there something more specific to managing the two queen configuration (as opposed to a massive hive with only one queen)?


Go to Michael Bush's cite here:
http://www.bushfarms.com/beestwoqueenhive.htm
His experiences and mine were about the same. Before any honey supers my colony stack was chest high or higher (also had cinder block foundations for my bottom boards). Then imagine having to manipulated 60 # honey supers that are higher than your head.



fafrd said:


> I am building a couple of double wide hives and am planning on running one of them as a one-queen hive and the other as a two-queen hive. To help in reducing the height of the supers, I am planning to use 3 6-frame deep supers per row (11" wide each for a total width of 33", same as the doublewide hive body).


I would just take 2 sets of 2 deeps or 3 mediums, side by side each set with a queen. Place one queen excluder on each brood set, and straddle these with the honey supers as shown in the Betterbee article. then you are only building 2 modified 1/2 migratory tops. The honey supers then would only be higher because of increased production and not because of the double stacked brood chambers.

I will expound in a later post the reason for my experiment for my massive colony. Rain has stopped and I am burning daylight typing on this computer.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## ACBEES (Mar 13, 2009)

DRUR, why are you buying australian queens? I haven't found any evidence on this forum that they have anything genetically speaking to offer our industry. Many people have cited from experience australian queens/bees are far inferior to stock bred in this country. They lack resistance plus there is the possibility or importing some new disease/parasite. Why not go with queens from Hawaii?


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## CentralPAguy (Feb 8, 2009)

Drur,

I do want to thank you for taking the time to try these experiments as it can only help us.

I was curious what were the traits that you were looking for in your best genetic gene pool. Were you looking for honey production, gentleness, hygienic behavior? Thanks. Doug


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

ACBEES said:


> DRUR, why are you buying australian queens?Why not go with queens from Hawaii?


You might want to re-read my original thread starter post. I began looking for available queens the beginning of December and none were available at the dates in which I needed them except those I found available from Australia.



ACBEES said:


> Many people have cited from experience australian queens/bees are far inferior to stock bred in this country. They lack resistance


As far as being inferior to our stock--Hmmm-I wonder what our friends the Aussies would say concerning that statement. Doesn't seem to me that they are importing our bees, does it? 

Part of my experiment is to put these "lack resistance" stock on small cell and test their survivability. The success of beeks who are on small or natural cell [who survive without treatments] is often attributed to our bees over time, being adapted to the mites and now being able to survive the mite infestations. Aussie bees have not developed a natural resistance to mites, making them ideal for that part of my study.



ACBEES said:


> DRUR, plus there is the possibility or importing some new disease/parasite.


The Aussie bees are already being imported in large numbers. Reckon my 15 queens just might be the ones that bring the new disease into the country? Possible, but not probable.

In closing, I would like to say, that I read through part of the thread bad mouthing Aussie bees. Whether the things stated are true or not, I know not. But this I know, I could not find any queens available to me in the quantities that I needed/wanted/could afford except from BeeWeaver, and their Taylor made queens. Do you really reckon that the Weavers who run 8,000 commercial colonies would import if the risk was as substantial as has been alluded to? Beekeeping and Wars have _'de nada_' in common but I do recall the Aussies standing with us in the War in Iraq [although I would have preferred they wouldn't have], and far be it from me to castigate our friends on such flimsy evidence.

In closing, I would like to say that there is some legitimacy to your questions, but most were taken into consideration in making my decision, including contacting BeeWeaver with regard to many of your concerns. 

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

CentralPAguy said:


> Drur, I was curious what were the traits that you were looking for in your best genetic gene pool. Were you looking for honey production, gentleness, hygienic behavior? Thanks. Doug


In selecting my queens from various apiaries, I was interested in this order:
1. Survivability of bees without any chemical treatments. I guess hygienic behavior would be included here also.
2. Honey production.
3. Gentleness.

In choosing which queen's genetics to use in my massive colonies from my original eight colonies [I will not be using any Aussie queens for this] I will select based upon general vigor, bee populations, brood patterns/with consideration given for hygienic behavior, and finally gentleness. After I have an idea concerning nectar production [which I don't at this time], that trait along with survivability will go hand in hand.

Doug, thanks for your inquiry and giving me the opportunity to explain. At a later date I will make another post to delve into some of my considerations.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## ACBEES (Mar 13, 2009)

Drur, it's my understanding they can't import our bees because of import restrictions(which we don't have for aussie bees). Testing lack resistant stock on small cell(or natural cell) seems to have been already done or in progress by feral bees. Many on this forum are of the opinion the ferals are working out the mite issue on their own and making a come back, so in some sense it works. 

I don't think your 15 aussie queens are going to be the cause of the next bee industry plague, but I do think encouraging and keeping a market going for importing bees will be the cause of the next great plague on our industry. The opinion of many is we breed better bees anyway and the only possible explanation for justifying the imports is almond pollination.

It is virtually impossible to inspect every package or queen coming into the U.S. and it will only take one infected package or queen to make the introduction. I don't think anyone(weaver included) intentionally wants to bring in diseased bees. But in my opinion, if you tease that dog long enough, sooner or later it will bite you.

I think your experiment is commendable, but wish you would explore other options for queens/methods to facilitate said experiment....jmo and good luck.


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

ACBEES said:


> Drur, it's my understanding they can't import our bees because of import restrictions(which we don't have for aussie bees).


Yes, we have all kinds of bad stuff they don't have.



ACBEES said:


> Testing lack resistant stock on small cell(or natural cell) seems to have been already done or in progress by feral bees. Many on this forum are of the opinion the ferals are working out the mite issue on their own and making a come back, so in some sense it works.


This can't be true because our feral bees have been subjected to varroa mites and have therefore been 'winnowed' through survival of the fittests. However, this issue was an afterthought of my experiment on massive bee colonies. I just thought it would be an excellent way of testing small cell on a sample size that could not have developed mite resistance.



ACBEES said:


> I don't think your 15 aussie queens are going to be the cause of the next bee industry plague, but I do think encouraging and keeping a market going for importing bees will be the cause of the next great plague on our industry. The opinion of many is we breed better bees anyway and the only possible explanation for justifying the imports is almond pollination.


We are each entitled to our own opinion, I just disagree. Maybe you can find me 15 high quality Italian queens from a reputable dealer by March 1st and I will consider canceling my order for the Aussie Queens, but do it pronto, it will not be right to leave BeeWeaver hanging.:waiting:



ACBEES said:


> I don't think anyone(weaver included) intentionally wants to bring in diseased bees.


Don't you also, reckon BeeWeaver would just as well order large quantities of queens from U.S. sources if they were available. You also have to consider the AHB problem here also.



ACBEES said:


> Drur, I think your experiment is commendable, but wish you would explore other options for queens/methods to facilitate said experiment....jmo and good luck.


This thread is not about Aussie queens, we have had a thread which bashes them. It is about trying to economically produce large bee populations in order to fully utilize the nectar flow. Also, one of my theories is that is should also reduce or eliminate the possibility of swarming with these massive bee populations. I will delve into this when I have more time. I hope that this is not turned into an off topic argument.

Kindest Regards
Danny Unger


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## ACBEES (Mar 13, 2009)

Danny, Reed Honey has Italian queen cells for sale entire month of March/April in Montgomery, TX. Look for post in "For Sale". Don't know anything about them.


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

ACBEES said:


> Danny, Reed Honey has Italian queen cells for sale entire month of March/April in Montgomery, TX.


Already checked with him, he won't have queens until April.


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## StevenG (Mar 27, 2009)

I assume you've checked with B. Weaver, and R. Weaver.


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

StevenG said:


> I assume you've checked with B. Weaver, and R. Weaver.


Yes. Fact is I have 15 of the Taylor made queens ordered from BeeWeaver.com. I called and Laura was going to order a battery bank of queens to break up. Others might check for quantities smaller than 50. But realize that the Taylor made queens come from Australia. I also spent time on the phone and in emals with Laura concernging discussing many of the issues which ACBEES has raised.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

Thought I would add some additional information. Someone had commented about splitting colonies, apparently to control swarming. They brought up the point that one strong colony will produce more honey than 2 weak ones, which has also been my experience. 

This is part of the reason I am doing this experiment. First by making early splits I will have about twice as many colonies, thereby, hopefully will double my brood production by honey flow time. Then, I inted to kill queens and put the brood of about 2 1/2 colonies into one without a queen. I will wait a week and then kill all the queen cells and subsitute a frame of eggs/larva from my selected colonies so that these queenless colonies raise queens from my best genetic lines. My hope is that this will produce a colony with massive bee population in order to maximize honey production. Also, I am hopeful that by handling this experiment in this manner it will greatly reduce the chance of swarming, since the new queens will not start laying until towards the end of our main flow. Then after the main flow is over I will make splits in June, hopefully giving the splits time to rebound to full strength in time to prepare for our reliable fall flow in preparation for winter.

Any comments would be appreciated.

Kindest Regards
Danny Unger


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## Roland (Dec 14, 2008)

My father was sent, by our Gov't, to Kiev Ukraine, to help Valdimir Ratuchny with his beekeeping. They used a rather novel system. They put a 3/8 inch divider down the center of 2 deep brood chambers. These where stacked on top of each other, with a metal bound excluder on top, and then the honey supers. The theory was that the two side by side hives shared heat and expanded quicker in the spring. Their climate is continental, with COLD winters that change quickly into HOT summers. This set up was designed to overcome the "late" bees.

Opps, they may have used double excluders down the middles, can't remember.

I tried the system, and IF you have both queens, it does indeed work as envisioned. Problems arose when one queen failed, expecialy if the partition is permiable. It was also tricky to work, because you had both hives open at once.

I would think that a variation using 4-6 frame supers would solve some of the problems, but now the heat is not shared as well.

I gave up, but it was a good mental excersize.

Roland


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

DRUR said:


> *EXPERIMENT NUMBER ONE*:
> 
> *INTRODUCTION*:
> During the 80’s I experimented with horizontal 2-Queen colonies.


Excuse me for the misrepresentation. I did verticle 2-Queen colonies [one on top of the other] as opposed to horizontal which would be side by side brood boxes as suggested by Michael Bush. At the time Mark Hamilton [deceased friend] and I did the experiments we never considered side by side brood boxes.

My mistake.
Kindest Regards
Danny Unger


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

Danny:
Re verticle/horizontal: Wondered about that the first time around, but withheld comment. The last thing I want to do is discourage experimentation, but have a couple comments:

Some beeks call an equal division of assets a spilt. A split to me is the taking of a frame or more of brood with support from a donor colony to populate a nuc. Am assuming that your splits are divides in my jargon. No??
To communicate in this business, someone needs to prepare a beekeeper dictionary, and the rest of us USE it.

Re Q replacement in a strong colony: In a weak colony or in the early season, Q loss results in few emergency cells. But in strong colonies, later in the season when young brood is scattered, E cells are all over. Have seen 20 or more. To insure survival of your added foreign Q you must take out ALL the E cells - They prefer their own to the added foreigner. It's not easy to remove all the competition. Some are tucked away in hiding places.
Forwarned is forarmed.

Walt


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

wcubed said:


> Danny:
> Re verticle/horizontal: Wondered about that the first time around, but withheld comment. The last thing I want to do is discourage experimentation, but have a couple comments:


You should have said something earlier, upon re-reading my post I felt like an idiot. Like the guy that gets home late in the evening and his fly is open. Constructive criticism is welcome and also those which correct a statement or obvious error. Also, I notice that since my accident my brain doesn't always function as sharp as I would like.



wcubed said:


> Some beeks call an equal division of assets a spilt. A split to me is the taking of a frame or more of brood with support from a donor colony to populate a nuc. Am assuming that your splits are divides in my jargon. No??


I will try to 'divide' and apportion resources as equally as possible, thereby giving all an equal chance.



wcubed said:


> To communicate in this business, someone needs to prepare a beekeeper dictionary, and the rest of us USE it.


Good idea but then someone must use it, but thanks for the opportunity to clarify.



wcubed said:


> To insure survival of your added foreign Q you must take out ALL the E cells - They prefer their own to the added foreigner. It's not easy to remove all the competition. Some are tucked away in hiding places.
> Forwarned is forarmed.


Last summer, after making a 'split' in advance of an ordered "Zia Queen", I destroyed 'all' the queen cells after the colony had been queenless for about a week, thereby destroying the hope of the colony of raising their own. I had pulled the queen and most of the brood and bees and moved them to a different location, leaving mostly sealed brood [although there were some eggs and larva] and the foragers to accept the new queen. However, there was a drone frame which I did not check at the time I went back to destroy all the queen cells. The colony did not accept the Zia queen and upon inspection I found the queen cells on the drone frame [2-3 as I can recall]. My first time to use drone frames, and I suppose that the workers can transfer eggs to the larger celled frames [as I am on all small cell frames] in order to raise queens. I wonder if anyone else has had this happen to them? 

I haven't had a lot of experience in raising my own queens as when I previously kept bees I always 'requeened' late summer/early fall with young midnight queens. But, I am just guessing that one might have better luck getting a queen accepted with younger and emerging bees as opposed to the older forager bees. In pondering my loss of the Zia queen, I also wondered if I shouldn't have left the queen in the original location with the foragers, and let young and emerging bees to release the queen [moved to another site]. In hindsight I also would not have moved the drone frame with the 'split'. Your input would be appreciated.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

>Some beeks call an equal division of assets a spilt. A split to me is the taking of a frame or more of brood with support from a donor colony to populate a nuc. Am assuming that your splits are divides in my jargon. No??

The words "split" and "divide" are essentially synonymous according to multiple dictionaries.


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

A D...Understand the problem, but let's not derail DRUR's experiment thread with a tangent. He made it plain what split means to him. Open a new thread on the subject. I would be interested in the discussion. 
Walt


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

Nothing to discuss.


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

Danny:
Not to preemp your experiment, but it is definately possible to build a super producer. I did it by combining two normal sized clusters, with a full super of honey in between in the early season. The super of honey for semi-isolation of the queens - no excluder. The excess honey at the top led to most swarming, but two colonies exceeded expectations. One produced 15 supers and the other 16, with a couple of mediums in the stack of shallows. Have a picture of myself on a ladder removing some supers from the 15 unit, bees and all to another unit on that trailer where I had fractured their single supersedure cell.

Be careful what you wish for. Thought I had reached the law of diminishing returns and abandoned that concept. Ladder supering is not fun.

Walt


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

wcubed said:


> Be careful what you wish for. Thought I had reached the law of diminishing returns and abandoned that concept. Ladder supering is not fun. but two colonies exceeded expectations. One produced 15 supers and the other 16, with a couple of mediums in the stack of shallows.


Well I am wishing, . WOW, That's about twice as much as I ever produced even with 2 queen operations, or bees on a trailer moving to different locations. Most productive flow I have ever been on was 30 [unfortunately only 5 were mine] colonies on about 30 acres of Hubam clover. About every 5 days had another medium super of honey, drawn from foundation and fully capped. You could work these bees naked if you you were so inclined. All they wanted was that Hubam clover. Unfortunately it only lasted about 3 weeks and then the farmer turned it under [while still in bloom] for green manure. This stuff was thick stemmed and about 7+ feet tall and covered with blooms from about 2 feet off the the ground to the tip top.



wcubed said:


> The excess honey at the top led to most swarming, Walt


Walt, swarming is a primary consideration in allowing colonies to reach massive populations. It is my hope, that by being queenless, and having to raise a queen, that it will increase honey production since there is not brood to raise, and limit swarming since there is no queen to lay swarm cells. 

Also, these large colonies should raise the best possible queens from the provided genetics. It is my hope to join the colonies [killing the queens or placing them in splits from other colonies] about the 1st or 2nd week in April. I will then destroy all queen cells after 1 week, and introduce a frame of eggs and larva. Few days later I will destroy the more advanced queen cells [emergency cells], infavor of those from eggs from day one, hopefully getting the best possible queen.

If this works out like I hope, My populations should be about 50,000 emerged bees 1st week after combine + another 50,000 2nd week. This should make my populations in excess of 100,000 bees [counting the populations already in existence].


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

Danny:
An interesting side note on the super producers: The foragers had a unique coming and going pattern. Incoming qued up on approach by slowing up, maybe 6 feet away, and formed a band of almost solid bees almost the size of the entry. This band of bees hit the entry almost like a solid stream just about the right size to enter. Out going foragers came out the entry at the top of the opening, upside down, and crawled up the face of the bottom box to get airbourn above the incoming stream.

Have mentioned forager one-way traffic in other respects, but this is another example of that trait. When you see this traffic pattern, you have a super producer.

Walt


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

Re-read your post and might add another note: Inducing a brood break may be all swarm prevention needed. The comb honey producers do that when they intend to deliberately overcrowd colonies. I suspect (without confirmation) that the brood break of 10 days simulates the brood break of swarming or supersedure and does change the colony motivation.

Walt


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## Cordovan Italian Bee (Oct 27, 2009)

About mite tests, we are going to do a mite test study this summer. We are going to feed one hive garlic in sugar water. I have heard for a long time if people take garlic it repels mosquitoes. I hear if you spray it on your garden it keeps the bugs off. Maybe it will repel mites off of bees, if they will drink it, I doubt it will kill them or harm them.

Also we keep paper with Vaseline on it on the screen on the bottoms of our stands. A lot of the mites fall though the screened bottoms and get stuck on the paper. It kills them and keeps them from getting back in the hives.


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

I don't know if I should even comment here, but I will. 

The Alberta Beekeepers Commission recently spent tens of thousands of dollars on an useless garlic study. Garlic has been proven to keep the vampires and werewolves away (nobody has seen any lately) but has _no_ efficacy _in a beehive_ for anything except producing honey-flavoured barbecue sauce. 

What can be demonstrated in a lab setting or a test tube has little bearing on what happens in a hive. There are many things which show anti-bacterial and anti-mite action in a lab which cannot be practically deployed in a hive.

As for inducing a brood break in producing hives, I read that when I was young and gullible and I tried it. I proved quite clearly to myself that hives with brood in all stages produce far better than hives without and also that hives dequeened temporarily in mid-season do not winter well.

I was the world's largest producer of Ross Rounds for years and never dequeened hives or caused a brood break after splitting season (May/early June) and that was unavoidable and was a short as practicable. Experience quickly proved to me that queenlessness, whether short term or long term, is destructive to production -- and can cause headaches.

Excessive and novel manipulations are IMO one of the major reasons that many have health problems in their hives while those who merely provide plenty of room well in advance of need and keep good laying queens heading their hives have much less trouble.


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## Cordovan Italian Bee (Oct 27, 2009)

>I don't know if I should even comment here, but I will. 

The Alberta Beekeepers Commission recently spent tens of thousands of dollars on an useless garlic study. Garlic has been proven to keep the vampires and werewolves away (nobody has seen any lately) but has no efficacy in a beehive for anything except producing honey-flavoured barbecue sauce. <

New to bee keeping about 2 yrs. Didn't know this.


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

Just to post an update on my bee experiment. First, I reduced my order of Taylor made queens from 15 to 12. I modified this order in order to allow 3 of the queens to go to requeen a friend's suspected AHB colonies, and to insure I had enough brood for a good start on the remaining nucs. The 12 queens arrived about 6PM on Thursday 3/4/2010 [after being shipped on 3/3/2010]. 2 of the queens were not moving much. I had previously prepared my nucs so I installed the queens. Nasty job I might add that late in the evening on queenless colonies. The 2 weak queens, I first fed a drop of water and a drop of honey and the queens seemed to revive a little. However, upon checking on 3/6 the bees were no longer paying attention to the 2 weak queen cages, and upon further examination the queens were dead. I notified BeeWeaver and free replacement:thumbsup: [including free freight:thumbsup:] queens arrived on 3/12/2010 which I promptly installed.

Upon making my splits I discovered 2 of my original 8 colonies had what appeared to be several supercedure queen cells, one from my feral [4 cells located in the middle of 2 frames] colony and one from a MHQ [3 cells on only middle of 1 frame]; although both appeared to have adequate brood and nice patterns, I left the bees to do their own thing.

On 3/8 I checked on the queens, and 8 of 10 had been released; the other 2, I punched out the candy [which had only been eaten about 1/2 way through] to speed their release [the queens were already fat and plump and ready to lay]. Today [3/14] I just finished checking the 8 queens which had first been released, and all were accepted and laying, Making my current count 8 of 8; [I didn't check with the 2 queens released late, and 2 others just recently installed. 

Danny


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

Another update on my bee experiment. On March 12, 2010, I received the 2 replacement queens from BeeWeaver, bringing my total queen count up to 12 from BeeWeaver. I checked the 2 previously installed [on March 5] queens that were late releasing and both are apparently accepted and laying with eggs/larva and small amount of sealed brood. That makes my original acceptance of the live queens 10 of 10 [2 of 12, were weak and died in the cages, but were replaced by BeeWeaver].

However, as I previously stated my feral queen was in supercedure. However no new eggs have been laid; but they now have about 6 queen cells on 3 frames [but no more eggs]. I am guessing that I may have injured or killed the queen in making my divide [as I used all 8 of my original colonies to help make splits]. Otherwise I messed up and placed her in the new nuc from which I installed one of the 2 last new queens.

About the same thing with my Zia queen. I had shaken all the bees [from all of my colonies] down into the lower boxes of these feral and Zia colonies [or so I thought]. Moved some eggs/larva/sealed brood up and separated with a queen excluder. When the Weaver [Taylor made] replacement queens arrived, I checked each side of the queen excluder for eggs and when I didn't discover any [had been about 5 days since the excluder had been put in], I made the splits from those boxes without eggs and dropped the new queen into the split. The new splits have now both released the new queens and have eggs and larva, though I haven't actually seen the queens yet. Unfortunately, both of the other side of these splits are now without eggs and have sealed queen cells. I either placed the new queens in the wrong side of the splits or I injured and/or killed the queens in the splits. Sloppy work, I know.

I will wait another week to give the queens time to get settled good and make a closer examination. Both the Zia and the Feral queens were marked, and so I should be able to tell if I have lost the new queens or my old queens. Hoping its the new queens and that I still have my previously marked queen and that I just messed up in my splits. This will reduce the number of bees available for my experiment when I make my joins the First week of April, so I will just have to modify the number of colonies for my experiment.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

It has been a tough couple of weeks. I did not lose either my feral queen nor my Zia queen as I had originally thought. However, Apparently both of these were in swarm mode, not supercedure. The last couple of weeks I have had 3 of my 8 original colonies swarm. 

Caught one swam from my Zia queen colony but only had about 1 1/2# of bees with a virgin queen. I guess I missed the primary swarm with the Zia marked queen.

Completely missed my feral colony swarm, but now have a young new queen but drastically reduced size and bee population.

I caught one of Michael Bush's Queen colony swarm, and retrieved a swarm with about 6-7# of bees. I assume it was the primary swarm and will check tommorrow to see if I got the marked queen. I was able to prevent any other swarms and the colony is still fairly strong as they were loaded with about 12 medium frames of sealed brood.

All of these colonies had been checkerboarded [the all medium colonies] or had the brood chamber reversed [with deep/ medium]. Also, both had been used to build splits by taking about 1/2 the brood with bees the first week of March.

I have made all my combines and will give further details with a later posts. I am tired and short of time.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

I was a little overly optimistic on my original objectives; therefore, my ultimate objectives have been somewhat modified. To begin with I only ended up with 10 colonies from Taylor made queens. I diverted 3 of the queens [of the 15 originally ordered] to a friend who needed to requeen some hot colonies, and this helped me out because I was a little short of brood the first week in March, and I guess I will blame the extended late cold weather and unusually 3 snows that we had this year. Furthermore, I had 100% acceptance rate of the 8 nucs [8 of 8] that I had made from purchased deep brood frames. These frames were all sealed and/or emerging brood without eggs or young larva. However, the 4 nucs I made up from my splits, I only had a 50% acceptance rate [2 of 4]. 2 of these nucs made their own queen cells from young eggs and/or larva; and although the Taylormade queens were released they were not accepted.

I have previously posted informations on swarms for which some of the information was slightly incorrect. The following is from the notes I took on my Big Chief yellow pad and should be correct. 

*First:* I had a feral colony swarm which initially only had 6 [what I thought were supercedure, all located center frame] queen cells on several deep frames. One of the frames had 3 extra large nice queen cells in the middle of the frame. I destroyed the 3 smaller cells, leaving only the 3 nice cells. This colony ended up swarming taking with it most of the bees. I missed the swarms and only ended up with the original colony with small population which I joined with a captured swarm below. I had used brood from this colony early March to make splits, Had also reversed brood chambers deep and medium, but this apparently did not prevent swarming.

*Second:* My Zia queen colony swarmed and I missed the primary swarm, but did capture a small swarm that only had about 1 1/2# of bees with a virgin queen. I joined this swarm with what remained of my feral colony that had swarmed and also which had a virgin queen. I do have a laying queen now but the population only covers about 3 medium frames. But, I think they will eventually build up. This Zia colony was 3 mediums and had been checkerboarded, and I had also used brood to make up splits early March. They still swarmed.

*Third:* My best colony from Michael Bush's queen swarmed; however, I was able to capture this swarm and place in another box. This was [I believe] the primary swarm and had 6-7# of bees. I placed them in a deep and medium box. This colony had also been used to make splits early March and was on 3 mediums. This colony had also been checkerboarded, but still swarmed.

So, I have had 3 of my original 8 colonies swarm which was a great set back, especially beings I lost many of the swarms and they had been some of my strongest colonies [except for the feral colony].

I have made all the combines that I intend to and this is what I am left with:

1. I have 5 double strength colonies at 2 different locations.
2. I have 7 normal strength colonies at 3 different locations.
3. I have 3 nucs, all at the same location.

The bees have been working the crimson clover hot and heavy [at least until the rain we began receiving on Saturday]. They were on the crimson heavy when I first checked at about 8:30 a.m., and also at about 1:00 p.m., and then also, when I checked again at about 5:30 p.m. So it seems that they have been working the crimson throughout the day. Our weather has been in the upper 50'sF to lower 60'sF at night, with the highs getting up to upper 70'sF to lower 80'sF. The crimson in a small orchard [about 1/2 acre] and along the roadside is being worked heaviest. This crimson has been blooming since about late March/early April and this is the crimson the bees were working the heaviest. Also now the crimson in the pastures is beginning to bloom, but there were only a few bees working this late bloom [because it has been grazed] crimson.

To be honest swarming is a new concern for me, and one for which I have no experience. When I kept bees during the 80's my midnights were requeened every late summer/early fall and I think I only had 1 swarm that I was aware of. I am certainly more sypathetic to those who have had swarming problems.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

Checked my colonies yesterday. 2 of the 5 colonies that should be raising queens have queens laying good patterns. Saw [what appeared to be] a virgin queen in another. The last 2 have empty queen cells [ends cut off apparently from emerged virgins] and also queen cells with the sides ripped open, apparently destroyed by an emerged virgin queen.

One of the colonies on crimson clover has a deep with all frames full of honey and about 2/3rds sealed and a good start on a medium. The other super combined colonies are approaching 1-2 mediums of honey though only beginning to seal the honey. The crimson flow is about over. Yaupon [or a bush I call that] is about to bloom and the tupelo [a.k.a. blackgum] look to be about a week to 10 days from bloom.

The colonies that were just normal strength will average about 1/3 to 1/2 super each, except for my Weaver queen which has about 1+ 1/2 super full of nectar but mostly still open.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## Monie (Feb 13, 2008)

Thanks for doing this, Danny! this has been a great read with lots of information.


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

Just an update on how things are progressing. 

*First:* I have now had 5 of my original 8 colonies swarmed even though they were all either checkerboarded [those that were all mediums] or reversed brood boxes [those that were deeps/mediums]. My Beeweaver queen, one of my Michael Bush's queen, and Tecumseh MHQ [w/cordovan coloration] have not swarmed. Not counting my double strength colonies my most productive colonies [honey production wise] so far in this order are BeeWeaver, Tecumseh MHQ, Michael Bush's queen. All the rest have swarmed and I hope to still make a super each off the others but this may be wishful thinking. 

*Second:* All of my double strength colonies now have successfully raised queens and those queens are laying. The last just has young grubs and eggs, nothing sealed yet.

*Third:* Friday, I ordered extracting equipment and honey processing supplies from Walter T. Kelley Co. [ http://www.kelleybees.com/PageDefault.aspx ] and bottles from Sailor plastics [ http://www.sailorplastics.com/catalog/information.php?info_id=4 ]. Kelley will ship today and should be here the end of the week.

*Fourth:* I hope to pull supers and harvest some the end of this week.

*Fifth:* We are now getting extremely dry and in need of some moisture otherwise I am fearful that the nectar flow will end early.

*Sixth:* My captured swarm from Michael Bush's queen has a drone laying queen and I must deal with that problem. I had hopes that this was the primary swarm and I had captured the queen, but the queen is not marked.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

Just an update on how things are progressing. 

First: it has been extremely dry here. We did get about 1/10th" rain yesterday which was welcome. Other than than we have not had a meaningful rain since March.

Second: the tupelo flow shriveled on the trees and was a big disappointment. To dry I suppose everything is brown now here. Same with the persimmon which dropped most of the blooms from lack of moisture I suppose. Nothing left major but the Chinese Tallow which are starting to make blooms but they seem rather small. They are working the mimosa some but not much of it here.

Third: Pulled 4 medium supers and 1 Deep all completely sealed and mostly drawn on about the 15th of May. The deep came from my double strength colony which was the last to make a queen and the bees had used several frames of honey which had been sealed. So I actually got about 7 sealed deep frames from this colony, but substituded 3 other deep frames from an adjacent colony that was using the deep box for brood but had 3 outside sealed frames. After extraction I had 3 full 5 gal. containers and 1 3/4 full 5 gal container. Close weight would be about 225# after weighing buckets and subtracting for the bucket weights. 

Fourth: 3 of the double strenghth colonies had another super mostly filled but only about 1/2 sealed, a fourth had 2 supers mostly filled but only about 1/2 sealed. The 5th double strength was the last one to make a queen and has only a little stored honey. This is the one I pulled the deep from.

Fifth: The single strength colonies have partial supers full of honey with the BeeWeaver colony has about 1+1/2 super partially capped.

Sixth: All of my harvest is bottled, and 90% sold + a good bit of my next harvest is spoken for. So far collected about $861.00 but a good bit of the harvest has been given to relatives and of course we are using our share also.

Things are really dry and the flow has about ended early. I will be harvesting again early next week and hope to pull about 6 mediums. I will keep you posted and give you a total by colony on production at that time as I don't have my big chief pad available and I am ready for bed.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

Finished my last extraction of about 280#. With my earlier extraction of 225# that comes to a total of about 505#, a paltry sum for sure. We had 1/10" of rain from the middle of March thru the middle of June. Our Tupelo [a.k.a. Black Gum], blossoms shrivled up, literlly dried up and did not produce. Tallow was only slightly better. All the rains just missed us and went North. I figured each deep at about 6# per frame and extrapolated the remaing average on the mediums at about 4# per frame. Don't have time right now but will give a more complete analysis later. I had 5 double strength ["DS"] colonies which raised their own queens and 3 ordinary strength colonies when I exclude those that swarmed. None of my double strength colonies swarmed.

1. BeeWeaver queen:
16med x 4=64 + 3 Deeps x 6=18, for a total of 82#;

2. Michael Bush Queen:
4 deep x 6= 24#; Note at the first extraction, this colony had almost a full deep full of honey, but not sealed. I guess because of the drought, when the flow stopped they consumed this and I only harvested 4 deep.

3. MHQ [from Tecumseh]: 
15 med x 4=60#;

4. DS [double strenghth]:
22 med x 4=88#;

5. DS:
28 med x 4=112#

6. DS:
12 med x 4=48#

7. DS:
12 med x 4=48#

8. DS:
7 Deeps x 6=42#

That should be an average of 55# per normal strength colony and 68# per double strength colony. As I mentioned earlier, when I have more time I will give more informations and further observation.

Kindest Regards
Danny Unger


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## Hambone (Mar 17, 2008)

Good info Danny. I pulled from one of my bweavers this morning. 3 supers. 9 frames each.


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## DRUR (May 24, 2009)

Hambone said:


> I pulled from one of my bweavers this morning. 3 supers. 9 frames each.


Derek, I started to mention your area by name. You received all the rain that we normally get. Several, times we had thunderstorms that just petered out once it got to our area, but I had noticed that areas North of us were getting plenty. Last week or so we have received about 6" of rain, and I am guessing that will help a summer flow somewhat; but this will be darker honey and I will leave it for the winter. My brother [between Leroy and Hubbard] just missed the rain we just received but I reminded him that during April and May he received all of ours. He still wasn't to happy. I am currently making splits and hope to make splits again the first of September.

I will be posting more information later on, just a little down right now with my swarming issues, the drought [although now broken], and poorest honey crop I have ever had, + my brain has been giving me fits lately, heat I guess.

*Last comment*: Also, Hambone, glad yours are producing good. keep us informed on how things go. I think in your area [Ennis, because of the darker soil] you should produce more, especially if you can get on some sweet clover along with the Mesquite. I sure miss that Mesquite honey, nice golden yellow color; although, my first extraction was some of the lightest I ever produced [light gold color], but the second extraction, was just a little darker. Both have excellent taste.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## Hambone (Mar 17, 2008)

Our last measurable rain was May 17th (I think) Only .43 since. Most of the rain has been just to our south. By 20 or less. The flooding rains from a couple weeks ago missed us to the south by 10 miles. 

About 1/4 of the Mesquites are still blooming. Most of them bloomed really this year. They mostly bloom all of June. We are in the Black Land so our soil is pretty good. 6 miles to the east of my land and one of my yards it turns to red. Just past the Trinity River. 

I still have some to pull. I will see how much the others have. Then plan on splitting in the next week or two.


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