# Night temps for succesfull splits and nucs.



## jcolon (Sep 12, 2014)

I am planning to expand and make some nucs for sale. I have 5 colonies, 3 strong, 1 medium and one that's still pretty young. 
My plan is to take two frames of brood from my best queen and make a nuc. Notch the frames OTS style to encourage them to produce 10 to 12 queen cells. Once the cells are capped I will make nucs from my other colonies, trying not to weaken them too much but enough to reduce swarming chances, and give each new nuc a queen cell from my favorite queen. Feed 1;1 until they are established.

My main question what's the safe night temperature to pull this without getting chilled brood and failing the queen effort? So far we still seeing 50s and even high forties till the end of march? My thought is that a steady 60s at night is ideal to move forward. 

Any input would be appreciated.


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## D Coates (Jan 6, 2006)

The warmer the better but 60 is a safe bet. Depending on how low the brood frames were laid in can also be a concern as well. They'll let the bottom chill if they can't cover everything effectively. The higher the population the better they can deal with this. You didn't mention if the other frames were drawn or not.


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## jcolon (Sep 12, 2014)

2 Brood, 2 drawn food and plenty of nurses. I think I got that down. My only concern is not going too soon.


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## Satch (Aug 15, 2012)

And plenty of drones to mate with the new queen. Everyone around here seems to forget this early that it takes two to tango.


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## jcolon (Sep 12, 2014)

Indeed. The drones are they queue to get busy. I have seen a few, but not enough. Expect the next few weeks they will be in bigger numbers.


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