# Raising queen



## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

gingerbee said:


> Is it possible to raise a queen from a swarm cell? I have a really strong hive and would like a queen from it. Would it be best to make a nuc with frames from the hive including the swarm cell? I've tried to do a split before, having a hive raise their own queen from eggs (which may or may not have been in there) with poor results.
> 
> Any suggestions? Thanks.


Sure, I do it all of the time, when they are available. Some people don't like to do it because you are selecting for bees that swarm. But hey, don't they all? Some do more than others.

Good idea. Go for it.


----------



## AndreiRN (Jun 13, 2008)

I have just done that and I am happy with 3 new queens.
The hive produced 10 queens on 4 frames and I moved them in 3 nucs and a hive with old queen that I removed.
Yesterday I saw larvae in the nucs.


----------



## gingerbee (Jul 22, 2006)

Because a swarm cell is used you are selecting for bees that swarm? I appreciate your reply but this seems a huge assumption. But glad to know it can be done, When I go through the hive next inspection I'll see if they've made any.


----------



## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

gingerbee said:


> Because a swarm cell is used you are selecting for bees that swarm? I appreciate your reply but this seems a huge assumption.


Of course, in the long run, over time. You're talking about one colony, one queen cell. Isn't beekeeping for you more about learning and having fun? So jump right in head first, make the nuc, and have some fun. Don't worry.

Ahhh, this beekeeping. Isn't it great?


----------



## gingerbee (Jul 22, 2006)

Thanks for your response Michael, but it still seems a pretty big assumption that using a swarm cell to create a new hive genetically selects for bees that swarm.


----------



## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Thanks for your response Michael, but it still seems a pretty big assumption that using a swarm cell to create a new hive genetically selects for bees that swarm.

I have not observed that. Swarm queens tend to be very good queens. Bees swarm. If we could breed bees that didn't we would destroy the species.


----------



## bleta12 (Feb 28, 2007)

gingerbee said:


> Thanks for your response Michael, but it still seems a pretty big assumption that using a swarm cell to create a new hive genetically selects for bees that swarm.


It is a numbers game. Swarm cell are the natural way the honey bee colonies increase and multiply the numbers. Swarming to a beekeeper is not desired, leads to the lost of honey production. So there is a contradiction between nature and beekeepers interest.
All colonies swarm, some more some less. Less swarming is one of the characteristics that the bee breeders look for like honey production, gentleness and few other characteristics.
If you keep doing your increases only with swarm cells the chances are that you will have colonies that will keep swarming the same than the mother colonies.


Gilman


----------



## Bizzybee (Jan 29, 2006)

As opposed to getting queens from where b12? Grafting doesn't remove swarm tendencies in any given line of bees.

Given a hive is looking to swarm without reasonable cause I wouldn't use their swarm cells. But a hive that is swarming due to over crowding doesn't lend to the notion that they are going to be "swarmy" bees.

I don't think I would subscribe to the practice of crowding bees to get my cells on a regular basis, but taking advantage of the occasional missed hive or bees that have exploded in population due to a prolific queen would be a good move in my estimation. 

Ginger, remember there's a swarm cell there for a reason. When the split is made, take enough bees to thin the hive and give them more room by adding a box and stay ahead of them. A smaller split can be made by taking the queen and leaving the swarm cell behind. "Create the artificial swarm" but still add room for the hive.

Bees don't always have to swarm, if they're given the room to expand and not allowed to become honey bound restricting the queen from laying.


----------



## bleta12 (Feb 28, 2007)

That is why I like beekeeping buzzybee, lots of different opinions. Someone got to be right.
There is nothing wrong on making a nuc from a swarm cell. Done in small scale is quite right an I dont have any problem with that. In that way you get nice cells and prevent swarming. That is much better than making splits and letting them raise their emergency queen cell.
The larger the operation the more problem I have with that practice.

Gilman


----------



## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

Bizzybee said:


> Given a hive is looking to swarm without reasonable cause I wouldn't use their swarm cells. But a hive that is swarming due to over crowding doesn't lend to the notion that they are going to be "swarmy" bees.


That's how I feel. No one is suggesting that any breeder will succeed at developing a non-swarming bee. It's just that some bees tend to swarm more redily than others. Look at the difference between Italian, Carniolan, Russian, and Caucasian bees. All other things being equal...strength, queen age, empty comb space, etc...some will obviously swarm more readily than others. Why? 

If swarming tendency varies between races, then why not among strains or colonies?


----------



## tecumseh (Apr 26, 2005)

michael palmer writes:
some will obviously swarm more readily than others. Why? 

tecumseh:
if you contrast (in general terms) the difference between european stock and african stock the tendency to swarm and the surplus they put up definitely has genetic roots related to selection pressure.

as you final sentence suggest variation would be expected even within subclasses*.

I have heard it suggested (in queen rearing kinds of books) that the best queen cells are not produced when the swarming impulse is inplay. emergency and superscedure response (less cells) is suggested to be a better environment for rearing cells.

on a more practical note I would say that when I did my largest/yr increase (going from 12 hives to 40+) I primarily utilized some farily simple things to encourage swarming. you had to watch them real close and of course you never had a real good idea of exactly how old the cell were when split. on a small scale it was doable simply because of the small numbers. I don't think the process would be reasonably doable on a larger scale.

*the entire class/subclass thingee is a mental model of man that may change from time to time ... as the most recent dna technology has suggest in regards to bioliogical identification.


----------



## Bizzybee (Jan 29, 2006)

The bees in the US are so crossed up from so many races, it would be far to difficult to pin that down on any line of bees. Except for the very few that have maintained lines for many years through II, any line could easily have a recessive trait pop up and going spinning down a different road.

It is completely conceivable to have a line of bees for for many years suddenly have a change in tendencies toward swarming. That's given that ever possible angle has been covered by isolation and flooding. 

There is no chance whatsoever of ever hoping to hold a particular set of traits indefinitely in an open mating environment. Certainly some control can be achieved through culling, but at best it's just stacking the deck in your favor. It's still nothing more than russian roulette, only there's more than one round spinning in the revolver.

Kinda like sending your black lab out in the neighborhood at breeding time. You can toss out the pups that don't look like black labs and keep breeding from there. You'll always have a few that look right black labs, hopefully after a while there will be more black labs to breed with. But you will never get rid of the ones that look like poodles along the way, as well as the dachshunds, ****ers, shepards............................


----------



## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

gingerbee said:


> Thanks for your response Michael, but it still seems a pretty big assumption that using a swarm cell to create a new hive genetically selects for bees that swarm.


This is an overtime result. There are bees that are more prone to swarm than others and this is a genetic trait. So, knowing that, if one were to select bees that tend to swarm more than others and continue to use queens from swarm cells you are selecting for swarming tendencies.

Doing this once won't have much influence this way. And it is a minor concern at best. So forget I brought it up and procede as planned.


----------



## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

bleta12 said:


> That is much better than making splits and letting them raise their emergency queen cell.
> The larger the operation the more problem I have with that practice.
> 
> Gilman


Shoot, I've done that w/ hundreds of hives when I wasn't able to afford to buy queens or cells. I still do it w/ many of my colonies.

When I get to SC, next week I hope, I will split many of my colonies into two boxes and equalize the brood, come back in a week, split up the ones w/ the queen cells into nuc boxes 'cause they don't have the queen and either super the other half or take a nuc from it too after shaking the bees from the comb and setting the frames I want above an excluder to gather bees. Then, the next day I either add a queen or queen cell which I have purchased. Works well for me, enough of the time.


----------



## bleta12 (Feb 28, 2007)

sqkcrk said:


> Shoot, I've done that w/ hundreds of hives when I wasn't able to afford to buy queens or cells. I still do it w/ many of my colonies.
> 
> When I get to SC, next week I hope, I will split many of my colonies into two boxes and equalize the brood, come back in a week, split up the ones w/ the queen cells into nuc boxes 'cause they don't have the queen and either super the other half or take a nuc from it too after shaking the bees from the comb and setting the frames I want above an excluder to gather bees. Then, the next day I either add a queen or queen cell which I have purchased. Works well for me, enough of the time.


You have done it when you did not had the money to get cells or queens? So that was a decision made on less than perfect economical conditions. Cheaper is not better. If there is no difference and the emergency queen cells are not inferior, most of the time, then why people breed queens and don't use only emergency queen cells? It will be eraser.
In an emergency situation the Nature breeds for survival not quality and certainly does not have the beekeepers interest in mind. 
Because you have done it does not make it right. The larger number of the application of your method does not make it right either and is not impressive.
I have the feeling that once you start to raise your own queens you will stop using emergency cells.

Gilman


----------



## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

Let's distinguish between a hive with normal swarming tendencies that is in the process of swarming and a swarmy hive. I wouldn't be taking queen cells from a hive I perceive as swarmy, but neither would I consider them swarmy just because they are swarming under the kind of circumstances that they would be expected to swarm in.


----------



## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

bleta12 said:


> You have done it when you did not had the money to get cells or queens? So that was a decision made on less than perfect economical conditions. Cheaper is not better.
> Because you have done it does not make it right. The larger number of the application of your method does not make it right either and is not impressive.
> 
> I have the feeling that once you start to raise your own queens you will stop using emergency cells.
> ...


Whether something is right or not, it was right for me and I still do it. Though not to the same degree or frequency that I did before.

My point in explaining what I did and that it works was simply to illustrate that it does work. It is up to the person who asked for advice to decide for themselves whether they wish to do it the way I said it could be done. And like any advice, it is worth what was paid for it. I could care less if one did what I said could be done or not. And i am not offended by you reaction or anyone elses, if you wondered.

If by your last staement you were refering to me, No I will not start to raise my own queens. My eyes don't work well enough to wish to bother w/ the strain of looking into those cells and my hands aren't dexterous enough to do the fine work required well enough. I'd rather pay someone else to do that for me. That's why I buy queen ceels and queens.

But that's just me and the rest of y'all should do what is best for your own situation and your own capabilities both physical and economic.

Peace out.


----------



## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

bleta12 said:


> So that was a decision made on less than perfect economical conditions. Cheaper is not better.
> 
> then why people breed queens and don't use only emergency queen cells?
> 
> ...


I have never had perfect economic conditions. Bless you if you have. When cheaper is the only choice other than not something to survive, then cheaper is better.

People breed queens so they have lots of them to sell when other people want them. So the bee breeder or queen raiser can make a living off of those who need queens. 

Whether it is right or not it works.
I wasn't trying to be impressive. Just stating facts.


----------



## bleta12 (Feb 28, 2007)

sqkcrk said:


> I have never had perfect economic conditions. Bless you if you have. When cheaper is the only choice other than not something to survive, then cheaper is better.
> 
> I was speaking purely in beekeeping terms. I normally get passionate about it and forget the economical part. My wife reminds me that every year before April 15.
> From economical point of view and if we agree that the queen is the heart of the colony, i believe that it is more expensive to keep an nonproductive hive than to spend money on a good cell or queen, not to mention the time lost.
> ...


----------

