# what happens if you place grafted queen cups in queen right hive?



## oldspice (Aug 20, 2016)

Just curious, one day I might try this but right now I do not have the resources. Curious if anyone has tried it? I read everywhere that you need to put them in a hive that either is queen less or you just made queen less. perhaps they just think its a supersedure and go along with nurturing it even tho there may be a queen around.


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## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

Works if you place the grafted cups above the queen excluder and the queen below. Usually the bees make more queens on the second or third try. It would appear as if it is a learned behaviour of the bees.

Jean-Marc


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

oldspice said:


> Just curious, one day I might try this but right now I do not have the resources. Curious if anyone has tried it? I read everywhere that you need to put them in a hive that either is queen less or you just made queen less. perhaps they just think its a supersedure and go along with nurturing it even tho there may be a queen around.


Start the queenless, then after 24-36hrs finish them in queen rite isolated from queen


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## yousowise (Apr 14, 2011)

I've had good luck placing open brood above an excluder to lure up nurse bees and placing my grafts there.


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

From experience, with a newly mated strong queen scent, they will not
keep these grafted queen cups. Good one to try on a 2nd year old queen though.


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## oldspice (Aug 20, 2016)

what does "finishing" mean in this aspect? I read that after they are capped they are put in finishing hive? Why do they need to go to another hive for that and what happens in that phase? what do bees do for queen at that point? keep her warm? ( and probably sing her songs)


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

start , 24-36hrs
Finish 35hrs-10 days


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## oldspice (Aug 20, 2016)

so does it need to be in a different place for "finishing" ?


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## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

Short answer no.
you so wise has it right. I did not mention that part but it is standard beekeeping praise to raise open brood above an excluder to draw nurse bees up.

Jean-Marc


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

oldspice said:


> so does it need to be in a different place for "finishing" ?


Staring requires queenless
Finishing is best done in populous queen rite colony isolated from queen


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Finishing is best done in populous, queen less, and brood less pollen frames in a
nuc hive.


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

beepro said:


> Finishing is best done in populous, queen less, and brood less pollen frames in a
> nuc hive.


Queenless finishers tear down cells


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

You have to do it before the cells are capped.
A newly queen less finisher will rarely tear down the cells but a strong newly mated queen right
hive will. Make up the new nucs to put the cells in. The younger emerging bees will
protect the cells instead of tearing it down. This way you get consistent bigger and healthy
cells. How can I use my strategy if they keep on tearing down the cells like you said? They didn't!
Guess there is more than one way to do this.


Pollen frames raised, queen less, cap brood less newly made up finisher:


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## Lburou (May 13, 2012)

You might enjoy reading about the Ben Harden method of queen rearing. That method does what you asked in the original post. Queens produced like this are slightly smaller than using a queenless colony to start & finish the cells.

Read about it here,  or  here, or here.


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## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

He asked what would happen if cells were placed in a queen right colony.

Starting does not require queenlessness per se but a reduction of queen pheromone in oart if the colony.This can be accomplished by placing cells above an excluder. Raise open brood above the excluder and there you have it. Of the bees do not raise too.many cells on the first go around they will do better the second time assuming nutrition is adequate. If conditions are such that nutrition is poor nothing will work unless colonies are fed.

Personally I prefer to use queenless starters and finishers . It is just easier to manage. We strengthen cones with 2 tames of capped brood every week... kill any build queen cells and remove all frames od honey
We attempt to keep the bees on as few frames as possible with the intent to increase the concentration of bees on a per frame basis.

We have no problems with cells getting torn down unless a virgin hatches a bit early.

Jean-Marc


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Yep, queen less and brood less will concentrate all their
effort on the developing accepted cells. What else can they do when nothing
is there for them to take care of. No even a single cap brood!


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## oldspice (Aug 20, 2016)

Thanks for all the response, but im afraid I dont understand what this whole finishing thing is about. What happens during the "finishing" process? as far as I can guess the bees just keep it warm and I wonder why cant the bees who made the beginning part happen "finish" the job?? :kn:


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

We focus a lot of attention on the first 24 hrs , starting. 
We set up starter finisher colonies. To start we segregate the queen and open brood to one box, capped brood and most of the bees to the other queenless half . Boxes separated with a solid board. 
Graft is placed, 24-36 hrs we simply remove the division board, place queen excluder to turn the hive into a queen right finisher. All the hive needs to do is continue feeding the larvae . 
This method requires very little hive maintenance. A queenless finisher (we have found) that has not been maintained with fresh bees will tear down cells. 

So what does a finisher do? Simply put, finishes the cells after the start. I speak of start and finish because of the extreme importance of that 36hr start


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## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

Finishing in a queeright colony is apparently important because bees an sealthe larvae early if te finishing colony is queenless, that is why some guys use finishing colonies... or so I was told. I cannot really tell if they seal them off 6 hours or 12 hours early. I prefer to use the 6-12 hour old larvae but sometimes I use 24-36 hour old larvae out of sheer laziness. So whether bees seal the cells early or later is moot.

today to confirm what I an has been saying bees started tearing cells down. We have been raising them with feed and the bees nutrition is down a bit. There are large sheets of capped brood hatching and the young bees require a lot of pollen to complete their development hence the colony nutrition is down a bit. Our yards are pretty big as far as hive numbers go and natural resources are somewhat limited at this time of year. The bees point it out in their behaviour... they tear cells down.

Jean-Marc


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## oldspice (Aug 20, 2016)

tear down as in before its capped, after its capped, or both? i just dont get why they would build it then tear it down later lol. and not to change to topic but why do I read some ppl say to use 1-12 hour old egg and some say 1-12 hour old larvae ?!?


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

thats something you will have to ask the bees. We typically run things trial and error, as most guys do. Differences in methods usually attribute to suttle managment actions not accounted during a discussion


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## DerTiefster (Oct 27, 2016)

I have to confess, I am not a bee. Nor do I commonly converse with them. However, I suspect that they are mindless and react to their environment in mildly variable but generally consistent and genetically driven ways. Ask yourself some questions and see whether the behaviors reported about bees seem consistent with survival. Then apply that to your original question.

1) What does a hive do when it finds itself queenless? Make queens in the emergency mode. You might ask "how many?" and I'd suggest the answer is variable, but mostly "all that the resources support." This is an _emergency_ you see. The bees don't plan this or keep records of on which frame how many queen cells are started. So it's reasonable that a desperate hive flush with resources and bees will start dozens of cells if larvae are available, plausibly more cells if the larvae are separated and the queen cells don't interfere in spacing.

2) How many emergency cells would be needed for hive survival in emergency conditions? Probably only one or two, so it is plausible (remember: I said "plausible" and not that it is definitely so) that they might only spend resources on completing rearing of a few queens. Otherwise the hive's resources could be squandered on a bunch of fratricidal (sororicidal?) queens. The reports I read say that emergency queen response gives several queen cells, not as many as the swarm response gives.

3) How many cells will a swarming (implicitly queen-right) colony raise to maturity? As many as resources will support would provide the greatest chance of hive reproduction, with several cast swarms after the principal one.

I read this set of questions and observations reported by others as consistent with a queenless colony starting a bunch of cells, but not necessarily bringing all to maturity. A queen-right colony might not spontaneously start a bunch of swarm cells, but if the bees found themselves with a bunch of queen cells started, and resources are available, their genetically driven behavior may drive them to finish the cells if resources are available. "Oh! this _must_ be a swarm preparation. I feel it in my exoskeleton. Let's get these queens ready, girls!"

Naturally, there is not a firm and unique logical consequence to a given set of conditions. Life is variable in its response. But the behaviors I've read about seem consistent with emergency responses driving large numbers of queen cells being generated, many of which would be torn down before maturity if no queen is around (emergency, remember). And swarm preparations are done with a queen in residence, but many queen cells started and finished.

So, to me, these are plausible scenarios. I'd answer the O.P.'s question with, "A lot of times a queen-right colony would ignore grafts, or more likely tear them down as unnecessary." But not always, and maybe not even most of the time. But a queen-right colony flush with resources and finding a bunch of queen cells under way inside itself might decide it is OK to finish them all. So I see queenless starts and queen-right finishes as being behaviorally reasonable ways to utilize the bees' genetically programmed tendencies.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

If the cells are far enough away from the queen (twelve inches or more from an excluder that the queen is below) and if the hive is crowded (overflowing with bees) they will probably start some cells. But you'll have better luck if they are also queenless.


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## DanielD (Jul 21, 2012)

My simple understanding of starter/finisher, is that the starter hive, being queenless, starts many emergency cells. The stronger the colony, more cells can get started. After a day or so, some of them are torn down or not taken care of so well, since the need isn't for all those queens. Going into a queen right finisher after that first day, which sees them as swarm mode cells now that they are started, builds with more vigor and importance to each cell since swarming mode generally builds an abundance of cells. 

Here's a good thread http://www.beesource.com/forums/sho...arter-and-finisher&highlight=starter+finisher


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## lharder (Mar 21, 2015)

I have found this to be true using snelgrove boards. 1 medium super between queen rearing section and old queen isn't enough to get consistent results, but 2 are.


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