# Cupularve System



## BillS (Feb 2, 2005)

I have been looking at the cupularva queen rearing system that Betterbee sells. You don't have to graft larva.
On the surface it looks good for my size of bee keeping (small). You get the Queen to lay in cups, then put one cell per nuc to finish and mate. For me this would be a step up from just doing a split and letting them raise thier own queen. I don't want to buy queens as I have two hives with a feral strain that I want to keep going. They do better than the Italians by a mile so I want to make increase, but I want to roll my own.
Have any of you used this system or one like it?

Thanks

Bill Schaefer


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## wayacoyote (Nov 3, 2003)

Bill,
I haven't yet, but I did purchase one of the no-graft systems and promptly returned it when I found out that some parts where one-time-use only. I have an order with Brushy Bees for their system which is supposed to be completely reusable. I'll also point out there there are cheaper ways of providing enough queens for yourself without too much fancy equipment, all of which can be home-made
Waya


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

Try a search on "jenter" and "nicot" and "cupularva".

There have been MANY discussions.

There some about the Jenter here:
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesqueenrearing.htm


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## sierrabees (Jul 7, 2006)

Check out the queen rearing system in the book by Jay Smith that MB made available. The info is in the thread currently just above this one in this forum. It makes a lot of sense, uses a minimum of extra equipment, and sounds like it will require less time to develope the skills needed.


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## BillS (Feb 2, 2005)

Waya,

What I want to do is keep the genes from two hives of ferals, make two to four nucs for increase and not loose my honey crop from those two hives as they are my only hives at this point. They seem to thrive when the Itialians just roll over and die. 
In the past I have tryed letting them do it them selves with very mixed results due I think to the month lag time.
So - what would you do? I am not big on grafting eggs due to 51 year old eyes.

Thanks 

Bill Schaefer


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

Take a look at the Hopkins method:

http://www.bushfarms.com/beesqueenrearing.htm
http://www.beesource.com/pov/hayes/abjmay91.htm

You don't have to graft and you don't have to buy a queen rearing kit.


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## BillS (Feb 2, 2005)

Yes Michael,

I have just spent the last half hour reading about the Hopkins method. It looks like it is perfect for me. Is it really nessesary to use three cells per hive? It is not a problem as I will be makeing 2 - 4 nucs, depending on how well my hives winter. So I will need 6 - 12 cells.
I guess I will have to destroy most of the eggs.
What would be a good saftey margin to go over by? 

Thanks
Bill Schaefer

Bill Schaefer


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Is it really nessesary to use three cells per hive?

No. It's just better insurance. I think the assumuption is that you are requeening hives as opposed to mating them in nucs and you want assurances that the hive doesn't end up queenless. They are also assuming that, as a hobbiest, you'll have more cells than you need.

> It is not a problem as I will be makeing 2 - 4 nucs, depending on how well my hives winter. So I will need 6 - 12 cells.

I'd make up a nuc for each cell.

>I guess I will have to destroy most of the eggs.
What would be a good saftey margin to go over by? 

I'd do every other row and every other cell minimum. leaving one out of three in both directions wouldn't hurt.

I'd also check out Jay Smith's book, Better Queens:

http://www.bushfarms.com/beesbetterqueens.htm

It is similar to the Hopkins method except he's cutting the comb into strips and waxing it to top bars to make cell bars out of it, but he has some good insights on queen rearing in natural cells.


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## Velbert (Mar 19, 2006)

Hi BillS 

if you happen to use more than 1 queen cell dont make the nuc too strong some will swarm

[ December 13, 2006, 06:42 PM: Message edited by: Velbert ]


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