I raise my own queens and they are AMM
I raise my own queens and they are AMM(ish)
I raise my own queens and the are carniolan
I raise my own queens and they are caniolan(ish)
I raise my own queens and they are buckfast
I raise my own queens and they are Buckfast(ish)
I raise my own queens and they are Italian
I raise my own queens and they are italian(ish)
I raise my own queens and they are hybrid/allsorts
I raise my own queens as part of a breeding group
A trait like aggression will not be controlled by a single gene, bound to be several.
I doubt it is a simple dominant / recessive scenario either.
One thing noted by a lot of beekeepers is that aggression can be largely bred out of bees in just a few generations if you don't keep mixing up the genepool.
Not as many Italian Bees being raised
Surprising me a little because the Light Italians are incredibly gentle
In a garden situation in a big City like London they are a safe bet
They suit the South a little better
Has anyone had cream legbar chickens I have a few
https://www.omlet.co.uk/breeds/chickens/cream+legbar/
You can get the lowdown on them here
They breed true produce blue eggs are nice tempered and easy on the eye
Good layers but in my experience they are prone to lay in hiding places rather than the nestbox
Pure breed created in the 1920's
Buckfast have a better pedigree than that so they are a true breed and it's a little unfair to compare them to hybrid allsorts like my bees
Last edited by The Drone Ranger; 12-11-2013 at 06:09 PM.
Just been checking the size of the forum membership (pretty big)
so either there are a lot of votes to come or not many people raise their own queens
Interesting
It will be the latter.
Of the hundreds who attend queen rearing demos and training events only a fraction ever go on to do any queen rearing in a controlled way.
Whenever I started queen rearing I assumed that there were lots of more experienced people I could get advice from.
The reality is that only a handful of people rear queens locally.
Something is not working. Rearing queens is not so difficult yet very few do it.
The books make it seem complicated.
The exams test on all manner of things, many of which are of peripheral value to a beekeeper.
Working within a group is one way of improving the situation, as the members can acquire more skills in a convivial setting.
I think you are right Jon. People expect queen rearing to be difficult and try to follow some complicated technique, stage by stage, without fully understanding why it works and lose confidence when it fails. In essence all you need do is arrange to get a young grub in a vertical cell and located in a part of the hive where the queen pheromone is depleted. There are hundreds of way of doing that and one is as simple as tipping a comb on its side high in the hive.
BIBBA is currently running a series of workshops aimed at encouraging people to get involved in queen rearing and they are proving to be incredibly popular. The emphasis is on simple methods suited to beginners. The National associations should have been doing this years ago because the demand is huge.
Out of a preliminary class of 18 folks 3 seasons ago, about 10 went to queen rearing talks the next season but only one raised any queens (me). When I asked them how they were getting on and said that I had raised a couple of queens for increase you would have thought I had gone over to practising the dark arts! Any increase my friends had was through swarming. A couple of seasons on I have attended Jon's queen rearing group all summer, grafted, used the Ben Harden queenright method, raised a few lovely black queens and increased my stocks again. Can't wait to Spring to get my Drone colonies doing as I've built some more mating nucs (up to 19 mini nucs now). Trying to get my stocks up so I have more to select from.
It's not difficult - give it a try! Get together with like minded beekeepers, make your mistakes, cut your teeth, and get breeding local queens.
Reading the last 3 posts from Jon Rosie and Blackcavebees I thought that can't be right
Then I started thinking about the beekeepers I know and realised it probably is not many of them are proactive queen rearers
A couple of people I have started with bees use the Snelgrove board (snore boring !!)
One friend with several hives in a more urban setting than me now has very gentle bees and they are productive
That took them a few seasons but I think I would swap bees with them happily
It's a good way to start, and if you want to move on to grafting etc it's easy to adapt the method
It's also a good way to increase your number of colonies when queen raising proper makes more sense
If the beekeeper wants to stick to keeping just one or two hives then it's an alternative to joining a group
Although if there is a group available it could be a fast route to getting better bees and confidence
I don't blame folk for not buying all the queen rearing paraphernalia on spec because if you only have a couple of hives it does look like overkill
The snelgrove board is great to get a couple of queens. I don't use them myself but know people who swear by them.
I would not be put off by the cost. My grafting tool is a 000 sable paintbrush which costs £2. A dozen base cups, inserts and cell cups will cost you about a tenner.I don't blame folk for not buying all the queen rearing paraphernalia on spec
Use an old frame to make your cell bar frame.
That's all you need to get started.
the biggest expense is likely to be the apideas/mini nucs but if you have the time and the skills you can make them like Stephen does.
The major advantage of the group is access to quality genetics and getting a good mating site for your apideas where you have flooded an area with drones.
One person can graft for 50 group members from a couple of quality queens.
Buy 10 Apideas and sell 10 queens and you have them paid for and they will last you for years.
In a good season you get 2+ queens from each Apidea.
I don't think you need buy mini-nucs either, although I do use a few myself. You can produce queen cells easily and if you only want to make increase for yourself you just need to make up small colonies by robbing frames of brood and nurses from your others and stick a queen cell in each one.Originally Posted by Jon
Possibly folk are linking raising their own queens to becoming involved with breeding programs aimed at specific pure(ish) breeds
You can make quite good progress just starting with what you have
Forget about wing scanning etc thats all a side issue
And if your bees are particularily vicious or chalkbrood prone etc don't be afraid to buy in a well bred queen to get you started
Temper is probably the place to start and you will soon see if it's going in the right direction
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