Amm queens

[The Drone Ranger]

Gwizzie
Have a look at Fatshark's excellent site The Apiarist and check out circle split
I managed two of them this year and my seasons first queens went in there

[Kate Atchley]

In Ardnamurchan we are set to rear more Amm queens than we have orders for, so far. They're from Colonsay stock.

Do let me know if you'd like to be added to the list.

[Jon]

I posted my first 15 queens off today.
Fingers crossed for a good season.

[Poly Hive]

I would like a couple Kate if possible?

PH

[alancooper]

I posted my first 15 queens off today.
Fingers crossed for a good season.

Is this exceptionally early? I inspected my hives on Monday - plenty sealed drone brood but just a small number had hatched.

[Jon]

The post is a year old. I haven't even started grafting yet this year. Someone has revived the thread.

[Wmfd]

The post is a year old. I haven't even started grafting yet this year. Someone has revived the thread.

Jon, out of interest, how do you gauge when to start grafting?

I'd thought of things like:
* Presence of drones
* Overnight temperatures - still too cold in my view here (frost on the windscreen!)
* Strength of colonies to be used

I'm not sure though, am I on the right track?

(Thought I'd try cell punching this year, after mangling quite a few larvae with a paintbrush last year!)

David



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[mbc]

I'm not starting grafting yet either, I like to wait untill I see some natural queen cells started when on my rounds.

[Jon]

I put drone combs into my drone raising colonies around the middle of April which means I will have viable drones towards the end of May.
If the weather is cold, the queenright cell raising method will give very poor results as the bees are just not interested in raising queen cells.
You get more cells started by using a queenless setup with a box packed with young bees.
Most years I start grafting somewhere between 1st and 10th May

[busybeephilip]

I've been thinking about it, several of my hives are making cells, have added supers to see if that will make them stop, else will start splitting