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Thread: Apiary Vicinity mating again

  1. #11
    Senior Member prakel's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jon View Post
    about 15 minutes
    Interesting. Seems like a long time to be in the air if she's mating on site. Think Dr G Koeniger reckons that five minutes is plenty long enough + travel time which obviously isn't relevant here. Maybe she needs a 'warm up' on the wing prior to mating? Any thoughts on this?

  2. #12
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    I am sure a queen can mate with sufficient drones in 5 minutes. The 15 minutes includes time for the cluster to congeal around the queen so she is not in the air all of this time. She alights on a leaf or a post and the workers settle around her as they do when a swarm leaves.

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    Senior Member busybeephilip's Avatar
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    Do you think the little swarm comes out before or after the queen leaves to mate ?

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    Senior Member busybeephilip's Avatar
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    You also say a load of drones, are the drones part of the swarm

  5. #15

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    Interestingly it might tie in with another thread with queens appearing unexpectedly in hives
    Probably enticed away or kidnapped by a gang of bees looking for a new queen

    Sent from my LIFETAB_S1034X using Tapatalk

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    Senior Member busybeephilip's Avatar
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    Immigrants

  7. #17
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by busybeephilip View Post
    Do you think the little swarm comes out before or after the queen leaves to mate ?
    They come out together. I have seen them leave the apidea and spotted the queen leave with them.
    It is likely the same process as a swarm, ie the workers push her out.

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    Senior Member busybeephilip's Avatar
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    Are the drones pushed out too

  9. #19
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by busybeephilip View Post
    You also say a load of drones, are the drones part of the swarm

    Even if you fill apideas drone free they often have 30 or 40 drones in there within a day or two.
    These resident ones leave with the mating swarm but I am pretty sure others are attracted into it from elsewhere in the apiary as there seem to be a lot more of them.

  10. #20
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by busybeephilip View Post
    Are the drones pushed out too

    The apidea is usually completely empty unless it has a few bees just emerged which are too young to fly. All the drones leave.
    The one in the garden I mentioned at the start was a 5 frame well filled apidea and it had a few bees left in it.
    I think the mating swarm needs a relatively small number of bees which more of less coincides with the population of an apidea.
    The single time I sawthis from a full colony during a supersedure it was a similar amount of bees, 3 or 4 hundred at most.

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