Why AMM?

[The Drone Ranger]

Gavin

I did my best but Jon is keeping all his queens (hundreds of them)
The idea of breeding from what you have got sounds like a very long and bumpy road.
You are right about the shortage of drone wings A few people I know have jumped on the "breeding for resistance "bandwagon and now their drones dont have any wings at all.
Where do you think your drone congregation area might be in relation to where you are
(don't give too much away or a white van might drive off with all your hives)
Jon might be directly under his -- that would be handy

[gavin]

Jon's strategy is to take over the Belfast area with half-Galtee natives. The stock will get here eventually as I'm sure drones could cross the Irish Sea if they really wanted to. He might be under a DCA but I'm under a drone black hole, if my mating success in those poly nuc boxes is anything to go by. At least that means that the drones there are largely the ones we put there.

We have a fierce collie to protect the apiary site. He'll harass any potential bee thieves by continually begging them to throw a ball for him. That should hold them up long enough for the police to arrive. That's the plan anyway.

[Trog]

Ours is protected by a spaniel who'll thwack folk on the legs with a stick ... and a goose!

[Jon]

I did my best but Jon is keeping all his queens (hundreds of them)

Not all mine as we have about 20 people in the new breeding group.
I am doing most of the grafting and keeping an eye on the apideas until the queens get mated.
Some of the members take home the apidea when the queen starts to lay but the cuter ones take home the queen in an introduction cage and get another cell in right away. One member took away 6 queens in introduction cages last Thursday and I put in 6 cells within an hour all of which have since hatched.
The group gives access to a lot of apideas and makes things a lot more efficient.
I try and have at least a dozen cells hatching per week as it means you can replace queens which have mated, or virgins which have got lost.

Tim the guy who brought over the grafts in the swarm box yesterday has 15 Kielers and 4 Apideas so it is good to get him on board to expand the numbers. I reckon that takes the mating nuc count over 90.
There is no point grafting 20 at a time if you only have a couple of apideas to put them in.

It's a good deal. You pay a tenner to join the group, to cover the cost of the grafting equipment, and can put as many queen cells as you want into your apideas. It was a bit tricky at the start when everyone turned up at once but now that the apideas are populated it is a case of weekly replacement.

[The Drone Ranger]

We have a fierce collie to protect the apiary site. He'll harass any potential bee thieves by continually begging them to throw a ball for him. That should hold them up long enough for the police to arrive. That's the plan anyway.[/QUOTE]

Hi Gavin

Wx was worried about their site in town being robbed until we came up with the idea of "borrowing" nextdoors LLama
Apparently they make fantastic guards just ask any shepherd (rustlers beware)
At first there was some concerns about it being stung but after a visit to correx.jon.uk we came up with this great hat ( the veil was removed for the photo)

[The Drone Ranger]

Trog
like you at home I am relying on the family pet -- Oliver (the cat)
Recently a mix up during a marathon wing scanning session resulted in him being classified a near native Apis Melifera Melifera
which accounts for his generally foul temper but also makes him the ideal hive guard (until the llama arrives)

[The Drone Ranger]

Jon
your breeding group sounds great .How many queens do your hive need in a season? they must be outnumbering the drones 2 to 1 by now

By the way I notice you haven't put the drone wings in the post yet presumably they are all worn out.

You are certainly getting your moneys worth out of that little paintbrush.

[Jon]

Neither dogs nor cats in Belfast have interesting wing venation, in fact to date I have only seen examples bereft of wings but replete with two pairs of legs. Our dog, a labrador pointer rescued from the dog pound in Lisburn, has a fierce bark and growl but is a total coward. I had to feed and water a pair of Guinea pigs today for a friend who is away on holidays. I took the dog with me and when one of the cavies made a quick movement, she bolted out of the garage with her tail between her legs and did not venture back in. Most dogs treat guinea pigs like rats.
With regard to apiary safety, she would collude with the bee rustlers as she has no time for bees and would be glad to be shot of them.

[Jon]

Jon
your breeding group sounds great .How many queens do your hive need in a season?.

Personally, I need about 12-18 queens per season as I work around 12-15 colonies plus whatever nucs I make up.

Got another 10 into apideas today. Two hatched in the panniers on the back of the bike on the way up the road. All that jiggling, even though I was trying hard to avoid both potholes and 12th July band parades. Lets hope they don't end up hybrids, leaning against kerbstones when they should be organising a team of workers to collect pollen and nectar.

PS. Why have you put a large block of cheese on the head of your llama. I am not knocking the idea - just curious.

[The Drone Ranger]

LOL!

Jon
Thats Correx it keeps the bees from stinging his head where male pattern baldness has left him vunerable

You have better queens in your panniers than we have in our hives.