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Thread: apidea management and grafting photos

  1. #21
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    I had a brainwave at the weekend. I have 9 apidea supers and I have worked out a way to convert them into apideas for holding mated queens which will free up 9 apideas to take more cells.

    apidea-super-conversion.jpg apidea-super-excluder.jpg apidea-super-excluder-floor.jpg apidea-super-seen from above.jpg

    A piece of flat correx with a half brick on top is your roof.
    I am also making 45 extra apidea frames from correx. will post pictures later.
    Last edited by Jon; 04-07-2011 at 10:52 PM.

  2. #22
    Administrator gavin's Avatar
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    Just thinking how thoroughly excellent it is to have such well-informed and sharing people on this forum. Thanks Jon and all. (only one glass of wine, honest!)

  3. #23
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    These are the best cells I have seen all year, large and very pitted.
    Only 14/22 were started but these will produce some great queens, due to hatch on Friday.
    I only set up the colony for queen rearing sunday week ago but it looks like a good one.
    The bees in the cell raising colony are pretty much Amm as the colony is headed by a queen which hatched from a supersedure cell produced in one of my colonies with Galtee genetics. The cells are from the galtee daughter I have been taking most of my grafts from.


    I put them in roller cages today and will move them to apideas on Thursday.
    graft frame with good cells.jpg two good cells.jpg pitting on cell.jpg

    The pitting is a characteristic often associated with supersedure cells and I find that a very good queen often emerges from a cell like this

  4. #24

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    How do you fix the brown bases to the bar - glue, nails, wax? We used Superglue and it wasn't entirely secure.

    Do you ever just stick the brown cups straight on the bar? I saw a picture - maybe even on here - of the brown cups stuck straight on the bar with wax.

  5. #25
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    If you look at the base you will see small holes. I just nailed them to the top bar using the frame nails I have. I tried Aradite which worked up to a point but some would just fall off after a few years

  6. #26
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    I have used both small nails and drawing pins. It was pointed out to me recently that you can attach them with a single nail driven through the centre of the base plug rather than trying to get pins in around the base.

  7. #27

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    Quote Originally Posted by Adam View Post
    I think that there is an advantage to have some brood in the apidea to 'anchor' some bees in the colony
    Adam - I would agree and amplify this comment, and it's not just important on mating flights. I focus on keeping my Apideas brood-right once i'm past the first cycle of queen raising - in a normal year (not this one!) I'd expect at least four cycles of mating per mininuc. Keeping colonies brood-right is important for keeping colonies contented, replenished, and reducing absconding, and of course avoiding laying workers.

    One of the important management tasks, therefore, is the redistribution of brood during Apidea inspections. Colonies which have experienced queen failure (emergence/mating/laying) and which remain broodless will dwindle and lose cohesion; colonies with laying queens will rapidly run out of space. I like to keep my queens in Apideas until I see a good pattern of sealed brood. Hence moving a frame of sealed brood and stores into a queenless colony will bolster them and quickly enhance cohesion, provided there are sufficient bees to look after the brood.

    Another important task is the management of adult populations. A weak and a strong colony can be safely swapped in the evening, provided that neither has a virgin awaiting mating. By 'strong' I mean stuffed with bees, plenty of sealed brood. This can also help in keeping the strong colony populations manageable (think absconding risk) and bolstering the weaker colonies so that they are better able to maintain queen cells, queens, or brood.

    In both these operations, we are breaking some of the hygiene rules which have been drummed into us as good beekeepers: we are spreading brood and bees freely between colonies! It's about understanding the provenance of the bees and the nature of the risk. Recall the source of the bees in the apideas: they would have come from strong, healthy colonies, probably a small number (one?!) of colonies used to fill a large number of apideas. Thus we started with bees from a small number of known-healthy colonies. Provided we tolerate no signs of disease within apideas, then we can exchange material between our apideas. This assumes that we are familiar with the signs of all common diseases, and take the time to look for those signs, of course.

    With these simple management steps I keep my apideas 'on the boil' throughout the summer. I'm running similar numbers to Jon, do not use the entrance queen excluders, and suffer from very low levels of absconding. I plan on 50% graft-to-mated success rate, and usually achieve 60-65%. This year the success rate is shockingly low, principally due to very erratic cell starter/finishers under the influence of fluctuating weather

    Er, by the way: Hello

  8. #28
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    Dan, I concur with both your main points above, redistributing brood to apideas which have lost a queen and swapping places as well.
    We have had atrocious weather this year but the queens are flying and mating which has surprised me. I put another 14 cells into apideas earlier this evening and I have 16 more to do tomorrow.
    An apidea without brood or a virgin seem to go laying worker in about 3 weeks or less if unattended.
    Last edited by Jon; 11-07-2011 at 09:37 PM.

  9. #29
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    I put about 30 cells into apideas last Wednesday and Thursday. I think there was only one which failed to hatch.

    queen cells after queen emerged.jpg hatched queen cells.jpg

  10. #30
    Senior Member Adam's Avatar
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    Hi Dan,
    Hi Jon,

    Yes I move brood about too. Small nucs can get congested very quickly.

    I have one where - I suspect - a second queen flew in with her entourage. (There is a quite empty and queenless mini-nuc 50 feet away). It is absolutely stuffed so there is no way I can look for a queen. All I have to hand is a second mini-nuc which I have gaffa-taped onto the top of the original one. This will give them space to sort themselves out so I can then see what's what - although there will be brace comb all over the place.

    Something I have noticed a couple of times with newly-charged mini-nucs and foundation only:- The bees have congregated in the food area and not on the comb with the queencell. On one occasion the queen emerged (a day later than her sisters) but never mated. On the other occasion the queen failed to emerege and was dead in the cell. My conclusion is that both the queens were duff and the bees knew it. (A good queencell will have bees crawling all over it very quickly).

    For me, my planned queen-rearing has finished. I have some queens in mini-nucs; but probably more than I need.
    Last edited by Adam; 12-07-2011 at 10:08 AM. Reason: typos

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