apidea management and grafting photos

[Jon]

The graft frame and cups need to put in the cell raiser colony for a few hours before use to acquire the scent of the colony.

graft frame and cups in colony.jpg

During grafting I cover the cell raiser colony with a cloth to avoid clunking about with a crown board and unnecessarily crushing bees.

cell raiser with cover cloth.jpg

Loading the apideas can be a chore. the worst part is shaking bees for filling.

loading apideas.jpg

I have over 50 set out at the allotment.

apideas-allotment.jpg

Producing the right sort of drone in large quantities is crucial. I checked several colonies earlier today and they were bunged with drones and had drone larvae all stages. If I doubt a colony I never let it make its own drone brood. I transfer over drone brood from preferred colonies and that keeps everyone happy.
I usually put super frames in the brood box for the bees to draw comb below. This year I have experimented by letting them draw their own comb in frames reinforced by fishing line. It seems to work well.

frame-natural drawn comb fishing line.jpg