The weather has been such that we're seeing queens laying well within a couple of weeks of emerging so hopefully all will go well for these too. Most of this batch are the same colouration although I've spotted one with much stronger orange although she has the same striping.
Following on from our last post, things are progressing nicely; cell opened and queen at large. She'll be left well alone for a couple of weeks now -there's not a lot we can do but wait.
The weather has been such that we're seeing queens laying well within a couple of weeks of emerging so hopefully all will go well for these too. Most of this batch are the same colouration although I've spotted one with much stronger orange although she has the same striping.
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Spent some time transferring queen cells into their mating nucs today, this batch will hopefully mate as successfully as the previous ones; such great weather for getting queens mated.
You'll notice that we don't use the plastic cell cups which are so popular these days; nothing against them but I can make wax cups as quickly as I can clean the plastic ones and I get a lot more enjoyment out of making them than I ever did when I had to clean the plastic ones. Also, I'm guaranteed to loose the plastic cups the moment that I put them down somewhere! It may seem that all of our queens are of an orange variety, giving rise to the usual mixed appearance of the workers that we become so used to seeing but occasionally we find a throwback to a more uniform appearance, in this case the entire colony has a dark look about it, very 'carnica' like.
Below is a photo of the frames that they're on at present; a very basic construction put together out of cheap timber using our frame assembly jig which we blogged about last year. We over wintered them on five of these half size frames (approx area equal to two and a half langstroth combs) in an OSB box. At present they're being used to build more mating nuc combs for use in July. Back in the spring we did a short post about some small mating nucs which we'd built entirely from scrap wood; small off-cuts which were far too small for anything else we could think of at the time. We're now seeing the first of them finally put into use... Always lovely to see a new queen laying.
Total cost in financial terms? A few pence for the nails and a tiny amount of syrup just to give them a foothold when they were initially made up. I can't remember a spring when there have been so many queen wasps lurking around the hives. Earlier today I was lucky enough to catch this photo of two queens in the apiary. Much as I come to hate the wasps every year once we reach late Summer, I can't help admiring them throughout the rest of the year. Took an opportunity today to have a look at a couple of colonies, nice to see a generally good build-up; some are always ahead of others or at least, that's how they look at a glance but we do get a 'feel' for the one's that are 'right' even if at present they appear to be behind others in the apiary; so long as there's no underlying problem we know that they'll be OK. No equalizing here, let them build up at their own pace and watch, observe the outcome. Like so many other beekeepers we have a herd of very diverse genetic heritage so instead of trying to force them into a predetermined schedule why not attempt to harness their own innate qualities? Do you overwinter 'spare' queens? Each year we try to leave a queen in each of our larger mating nucs as an insurance policy against winter losses; a spare queen at this time of year can save an otherwise good stock that has a drone-laying queen. Of course, we usually have plenty left over which we can then use to head increase nucs in May. Another advantage is that this method keeps the mating nuc frames stocked so when the time comes to place the first batch of queen cells we don't have the hassle of restocking empty mating boxes. Considering the winter which these small wooden nucs have been subjected to (relentless easterly winds for over two months) they seem to be doing really well for themselves. The frames are approximately the same size as a half length dadant shallow (langstroth medium) frame. The box in this photo holds eight frames during the winter months but is large enough to receive a central division board later in the season so that we have two four frame mating nucs in each box. For now, here are a few more general photos, it's great to look through the seasons photos at this time of year. A little light relief, just a few photos from our year album. |
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