The Basingstoke Beekeeper

Spring 2000

Contents

Apiary Update
Stoneleigh
AGM
HoneyShow
Library
New Queen, New Comb 1
New Queen, New Comb 2
GM Pollen and Honey
Study Centre
A Dying Hive
Emergency Queens
Cleaning A Solar Wax Melter
Recipe
Sorry

Apiary Update

Dave Purchase,
Apiary Manager and Seasonal Bee Inspector

You will recall that in my last report I described how Association Colony No. 1 at St. John's Copse appeared to be queenless for the second time this year. A final inspection at the end of September confirmed my suspicions.

What to do? Clearly it was far too late to raise a new queen. It might have been possible to buy a new queen - what an irony that would have been given that the colony had been used for queen rearing earlier in the season. I was reluctant to spend Association money when a failed introduction (there is always a risk) would have been more difficult to rectify so late on.

In the event, I decided to unite it with Colony No. 2 which itself had been queenless earlier in the season and was not quite as strong as I would have liked. Now we have a single, but strong and well provisioned, colony which hopefully will overwinter well.

Another sad tale. For the second time in as many years, the Association colony at Breach Farm was robbed of its modest honey crop by wasps finding a way into the super after the clearer board had been fitted. There was no obvious point of entry. The super was old (a Modified Dadant) but had been examined before use in the light of the previous incident when a joint had sprung.

Attendances at some of last year's apiary meetings were very poor. On the plus side, the queen rearing proved, once again, to be very popular.

In recent years limited manpower and, to a lesser extent, equipment have been spread rather too thinly in pursuit of several goals (i.e., honey production, Queen rearing, education and training). In future, priority will be given to education and training, leading hopefully to a beginners' course utulising the new Study Centre as well as Association colonies.

A straw poll has suggested that Saturday afternoon is still the most popular time for an apiary meeting. Therefore, this year's meetings will be held in St. John's Copse at 2.30 pm on the first Saturday of each month, starting 1st April. If the weather is doubtful, by all means check with me beforehand on 781288.

Please check your colonies for signs of American and European Foulbrood when carrying out you spring inspections. Don't hesitate to call me if you see anything that worries you.

To reduce the risk of disease, clean or replace floors and brood boxes and replace at least one third (preferably all) of the old brood comb.

Happy beekeeping!

Dave Purchase

Visit Stoneleigh

Sunday 16th January

We are organising a coach to take us to Stoneleigh this year.

The coach will leave from Down Grange front car park at 7am, leaving Stoneleigh for the return journey at 5pm.

Coach travel is free for members and their families and admission for the show is £ 6 in advance or £ 8 on the door.

Non-members will be charged £ 5 for the coach and £ 6 in advance for admission, i.e. £ 11 in total.

All monies to be paid to Christine MacKinnon by the end of March, please.

The Officers of the Association for the current year are as follows:

• President: Charles Oliver-Bellasis
• Chairman: Chris Mounty/Peter MacKinnon
• Secretary: Christine MacKinnon
• Treasurer: Norman Hughes
• Apiary Manager: David Purchase
• Other: Peter MacKinnon
• Other: Tony Burton
• Other: June Hughes
• Spray Liaison: June Hughes
• Delegate: Norman Hughes
• Delegate: John Furzey

Membership remains unchanged

Honeyshow Trophies

Mid Southern Counties Cup

for classes 1 to 6; Ron Brown

Hector Albery Shield

for classes 7 to 9; June Hughes.

Munroe Kerr Cup

for classes 12 to 15; Sue Scott

Honey for Sale Vase

Norman and June Hughes

Best in Show

Ron Brown for his soft set honey.

Library

A while back we set up a beekeeping library as a memorial to the late Garth Lewis.

Unfortunately that library became dispersed and I would very much like to collect it together again to restore both that tribute to an old friend and a useful Association resource.

If you have any of the books from the original library, any further books or other media that you would like to loan or donate to the library, or if you are prepared to be the librarian, please contact me.

Thanks,

Gordon Scott

New Comb, New Queen 1

by Gordon Scott

As I indicated in last the issue, I've been considering how the timing of Beulah Cullen's new year, new comb philosophy and Bill Dartnall's Early Queens technique might fit together,

Beulah advocates moving colonies to new comb every year by giving them new foundation and a modest feed of light (1:1) syrup around mid-March.

Not long after that, Bill begins his early queens method when the first of the drones appear in early April, raising new queens for the current season. And that process also results in the creation of new comb.

Sitting down with pencil and paper suggests that my ideal timings where the new combs colonies become the mating colonies seems too dangerous. To do this, I think one would either have to start queen rearing very early, or start the new comb procedure late. My experiences with the latter suggest that one risks triggering swarming behaviour by upsetting the balance just as they're thinking about it themselves.

A better strategy might be to mate the queens first and introduce them a little later. That's a shame because it adds further delays, but I can't yet see a better alternative.

I shall presume then that we start the new comb procedure in mid March as normal. That means that the queens go into the top box towards the end of March.

Bill's queen rearing depends upon the availability of drones!, so cannot safely start until you can see a few, though we could gamble on an earlier start if we don't mind failure. Most colonies try to keep a few even in the winter, just in case. Drones should start to appear in modest quantity in early April, building rapidly ready for swarming (it's what they do).

Let's run through some dates, using 2000 as a pragmatic example.

If we split the new comb colonies on the 18th and move the queens up into the top box on 25th, the last bottom-box workers should emerge on the 15th April, give or take a little. Drones would be a couple of days later. By that time, the queen should have laid up much of the top brood box and most of the colony will be with her.

Now if you started queen rearing around the first of April and if you have drones around, you might well try replacing the queen in a new comb colony with a queen cell, but it's definitely a risk. If she fails to mate you have to get a good queen from somewhere. Of course if you kept the old queen in a split, you can probably just back-track a bit, but at that time of year, you may not have had enough bees.

Making splits that early might also be a risk unless your colonies are already quite strong.

So I think it's probably better to mate your new queens separately and replace them in the usual way, probably around the end of April.

New Comb, New Queen 2

by Gordon Scott

A method of swarm control that's popular with many American bee farmers is to make Spring splits. There are several ways of doing this, but I'll concentrate around a couple.

Firstly I should explain what I mean by making a split. This is simply the process of dividing a colony into two or more smaller colonies. It can be used as a swarm control technique, or as a means of making increase (getting more colonies).

One method involves dividing a colony into two halves during swarm preparations, when you keep one good queen cell per half and knock down all the others. Put the two halves each into their own hive and make up to size with new comb or foundation. If you began your season building new comb the Beulah way, you'll have nice new drawn comb for this bit.

Another method involves dividing a colony into two halves before swarm preparations, in which case either you rely on the queenless half raising an emergency queen, or you introduce a queen or cell from your queen rearing. Emergency queens can be poor and if you choose this method, it often pays to revisit the colony five or six days later and knock down the first few emergency cells that are capped. This helps to avoid under fed queens. As with Bill Dartnall's early queen rearing method, don't try and raise queens until you have some drones. Once again, use that new comb.

A third method involves dividing a colony into many parts during swarm preparations. This involves at least (and typically) four new colonies and in this case, the hives for the new colonies are set up in a circle around the donor colony, entrances facing towards the centre.

In this case you keep one good queen cell per new colony, each cell on its own frame, and knock down all the others. Gently shake most of the bees into the centre of the circle so you can more easily see the queen cells. Then place the cell frame in the centre of a new colony box and sandwich it between combs from the donor colony. If you make more than four new colonies, you'll have to use just two combs per colony. Fill the remainder of the space in each new colony with new comb or foundation and empty any remaining bees into the center of the circle. By using four or more new colonies, the bees tend to share themselves out fairly evenly between the new colonies. Any fewer and they tend to favour just one new box.

Each of these methods creates a nucleus colony, a small colony that will build up over the year, but is unlikely to get a good honey crop unless you feed them to build them quickly. However, once your new queens are mated, you can requeen your unsplit colonies, either using a queen cage, or by uniting them. If you correctly planned the number of frames of foundation when you made the nuclei, this is your opportunity to remove the last of your old comb.

GM Pollen and Honey

The following letter has been received from MAFF

I am writing to let you know that the article in the Daily Mail of 22 October 1999, concerning the labeling of honey which may contain small amounts of GM material, was inaccurate in a number of significant respects. The position at present is described below.

As you may be aware, all GM crops intended for deliberate release in this country and in the rest of the European Community, have to be thoroughly assessed for human and environmental safety before they are allowed to be planted. This assessment includes safety implications of any exposure to pollen through ingestion or inhalation from the air, or as a result of its landing on other crops. There should not therefore, be any safety concerns arising from the possible inclusion of any very small amounts of pollen in honey.

As far as labeling is concerned, the EC Commission has stated that honey unintentionally containing pollen as a result of bees feeding on GM crops does not constitute a novel food within the meaning of the Novel Food and Novel Food Ingredients Regulations (258/97). If honey is not considered to be a novel food, then the labeling requirements in these regulations do not apply.

The only other labeling regulations for GM materials in foods in existence at the present time are those relating to Monsanto's GM soya and Novartis' GM maize (1139/98). As neither of these crops is being grown in this country, honey produced here would not need to be labeled. Furthermore, an EC Commission regulation was agreed in Brussels on 21 October that will set a threshold for adventitious contamination of non-GM food ingredients by GM soya or maize, below which the labeling will not be required, of 1%. This is many times greater than the maximum level of transgenic pollen likely to be present in honey as a result of bees feeding on transgenic crops.

Dr. J. R. Bell, Head of the Additives and Novel Foods Division, MAFF.

Study Centre

Our First Meeting At Our Study Centre

The 10th February saw a new beginning, our very first meeting in our study centre. We invited Dr Beulah Cullen, our Regional Bee Disease Inspector, to come and talk to us about Microscopy, and what a great evening we had, there were seven of us in total, and after Beulah had explained the fundamentals of the microscopes, we set to work, using the Association's dissecting microscopes, we all had a go at dissecting some bees to see if we could find acarine, fortunately we didn't as they were Beulah's bees. We then had a general look at bees' wings, legs, pollen baskets and not forgetting the varroa mites, Chrissie MacKinnon and I enjoyed looking at the flower petals and stamens, the flowers really came alive seeing them for the first time in 3D.

Beulah also brought her compound microscope along with some slides showing nosema. Norman and I took some of our slides along showing a worker bee's ovaries and sting.

We all had a very enjoyable evening, and all are looking forward to the next one, why not join us next time?

David Purchase and Norman travelled to Chippenham on Friday to buy the Association's own Compound microscope, together with a kit on making mounts of honey bee worker parts, so watch this space for dates.

June

A Dying hive

(from March 1999)

Alan Pagliere email@omitted.anti.spam

I am a hobbyist. One hive last year. Planning two this year.

I took advantage of the weather yesterday to peek inside my one hive. The colony that seemed very, very strong during a warmish day last month is pretty much dead. There was a lot of water, condensation. There were lots of stores, they had taken some of the honey, but not that much.

My theory at the moment, barring any diseases, of which there doesn't seem to be any evidence (question on this later), is that I left too much space on the hive for them to keep warm and ventilate.

I saw no cluster of bees as such. Just a few up in the honey stores eating, many dead ones here and there and a few small groups of live bees here and there. I don't believe there was a queen or any live brood.

So, I think the colony is dead. I thought I would ask here and see what people think. I believe I left too much space for them to keep warm and ventilate. I wanted to give them lots of stores, but I think I overdid it and just wound up freezing the poor girls. Very sad. And if that is indeed what I did wrong, it won't happen again. What say ye? Is that likely what my problem was?

I did see what seemed to be water in some of the cells. I assume that if water condenses in the hive, it can condense and gather in cells as well as anywhere else. Is that right?

I did see a few cells, not many, with what used to be brood. Sitting in what seemed to be water in the cells was something that looked like small white bits. Almost like grits or couscous, for lack of a better description. Were these just semi-dissolved larvæ? I am trying to determine if what I saw is a sign of some disease.

I'm only slightly worried that the imminent death of the colony is due to some disease. I did do the Apistan thing last fall, and, looking at some books, I didn't see (or smell) what I might consider symptoms of the usual foulbroods. If there was a disease, I assume I should worry about re-using the comb or frames, etc.

I've already ordered a queen and a package for what was going to be my second hive. I guess I'll just order another set and start two from scratch (but with some drawn and used comb...?).

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Alan Pagliere; Ann Arbor, MI

Lloyd Spear email@omitted.anti.spam

Alan asks about his hive that appeared very strong a month ago, and is now virtually dead. He suspects he left too much room for them to heat.

Alan, if you think about it I think you will agree that a month ago, when the hive was strong, you had all ready been through the worst part of your winter in Ann Arbor. The bees survived those temperatures just fine, and the amount of space in the hive had no effect on their ability to keep warm!

By suspending thermometers inside wintering hives, studies have shown that the bees only keep their cluster warm; they do not attempt to keep the total hive space warm. Therefore you giving them a lot of honey and room did not have an adverse effect.

Based on your description, the bees almost certainly died of excess moisture inside the hives. Now, "moisture" does not hurt. However, the moisture permits growth of other ugly things, principally bacteria and molds, and these kill bees! The moisture is caused because the bees eat all winter long, and use the food to "shiver", creating heat, which warms the cluster. This same heat causes condensation. As a beekeeper one must allow this moist heat to escape the hive. Dry cold does not hurt bees, condensation kills them!

There are many many ways of allowing the moist air to escape the over wintering hive. I will list some of them and make some comments:

• Drill a 1" auger hole above the hand hold on the top hive body. This is what I do. The disadvantages are that you are putting a hole in your new wood and as you move equipment around the hole may be where you don't want it.
• Prop up the outer cover about 1/8" (3mm) with stones, a piece of wood, etc. This works fine, but you have to be certain that by doing this the cover does not blow off during the winter.
• Cut a gap about 1/4" (6mm) high and 1" (25mm) wide in the outside of the inner cover. This works fine, but if you don't do it to every inner cover you will someday kill a hive because they did not have ventilation and you thought they did.
• Put a 3/8"-1/2" (10..12mm) piece of fiber board underneath the inner cover. This will absorb moisture and it will wick to the outside air. I know a very successful commercial beekeeper who does this with 2,000 hives. The only disadvantage is that the fiber board is another piece of equipment.

You did not mention whether you treated for tracheal mites by using grease patties. If you did not, your bees might have been weakened by these mites, but the amount of moisture you described is almost certainly what killed them.

Lloyd; http://www.rossrounds.com

David Green email@omitted.anti.spam

A post mortem is extremely important, both to protect yourself from future disease, and to learn the cause of death, so you can avoid future losses.

Did the colony have a ventilation hole near the top? Your condensation could indicate a ventilation problem. This is extremely important in cold areas of the US. A strong hive will produce a lot of moisture in the metabolism of honey, and this often freezes on the bottom of the cover, then thaws and drops back on the bees.

When you have a good cluster, most with their heads in the cells, you have starvation. This can happen with a small cluster and a long cold spell, where bees got separated from their honey. They can move up to honey in cold, but not sideways.

You indicate no general cluster, so I would discount starvation. Another clue is the scattered bees you mention. We saw a lot of hive losses during the tracheal mite era, in which the bees abandoned the cluster and could be found in scattered groups throughout the hive. I believe US stocks are gradually becoming more resistant to tracheal mites, and consider tracheal mite treatments to be a negative, in that development of resistance is delayed. I prefer not to buy queens from breeders who treat for tracheal mites. Hawaiian queens have never had the weak stuff sorted out at all, and are extremely susceptible. (Sorry to you Hawaiian breeders, but it is a fact). So TM may be a possibility.

Too much space over the bees? Do you mean empty comb? Empty supers should never be left on the bee during cold weather. But you imply that it was honey stores, in which case it does not function as a negative heat loser, but rather a positive heat storage device.

You didn't leave supers on with an excluder? The bees will move up, and the queen will be left to freeze below the excluder. (Okay, I admit it, I've done it; a BIG tuition expense in The University of the Seat of the Pants!)

The bees can put it there, as well as uncapped honey they are preparing to use, which would look like water.

In honey cells the small white bits could be crystallized honey. But I think you are referring to actual brood cells, and I am a little puzzled here. Starving bees will suck the body fluids from brood, but it will not be in "small white bits." The brood would be intact, except shriveled, unless the bees recovered and began to dismember and carry out the pupæ.

Small white particles along the sides of the cells, could be varroa feces. You indicated treatment, so I would think not, unless you treated very late, or did not have the strips in the cluster, or had fluvalinate-resistant mites.

Larger white lumps, one to a cell, might indicate chalkbrood, though usually a hive that is susceptible to chalkbrood will not survive until late in winter. Look for pictures in Morse's bee disease book, or show the frame to an experienced beekeeper.

On the pollination home page, under buying used equipment, is a photo of AFB scale in the comb. The frame is held upside down for better light, so look at the tops of the cells in the lower, clearer part of the photo.

If you see scale, do not reuse the frames, as you will just reinfect more bees. If there is no AFB, no other cause of death would prevent reuse of the equipment.

There is one other cause of loss that is frequently not recognized. If your bees took a pesticide hit back last summer, then appeared to recover in the fall, they may have stored away poisoned pollen, covered with fresh. They are extremely vulnerable to this poison during late winter, when brood rearing commences, and there is no fresh pollen to dilute the poison effect. You can test for this by selecting a frame with a lot of pollen from this deadout, and putting it right next to the brood in a healthy hive. If you see spotty brood on the adjacent frame, like you see with a failing queen, in a couple days, you know the pollen is contaminated, and young brood is dying and being removed.

It is hard to diagnose from afar. I can only give you clues. I feel strongly about knowing the cause of death, and those which I cannot determine to my satisfaction really bother me. I hope you can figure it out.

If there is no AFB, save the honey from any robber bees and use it to get your new hive(s) off to a quicker start.

It is interesting, here in South Carolina, where the bees probably haven't had 10 days they couldn't fly, robbers will often not bother an undisturbed deadout, even if it has quite a bit of honey. But once it is opened, or moved, watch out!. I had a deadout on the truck the other day, not remembering that it had some honey in it. I didn't take the truck in the morning, but returned to a madhouse of robber bees working on the hive in my driveway. Good way to terrorize the neighborhood! Fortunately the neighbors were at work.

Dave Green; http://www.pollinator.com

John Mesinger email@omitted.anti.spam

Bees in nature don't have as many problems as some beekeepers add. I think too much water suggests just the opposite of what you speculate happened. Bees keep the hive warm in winter. To do this they eat stores and release water vapor. You do need to arrange for somewhere to let it out. I would suggest you screen the hole in the inner cover, add an Imrie shim above it, with several 1/2" (12mm) in holes on each side, screened on the inside to keep other bees and bugs out, and restrict the lower entrance somewhat. Tilt the hive a few degrees forward. You should have a dry hive in the future.

Cordially, John F. Mesinger

Alan Pagliere email@omitted.anti.spam

Thanks to all that responded, on and off the list, to my post about my colony. Among the responses were two very kind offers to come look at the hive, one from Don Rahman in Toledo and one from Ted Fischer in Dexter, MI. I took up Mr. Fischer's offer since he is relatively speaking just down the road. Here's the diagnosis.

My worry about too much space left on the hive for the bees to warm was, as seen from many posts, unfounded. Bees warm their cluster and do not warm the rest of the hive.

What I was, in my inexperience and ignorance, worried was some kind of decaying brood was in fact crystallized honey (I had never seen crystallized honey so white - now I know better).

The entrance reducer on the bottom had a small opening, not big enough for a mouse but big enough for ventilation. The top super had a hole (about 3/4" (18mm)) drilled in the front (the bees always use that as an alternate entrance). The inner cover had the usual semicircle cut out on one side (which the bees also use as an entrance from time to time). I had thought that would be adequate ventilation, but I suppose not.

Here is the real story. When Mr. Fischer and I opened up the hive on Saturday, we found more activity, more population, than I had seen a few days earlier. Not a lot of bees mind you, but some. He noticed a queen, young, small, and as I looked at her, I noticed she was not marked. My original queen had been. There was a small cluster of brand new eggs nicely laid in an area in the lower of the two supers.

Here is the theory. The original queen was superseded very, very late last season. Not late enough to prevent her from mating however. Since it was too late for her to start laying, the population dwindled faster than it might have otherwise. I also think it must have been very late, because during my last fall visit to the hive, I noticed no signs of supersedure in the form of cells.

Anyways, now, coming out of the worst of the winter, the bees are starting up, the queen has started laying. There was no brood, there were only a few eggs, and clearly on a couple of days old.

Since there is a queen who has started laying, and since there seem to be just enough bees to start a colony (almost as if I had just bought a package), we decided to remove one of the two deep brood boxes I had (will save for my new hive since it has lots of pollen and honey), dump all the bees into the one remaining deep, put on an excluder and then put the two supers with capped honey on top of that. I will probably lose the few eggs in the super comb, but it is a very small loss compared to the benefit of getting the queen laying back in the brood area where all the pollen is. Another thing done was to shim up the back of the bottom board to help tilt the hive forward and drain moisture.

So. All is not as dire as I had thought. The hive is weak but not diseased. Small new queen, but laying. seems well. The cause of my problems were likely not disease, but just mediocre ventilation and a strange bit of timing, where the queen was superseded very late in the season.

So, several lessons learned here for all you other hobbyist/beginners. Tilt your hive forward, ventilate better than you think you should, and whenever possible, get the on-location advice of an experienced beekeeper, especially one like Mr. Fischer.

Thanks again.

Alan Pagliere; Ann Arbor

Emergency Queens

A Discussion from bee-l on the pros and cons of emergency queens

Remember when reading this that commercially produced US queens are lower-cost than ours and are often as a consequence less reliable. For example, if you buy a queen from John Furzey, you can be sure she's mated and laying. In the US, to reduce costs, the producers pack the queens to time, not necessarily to laying!

Allen Dick email@omitted.anti.spam

We have discussed emergency queens here from time to time, and the consensus is that emergency queens can be inferior to other queens.

The belief is that, when faced with a sudden queen loss, the bees may choose larvæ that are older than the optimal age for making queens. These queens then will have a head start on any younger queens that may be started and thus emerge first. The result is a partially intercaste queen that lacks capacity and longevity and perhaps some of the requisite pheromones.

Having said that, I do know that Charles Mraz had a system that was entirely dependent on emergency queen rearing and that I also used one for several years commercially without any apparent ill effects.

So what I am wondering is this: what is the evidence? What proof is there that, indeed, the bees do an inferior job when faced with an emergency situation? It really does not stand to reason in that the bees have relied on this mechanism -- along with the two others -- for queen replacement for eons.

Does anyone have any references or personal experience that confirms that the results of emergency queen rearing are indeed inferior?

email@omitted.anti.spam

If they are raised during a flow and plenty of food is coming in the unmated queen is fat dumb and happy. If the weather and the availability of drones is favorable you get good queens.

If any of the three are lacking you get runts and poor mating and eventual collapse or supersedure.

Michael Palmer email@omitted.anti.spam

Bill Mraz, son of Charlie, still relies on emergency queens. Never buys any queens. Makes spring nucs, and lets the bees raise their own. Works well for him. Saw some brood patterns last summer, and I was impressed. Mike

Tom Elliott; email@omitted.anti.spam

I have often requeened using an ``emergency'' queen method, but going back four days after pulling the old queen, you will find fully capped queen cells. This suggests that you have older larvæ being put into service. I have not ever allowed one of these prematurely capped cells to mature so I do not have any evidence in that respect.

I would add that it does stand to reason that any queen, even a poor one will serve in an emergency. All it would take would be one good egg to produce a new supersedure cell and queen.

``Test everything. Hold on to the good.'' (1 Thessalonians 5:21)

Tom Elliott; Chugiak, Alaska

David Eyre email@omitted.anti.spam

It seems to me that whenever I've left an emergency queen it's not long before the bees replace her. But unfortunately if the emergency queen was aggressive then the supersedure queen does not improve, whereas grafted queens from the original mother are almost a carbon copy.

Allen Dick email@omitted.anti.spam

There's enough here to keep me hammering away at this, and my reasoning does not prove that there is necessarily anything wrong with the cells sealed after four days...

Let's walk through the whole thing:

From Laidlaw's 'Contemporary Queen Rearing'

Now, let's look at the above and reason thus:

• We dequeen a hive and it takes a day to realise that and start cells.
• When it does start, it uses 2 day old larvæ (the oldest suitable)
• Two days later they are capped (see above)
• On day four the beekeeper comes and sees capped cells.

That is as it should bee. Isn't it?

Okay. I'm getting pretty deep into this and it looks more and more as if the bad press for emergency queens is largely superstition and misunderstanding. (I'm sure that this misunderstanding was not strongly opposed and questioned by queen breeders).

I went to to A I Root's 1891 edition (2nd) of the ABC and can see where the whole thing may have started. BTW, he is a very lucid and delightful writer; the pedantic prose that taints later editions is missing and he writes from careful and keen observation.

Without quoting at length, he observes ``... bees, especially when deprived of their queens unnaturally, and broken up into small colonies, as beginners are very apt to have them, in order to raise a queen, often select a worker-larva so old that the queen raised from it is about half worker and half queen.''

and

``So far as I have been able to make out, these half-worker queens are the result of trying to raise a queen when there are too few bees or when the larvæ with which they are obliged to rear a queen are too old: that is too nearly ready to seal up. Where they can do no better, they will undertake to rear a queen from a larva only one day before sealing up... ''

Manley has a poor opinion of emergency raised queens, but does not seem to have tried them much.

The Hive and the Honeybee specifies that the bees will choose a day-old larva. The assumption is that such an egg is available.

Other texts seem indifferent on emergency queens and do not seem to treat them specially.

In my own experience, emergency queens reared in the spring and when the hives are well fed and populous normally are laying prolifically by 21 days after the dequeening that caused their production.

Moreover, there seems to be a pent-up recoil action that propels them ahead, since the bees have had time to lay in good stores of pollen and conserved their strength during the no-brood interval and the hives rebound strongly. If splits are made by breaking a two-storey hive in two, the half with the new queen will usually go on to out-pace the half with the old queen within six weeks. The failure rate was quite low, being about ten percent as I recall.

Why do I write this? Well I just saw an email offer from the Argentinian source that seems bent on underbidding everyone and driving the price [of honey] to rock bottom, and it was at 62.5c Canadian (That's 42c US, folks [about 30p UK!]) If that is the current price of honey, I've gotta cut costs NOW, and one place to look is at that $ 20,000 Canadian worth of queens I was planning on...

allen

email@omitted.anti.spam

I have seen some sorry queens produced from emergency cells in midsummer here when the old queen is failing. Usually in July, there is almost no flow, and I have seen symptoms of starvation in some hives in a hot, dry year. Of course I cannot separate the effect from the heavy doses of insecticide on cotton bloom all through the area, and this may be the reason, both for the queen failure and for the failure of the young queens.

On the other hand, my first beekeeping mentor used to raise all his own queens from emergency cells. He would start splitting around March 25, whenever the first flow started here in South Carolina, and finish up about a month later. The biggest drawback was that we had to find each queen (more than 1000). The old queens got two frames of sealed brood, a frame of honey, and the field force. Toward the end of the period, she would get three frames. These were then taken north for apple pollination about May 5 -10 and usually were very strong.

The rest of the brood went into 5 frame nucs. All were made the same, with three frames of brood, making sure there were some eggs, one frame of honey, and one frame of comb or foundation. These were carried to another yard. He did not do any selection, unless the old queen was obviously failing. There were still a lot of the old German black bees around here then, and he had some seriously mean stock (a baptism of fire for a new beekeeper).

But the queen was usually a well fed, well bred one. I think the key was that he always did it on the spring flow, when bees are predisposed to raise queens anyway and drones were plentiful.

I still raise some this way, but I prefer to use cells. I started off using grafted cells, and still do some, but more often have plenty of swarm cells. If I have has swarm cells, I do not look for the queen. I just divvy up the brood frames so that each nuc gets a cell. If there are several on a frame, I may cut one or two off and push the top of the cell into a frame of brood. I've had good results that way.

I don't automatically use cells from every colony. If a colony is mean, has chalkbrood, or looks and smells poor, I will use the brood, but make sure they have a cell from better stock. I don't do any selection for color. Just health, productivity, gentleness. I like to pop the cover and see bees spill over the edge of the box. Nice smelling, clean looking bees...! In the spring, I like to see lots of fat healthy drones, also. A hive that isn't raising drones is suspect...

Dave Green; SC USA

Allen Dick email@omitted.anti.spam

Thanks for the reply Dave. Now that you mention it, I do recall that you have been talking up the use of swarm cells. My son likes to use them too, and guess where he learned that?

I wonder if you recall what percent of the queenless splits managed to raise queens, and what was the typical failure rate? I can't recall myself, and that would be of considerable interest here right now. I remember it was not ever very large if the splits were made on a spring flow, but forget the numbers.

I gather your preference for using cells is that the time without brood is reduced? In my experience it takes about 11 days to get a laying pattern from a ripe cell vs. 21 for a dequeened hive, and that 10 day difference can be important when building for a flow or pollination contract.

[I too have had good results pushing the top of a cut cell into a frame of brood.]

I wonder if you worry about the age of a cell when handling it? Of course, one cannot know that information when finding them in a hive unless they are just being sealed, or about to emerge -- or can one? Does it worry you at all? I never gave it any consideration whatsoever, but the texts do caution about handling cells at some stages. Naturally, we don't bang them around much.

One of the reasons I decided to forsake buying queens in any large number is that I had bad wintering losses in a few yards and the location leads me to believe that it might be from the queen stock we used for splits. Maybe they are poor winterers or maybe they cannot handle the tracheal mite. Whatever the reason, I think we paid for this loss and there is no reason to repeat the error now that the losers are culled. If we breed from good survivors, we should see continuing improvement.

Each spring we find that only about 40% of the overwintered hives are splittable, and I always wonder about the rest. I always wonder if we have some hives that just manage to make it through the year and winter nicely, without making a contribution to our income. Pollination contracts make this less of a worry, though, since it is hive numbers we hare paid for and honey production is of less importance.

allen

email@omitted.anti.spam

[My mentor] got very good results if the weather for the mating flight was good. I think over 90% during good weather. A week long cold or rainy spell would give a lot of drone layers. Some would start okay, but be drone layers in a month or two. Bad weather is unusual here by the time of the first good flow.

As you point out, not all cells are ``ripe.''

Gentle is the word. We don't even tip them upside down, unless they are obviously near hatch.

I believe it to be true [that if we breed from good survivors, we should see continuing improvement]. You will gradually adapt the bees to your conditions --- and your management style... Also, I try not to buy from queen breeders who treat for tracheal mite, but some will lie about it. Most years I do introduce some new queens, just to keep from getting stagnant (or perhaps I should say inbreeding).

I ``rejected'' a colony for breeding today. They were a two story colony, loaded with queen cells and looking real nice. Brood pattern was very good, no chalkbrood, lots of pollen and nectar in the brood cell corners. But they were savage! They backed me off four times, and that is really rare. I put on a long sleeve shirt, and carefully tucked it in. I was wishing I had some sleevies with me, because that's where they were heading. I also had a hole in my veil, which normally I just don't pay much attention to, but these guys were really good at finding it and trying to get into my ears, up my nose, etc. Do you suppose the killer bees have arrived? A couple cells had already hatched and I was only able to find and kill one virgin. I hope she had already done in the other. I never did find the old queen, though I suspect she was there. They probably would have hit the trees today. I destroyed 17 or 18 cells. And I made sure they were destroyed.I know I should have moved the entire hive away from my mating yards, because they still had drones.

I used to have a dozen or more of these snots each spring. I have made it a point to get these requeened whenever possible, and it has been probably three years since I've had a hive back me off. I made four single deep colonies from this one, and gave each a mated, caged queen, plus a frame of brood with eggs, on it, because there were no eggs or young brood. If the old queen was still around, I hope the young one gets her.

Each spring we find that only about 40% of the overwintered hives are splittable, and I always wonder about the rest. I always wonder if we have some hives that just manage to make it through the year and winter nicely, without making a contribution to our income. Pollination contracts make this less of a worry, though, since it is hive numbers we hare paid for and honey production is of less importance.

I have fewer dingalings than I had a few years ago, but I still cannot seem to get a consistent hive. No matter what we do, there are always some drone layers, an occasional snotty one, and (too many) those that just plain do not look good. You can make up 50 hives just as identical as you possibly can, and 40 of those will do fine. Two to four will become drone layers within the year, one or two will get chalkbrood, and the rest will just do poorly and look sick compared to the others. These get requeened in the summer (usually with a nuc) or culled in the fall. But they (dingalings) still show up again the next year.

Dave Green; SC USA

Ronald J. Bogansky email@omitted.anti.spam

I have been reading, and in some cases rereading, all the comments on emergency queens. I really don't have anything new to add but some questions. I guess I am missing something here but where is the connection between a poor, weak, queen and genetic inferiority? For the sake of argument we will say an emergency queen is poor because of the way she was raised, however she still manages to successfully mate and begin laying fertilized eggs. How would the offspring from these eggs differ had she been well nourished? In other words, if we took one of those fertilized eggs and raised it under optimal conditions wouldn't a good queen result? If the answer is yes, then I would think that a poor emergency queen could be superseded resulting in a good queen. If the answer is no, then why not? Are we saying that poor nutrition causes a genetic mutation? I can see that possibly by the time the supersedure queen is being raised there may not be enough young nurse bees left to do a proper job which may result in another poor queen, but this is not because of genetics. I would also think that a poorly raised queen may never successfully mate thus rendering the colony queenless.

One of the first recommendations for a new beekeeper is to start two colonies. There are a number of reasons for this but one was if something happened to one of your queens you would have a source (eggs) to keep that colony going and allow the bees to raise a new one. This may be just folklore but I think it is done successfully enough times to be true.

I guess I am having trouble accepting the fact that all emergency queens are bad just because they are emergency queens. I have split a number of strong colonies over the years with good results. FWIW, I am also seeing a lot of newly purchased queens being superseded after they have been accepted and are laying well. I really can't explain that one.

Ron Bogansky; Kutztown, PA

Allen Dick email@omitted.anti.spam

[I too have been reading] Over and over. Great topic with many viewpoints. Makes one think.

The question we must ask is this:

``Do queens all lay eggs that are of equal weight and quality, or do small weak queens lay smaller, weaker eggs?''

If so, then we also need to ask this:

``Do superior queens that are on the verge of starvation lay inferior eggs?''

And we must remember that in advance of swarming bees tend to reduce the feed to the queen, so:

``Are swarm queens therefore inferior?''

and

``If there are inferior eggs, do they result in inferior offspring even if the larvæ are well fed?''

I can see how it can be reasonably hypothesized that the offspring of poorly fed mothers can be nutritionally deprived also, and that it is not necessary for the genetics to be changed. It's the old phenotype/genotype problem. You would think that such hypothetical malnutrition effects would go away after a generation or two... wouldn't you? The genetics shouldn't change.

If there is any truth to the assertations some have made, apparently on the basis of observation, the explanation I gave above is the only credible argument I can imagine at this point.

My thesis is that you can get good and bad queens by any method. James Bach's tale of woe in regards the Midnites sure struck home here. I really hurt for him when I read of his tribulations.

There were many sad beekeepers heavily out of pocket this spring due to failure of many reputable suppliers to make queens that the bees would accept and keep, and which would perform well.

I personally did a bit of each method and had

• bad losses in the mated queens purchased,
• moderate and unpredictable failures in the grafted cells we introduced and
• apparently good results from the emergency queens.

All the queens -- regardless of source -- took a week longer than usual to get going.

Go figure... As Pooh (an expert on bees) said, ``You never can tell about bees''.

Bill Truesdell mister-email@omitted.anti.spam

I am coming to the conclusion that those who think emergency queens are inferior go by the book and what the book says. And if you look at the case that the books deal with, then I tend to agree that emergency queens will be of lesser quality than superseded queens. In the book there is no outside interference or control. The books deal simply with a failing queen that the bees supersede or the sudden loss of a queen leading to an emergency queen. In the supersedure case, the bees have control and there will be eggs or young larva so the created queen will be half decent. In the sudden loss of a queen, depending on the time of year, the bees may not have as many options.

But put the beekeeper into the equation as the intentional maker of the emergency queen, and the emergency queen should be much better than a supersedure. For example, I wait for a strong honey flow in spring, usually dandelion or clover. The hive is strong. The queen is laying well with lots of eggs and young larva. I put the emergency hive over the laying queen hive so they are warm. And I make sure the emergency hive has loads of bees.

I repeat my observation that my queens are excellent. Once and a while I get a dud, but I had more problems with store bought queens than my emergency queens.

Two years ago, I had one weak queen and figured its hive would die over the winter. Came through fine and finally gave the hive to a friend who lost all his hives regularly over the winter. When I last checked, my hive was still going strong, all from ``inferior'' emergency queens.

I am a hobby beekeeper, not commercial, who relys on emergency queens alone. I have not bought a queen in six years and have only been keeping bees for eight years.

Bill T; Bath, ME

Cleaning A Solar Wax Melter

Tom Barrett email@omitted.anti.spam

Hello All

I am trying to get into shape for the new season just around the corner. To day I decided to clean up the Wax Melter. There is quite a lot of ``gunge'' on the metal surface of the drip tray and with the best will in the world I cannot get it really clean. Can anybody tell me of a solvent which will get rid of all of the dross?. Thanks very much for any help.

Tom Barrett; Dublin, Ireland

John Burgess email@omitted.anti.spam

Try putting your wax in a polythene bag in the solar melter. Make a row of pinholes along the lowest edge (I use an uncapping fork) and the wax will be automatically filtered as it melts, leaving all the dross behind.

If things get *very* hot, the plastic sometimes melts a bit in contact with the metal tray, but it is still easier to clean than without. I suppose that covering the surface of the tray with a sheet of cooking aluminium foil would also work, but without the filtering effect the mesh at the exit would still get clogged.

I did think of trying turkey roasting bags to resist the high temperatures, but they are expensive compared to supermarket shopping bags. I you have enough sunshine this year to melt anything, why not try these ideas and let us know which works best

John Burgess, Editor Gwenynwyr Cymru/The Welsh Beekeeper

mcmanus email@omitted.anti.spam

Hi Tom

I saw your post on the problem of wax removal and I like Aaron would wait for a hot day, but then I was there, so there might be time in waiting for the sun.

If after you have removed all that you can and if you want it real clean. You might try to pick up, from the local candle supplier, (your bee supplier may know) a candle wax remover. The ingredient: D-IIMONENE which is non-toxic and bio-degradable.

While your there, you might want to ask about Mold Release, which is a silicone spray that is used for releasing candles from their molds. You can use this after to coat your metal to prevent sticking.

I you are unable to find these products in Ireland or maybe England, then let me know and I will sent you an E-Mail to put you in touch with a company here in Seattle, Wa.

Joe McManus Bremerton, Wa. USA

Aaron Morris email@omitted.anti.spam

The ``grunge'' on the metal sheet cleans quite easily and nicely when the sun has been shining on the solar melter. Just wait for a warm sunny day (do you get those in early April in Ireland?) and the surface will scrape clean (or nearly so) with a spatula.

Aaron Morris - thinking a nice sunny warm day would be nice!

Recipe

Frijoles; Mexican Beans

Beans are a staple in Mexican cooking. Wash 1lb of red kidney, pinto or black beans and soak them overnight in plenty of water. Add a couple of cloves of garlic, skewered on a cocktail stick and boil the beans at a rolling boil for three hours or until they feel very soft, adding boiling water frequently as needed. Discard the garlic, add 2tsp each of salt and honey and simmer gently for a further ten minutes.

Meanwhile, saute a chopped half onion in a little oil until golden, then add the onion and two whole green chillies to the beans and simmer for a further 15 minutes. Discard the chillies. The mixture should be quite thick. If not, mash some of the beans and simmer a little longer. Cool and refrigerate until required. They keep for around a week.

Frijoles Refritos; Refried Beans

Classic refried beans. In Mexico, beans are fried for each meal and they improve the more often they're fried.

Heat a little oil in a large pan and fry thick slices of half an onion in it until dark brown to flavour the oil. Discard the onions and add around a pint of the Frijoles, mashing them in the pan as they fry. Keep the beans moving, adding extra oil if they begin to stick. The Frijoles Refritos can be served at any consistency from thick porrage to a firm pancake or rissole as desired.

Chiles Rellenos de Frijol; Bean-stuffed Peppers

100ml corn oil; 500g Frijoles Refritos; 6 medium peppers, destalked and deseeded; 3 large onions; 3 green chillies; 900ml vinegar; 30ml honey; 2x5ml oregano, 5ml each of thyme and cumin; 2 bay leaves; salt and black pepper to taste.

Heat the oil in a heavy pan and and saute the peppers and onions until the onions are translucent. Slowly add the vinegar, honey, chillies and all the herbs, then simmer until the peppers are soft. Remove the onions and peppers and simmer until the liquid is reduced by half.

Meanwhile, allow the peppers to cool, removing and blistered skin if you wish. Stuff the peppers with refried beans, arrange them on a serving dish, place the onions on top and cover the whole with the hot spiced vinegar sauce. Allow to cool and then refrigerate for two days before serving.

A wonderful main course for hot summer days and barbequeues.

Sorry Again

... for another missing newsletter. I shall remain extremely busy at least until Christmas 2000 and almost certainly longer, but I'll try to get something out, even if it's thinner than usual.

So a very belated Merry Christmas and Happy new millennium to you all.

Gordon.