> That's pretty impressive for a 4 year old queen!  Surprising to me that 
> she
> could produce a colony large enough to gather such a crop!  No wonder you
> chose her as a breeder!

She had other qualities too, never any sign of disease, always good temper 
(I cleared honey in poor weather conditions with a blower - no smoke, no 
stings).  She was one of a very late batch of queens that I raised starting 
on 29 August.  Everyone told me it was too late, but I wanted to try as 
there are no yellow drones around at that time - only natives.  I put the 
queens in mininucs and then the weather changed - very poor September - and 
by 1 October there were no eggs in any of them.  It was Dave Cushman who 
said just leave them and give them a chance - so I did - nothing to lose. 
On 5 October with the air temperature at 5ºC I saw one of the queens return 
from mating.  A week later the whole batch had eggs which were followed by 
perfect worker brood.  I have to say that I was pretty amazed.  They became 
known as the 'late batch' and have done well for me.  Fortunately I now have 
now only the supersedure queen, but also a great granddaughter of another 
queen from that batch that looks really good.

> If I were organized enough to do so, I'd keep track of which queens 
> survived
> for two years.  As it is, I select breeders prior to swarming season, and
> don't mark any of my queens, so hard to tell.

I guess that I am a bit OTT with record keeping.  All new queens are 
clipped, marked and allocated a number in the Stud Book (if we see an 
unclipped/unmarked queen we know that the queen has been replaced).  At each 
inspection we assess the colony and score it for numerous traits.  All the 
data goes in the Stud Book which then averages scores, summarises, and 
allows analysis.  It is hard work, but has really paid off in the five years 
that it has been running.  More details of the Stud Book program here for 
anyone interested: 
http://www.stratford-upon-avon.freeserve.co.uk/Links.htm#Morphometry.  Of 
course if we costed our time then it would probably not be economic, but our 
bees are a sideline to keep us out of mischief in retirement and although 
the money is useful (pays for good holidays!) we are not dependent on it for 
a living.

Best wishes

Peter
52.194546N, -1.673618W 

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