In article <[log in to unmask]>, Vital
Gaudreau <[log in to unmask]> writes
>Interesting to note thaat JCB refers to marking more than one queen
>consecutively ...you must wash your fingers with alcohol between picking
>up queens. I have doubts that beekeepers carry alcohol and do do it in
>reality...or maybe some do ?!
This is probably one of these things, which abound in beekeeping, that
can be statistically demonstrable as linked factors (marking/clipping
and queen failure), yet at a practical level are insignificant, or only
slightly so.
In the two week period during which we mark and clip ALL our queens
(right now) I can handle and mark and clip up to 200 queens in one day,
and NEVER clean my fingers with alcohol. Actually, given our bees
dislike of alcohol I can think of few ways more likely to get me stung
on the tips of the fingers. I do not like being stung under the nail as
it is 'a little uncomfortable' and can 'bring forth intemperate
language'.
(Sorry George, I know what you said in a previous post about queen
clipping/marking. Have done it all ways and concluded that for
management reasons in our system and environment it is ESSENTIAL if we
are to cope. Thus I could not agree with your blanket condemnation of
the practice. Unclipped especially is like sitting on a powderkeg with
the swarming propensity of the black bee. Then again we are possibly NOT
in disagreement, as we use it for delaying swarming until we are next
there, rather than as an out and out prevention mechanism which it
patently is not. You just get that key few days more.)
We do not find that there is any appreciable increase in supercedure or
other damage linked problems. Examinations cause far more trouble. We
need to be able to find the queens quickly in high summer, and thus
marking is essential for this and the speed repays handsomely the time
spent finding them all in spring, plus clipping will delay the departure
of the old queen swarm until at least there is a cell close to hatching,
without clipping she can go as soon as the cells are elongating, even
before sealing. Just buys us enough time to get round the colonies, and
in addition, the old queen swarm does not go far without wings, usually
found as a pudding on the ground or on a nearby weed. Easy to catch and
hive, compared to 40 feet up a tree, or a mile away, or in another
beekeepers bait hive, all of which will sometimes happen if she can fly.
Back to the queen damage bit and causes for her to die/be superceded
after clipping marking. I suppose a lot could be down to how you do it.
If you grip her by any part of her body it must be a whole lot more
risky than our method. I see the queen and wait for her (sometimes with
encouragement) to be in a good position, and quickly pick her up by the
wings between the forefinger and thumb of your good hand. You DO get
used to this and quickly get the knack.
Holding her thus, allow her to gently grip the tip of your other
forefinger with her legs. When she is in the correct position catch at
least the two large legs on one side of the body between that forefinger
and the thumb. You now have the queen held securely in your less god
hand, leaving the good hand free to do the important stuff. First we
quickly clip her wings, one or both sides, it does not matter, but get
at least one full pair, back to one third or less of their original
length, but not right back to the thorax. In other words, leave a decent
stump. Then give a quick spot of the proper colour (you do not need to
do this, any highly visible colour will do, but we like to know how old
she is) on the thorax (we use vehicle touch up paint, the kind with a
little brush in the tube). Then just pop her back into the hive. No
putting her in a match box for the paint to dry or any other niceties.
Just do not use too much paint as a smeared queen with paint in about
her wing roots will very likely get superceded.
Before I let any new starter with us do this work we let them do it to
drones for practice, and only once they get that right will they be let
loose to mark queens. Until then they find the queen and call me or my
brother over to mark it. The inexperienced will have one or two
disasters before they are able to be assured in their work, but that is
life. They need to learn and the time savings at year end far outweigh
the effects of any damage they do.
One further thing about supercedure. It is not a tragedy as once it has
happened you have no further major management issues regarding swarming
that season with that colony. I even heard of a beekeeper who actually
goes round all his colonies in spring and pulls a leg or two off the old
queen. She generally continues to lay whilst a successor is raised, and
thus requeening is achieved relatively seamlessly. I've never tried it
but it sounds plausible enough.
In the end it is probably most important for the beginner to remember
that nature is the great curer in queen related matters. It is actually
quite a laborious task to render a fully functional colony hopelessly
queenless, ie with no queen and no hope of raising one. So, barring
failure of the new queen due to missmating or non mating and thus
rolling up with a drone layer, nature will normally take its course and
a new queen will result. Things like laying workers which crop up on
this list from time to time are actually relatively unusual and we will
only see them in a couple of cases (out of 1800) each season.
One further important thing about queen marking. We NEVER mark the queen
in the season of her birth. They are just too active and energetic at
that time so risk of damage is greatly higher, and it is not required
for management purposes as we do not examine the nest of colonies with
current seasons queens (in our environment with short seasons it means
that swarming is highly unlikely and certainly not frequent enough to
merit looking). Thus, in our first spring round we mark all queens not
previously marked with the previous years colour (we are using blue, the
2000 colour, this spring, and anything born this year will not be marked
(white) till spring 2002.
This has been a lot longer than I intended, but I hope it shows that
there are different factors at play in different areas, and if you would
prefer to clip and/or mark your queens there is no need to fear the
consequences so long as you are not too rough.
Hope you are all having a nice spring. Ours has just started after a
long winter.
Murray
--
Murray McGregor
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