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Date: | Thu, 30 Oct 2003 07:02:32 -0600 |
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Kenny said;
I am interested in producing queens next May or June is there an
optimum outside temperature for Queen bees to be bred.
Tim gave an excellent answer covering all bases so I almost passed on
replying but will add Missouri information as Kenny is in south Missouri.
We have little trouble raising queens in May or June but major problems in
early April due to cold & rainy weather and lack of mature drones.
All our splitting is done by May so we have little need for queens in May
& June and demand by other beekeepers is low .
On the positive side we have raised and mated queens as early as the first
week of April in rare years but when weather conditions are bad for getting
queens mated (rainy & cold) the queens you get many times are not worth
installing in hives (voice of experience).
A couple of my friends which got queens from the southeast last spring were
disappointed in the queens. The queen breeders said the problem was the cold
and rainy weather during mating which makes sense to me. Although another
batch of queens were shipped by the queen breeder the timing was off for
the beekeeper and a poor honey crop (and low hive numbers) was the result.
Although the general rule is;
"new queens make money instead of cost money" the killing of one or two
year old queens with good patterns and the replacing with inferior queens
can (and many times has) cost money in lost honey production.
Bob's advice:
Stick to your plan and attempt queen rearing in late May to early June and
forget April until you get queen rearing experience.
Start with twice as many cells as you think will need. Be selective with the
final product.
Sincerely,
Bob Harrison
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