Allen Dick wrote

> On the other hand -- amazingly -- there is *nothing* quantative on the
topic
> of the quality of emergency queens, and no obvious bad effects from
> emergency queens raised in season by good colonies.

Well let me add my anecdotal information.  20 years ago I tried the spilt
method as I was not going to pay for queens; let them raise their own.
(Maybe some of my Scotch blood coming to the fore.)

I split from good hives (subjective evaluation) in spring and got poor
returns.  Plenty of drones around.  The majority of those that did survive
turned out to be tourist hives i.e in migratory terms hives that were taken
around the country side for a look see but did not produce much honey.

I ended up buying some queens to re-queen and then got good results.

Tried splits again the next year with similar reuslts.  So I gave up and
kept to purchasing queens.

> Seems to me that the question is of prime importance.  Every beekeeper who
> has more than a few hives, and more than a few years experience, has
> emergency queens at some point or another for various reasons.

Yes I get them and when requeening, I often find that it is the self set
(superceded) queens that are heading poor colonies.  Yes there are
exceptions but not often.

> Back to the topic.  Seems to me that there are good studies on at least
most
> of those points. And, I cannot see what proof is needed when bees arrive
> dead, die on introduction, are rejected by the bees, etc. etc.

Dead on arrival is certainly a reason for poor performance and poor
acceptance.

Die on introduction - why?  Queen or hive?

Rejected - fault of queen or hive?

Where is the proof?  We know the end result but are we interpreting the
right cause?  I know beekeepers who now admit that when they introduced
queens to their hives, they had high nosema counts.  Reality tells us that
we often re-queen poor performing hives.  Why were they poor performing?

We have ceratin species of trees in Australia that when beekeepers are
working them, the introduction rate for queens is poor.  This includes
bought queens or queens raised by the beekeeper.  All real but we know the
results but not the reasons.

> Therefore, I am very curious.  Obviously, it is in the interests of those
> who make their money by raising and selling queens (and advertise in
> magazines) to study and promote use of those queens, and in the meantime
> trash the queens that any beekeeper can raise

I hope you are not including me in your above example.

My often expressed quote is that if you have a method that works for you why
change?  So if the split method works for you, stay with it.  So don't use a
broad brush to tar everyone that rasies questions contrary to your opinion.

I am turning away orders for queens so I don't have to malign others to get
orders.

> We both can see that there are many risks and considerable costs
associated
> with relying on purchased queens, since there are so many people of
varying
> abilities, including the purchasing beekeeper, in the process, and many
> places for things to go wrong

Agree fully.  As I said before we are dealing with nature and you have
pointed out people's ability, including both the queen breeder and the
beekeeper.  If it was easy, everyone would be a beekeeper and what would the
price of honey be then?

Trevor Weatherhead
AUSTRALIA

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