> How do you then use the virgins? De-queen mating nucs and introduce
> virgin? Any delay after de-queening? Introduce in cage?
I have not done enough to be sure that I am using the best technique but
I have had some success with the following and blame the awful weather
we have had for the failures. I put some virgins into newly prepared
5-frame nucs.  To do this I swish the virgins, still in their roller
cages, in  blood hot water before running them into the nuc.  I usually
do the same with newly charged mini-nucs but often don't bother with
washing them.  They are just dropped into the wet mass of bees when the
mini-nuc is first charged.  For mini-nucs that are requeened I usually
leave them for ten minutes or so before dropping the virgin in.  In the
past I have let quite a lot of queens emerge in a make-shift incubator.
For these I think washing is less important as they have less pheromone
from the finisher colony.  Where I have been particularly anxious that
the introduction does not fail in a 5-frame nuc I have put the roller
cage and queen between the frames of bees for half a day before
releasing her.

The failures I have had this year have not been due to the introduction
but failure of the virgin to mate or survive her mating flights.  We
have hardly seen a day that has peaked at over 20 degrees C all season
and while some queens mate at lower temperatures some seem to fail to
mate or lay a frame or 2 of worker eggs before turning drone layer.  I
suspect they start mating and then all the fun stops when a storm
suddenly brews up.  The next mating opportunity might be a week later
which is probably too late.

Unlike previous years I have found this year that once a virgin has
emerged into a cage in the finisher they survived better in a warm
cabinet with a drop of runny honey in the cage than leaving them in the
finisher.

Steve Rose

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