>  it seems like the practice of replacing queens on a yearly bases goes
back some and maybe even over 100 years.

Not surprising.  Humans haven't gotten any smarter since then, nor better
at making observations.  It seems that we're wasting a great deal of time
in confirming some well-known facts:


   - That beekeepers have long known that the best queens, independent of
   genetics, are those raised from very young larvae, and very well fed and
   mated.
   - Even then, perhaps 25% will be at the lower end of the bell curve for
   performance, and
   - A percentage will fail early in the season.
   - That queens are generally most productive in their first season, and
   - A large percentage may perform well through the honey flow of their
   second season, at which point they typically start to run short on stored
   sperm and are superseded.
   - Queens well-mated late in the season and prevented from laying many
   eggs, will perform like young queens the next season.

There is absolutely nothing new about the above observations


-- 
Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
www.ScientificBeekeeping.com

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