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Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology

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Subject:
From:
Peter Edwards <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Thu, 2 Jun 2016 20:22:11 +0100
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>Acceptance went down
as the virgin queen aged.  Acceptance was better for just emerged queens.
It was also better in mini mating nucs than in full size colonies.

I tried it because some years ago there was a post on Bee-L claiming that this was an easy way to re-queen a colony; just run a virgin in with plenty of smoke and she will kill the existing queen and take over the colony.  A high rate of success (90%?) was claimed.

Having thought about it since, it now seems a very poor idea!  If the V kills the queen then the colony is dependent on her mating and laying good brood.  Even if that goes well, there will be a break in brood rearing of, perhaps, up to a month - queens can be notoriously slow in starting to lay in a large colony.  There is also the possibility of a large mating swarm departing never to return.  If the V fails then there is almost certain that the remaining brood will be too old for  the colony to produce a new queen.

Safer to mate virgins in nucs so that you can see their performance before risking a full colony I think.

Best wishes

Peter 
52°14'44.44"N, 1°50'35"W

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