> The above tells me the researchers doing the study must be on the governments payroll as no beekeeper making a living from bees could devote 2 hours and forty minutes to each hive or even a hour to each hive.
I'm pretty sure they mean per season, not per visit. The experiment was run with 60 hives and they showed a 30% increase in honey production over hives managed the conventional way, which presumably lost production due to swarming. I am not advocating this method, but thought that it was of interest because of the proposed relationship between swarm production vs drone production. The authors propose that either one of these avenues satisfies the colony's instinctive urge to create a new generation. That is, either they produce a lot of young queens and swarm or produce a lot of drones and supersede the old queen.
* * *
So far, we have received 3,583 positive
references from the Czech Republic and Slovakia, and
many other beekeepers are going to apply this method.
The method has been unsuccessful for a small number
of beekeepers only. They have failed due to the lack
of adherence to the strict instructions of the method.
Searching for the causes of failure, we proved that
the time terms or the instructions were not kept.We believe
that the described antiswarming method is based
on general biological principles. As it has been successfully
tested under natural conditions of the Czech Republic,
we expect its functioning in various apiculture
technologies, in all geographical races of the honey bees
and the related subspecies of the genus Apis.
The health
condition of our 60 experimental bee colonies was excellent
during the seven years (2003–2009) of the testing of
this method. They wintered during the years 2006–2008
in a good condition as well, in spite of the common significant
losses resulting from the overgrowth of acarid
Varroa destructor in the mild winters in those years. In
some areas, the spring mortality reached up to 80% of
the colonies. Varroa prefers drones, if there are enough
drones it attacks workers at the second rate. However,
it is important to monitor the acarid infection carefully,
cut out the drone komb, and process to wax immediately,
after the end of the swarming time. This method
of swarming suppression is so effective that [queen]
rearing is not possible. Within its use, the colony tends
to [supersedure*] which is also very much appreciated.
We believe that our work based on practical experience
with antiswarming breeding of drones in honey
bee brings also stimuli for theoretical studies dealing
with biology of haplodiploidy insect.
[* quiet mother exchanges - in the original]
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