TA>From: Tom Allen <[log in to unmask]> >Date: Thu, 1 Aug 1996 10:38:44 -0400 >Subject: Re: Drone Laying Colonies TA>Is there any way to increase the count of drone cells.In my best hive I see >bloom.Milkweed is also flowering out. The queens are making lots of brood .I >they are doing well and the colonies strong will the production of drone >cells be reduced, until the desire for a new queen increases. Personal observations by myself and others working with bee diets and testing different pollens as bee foods we saw and used as a tool to rate different diets that if the bees would rear drones then the diet was OK. The more drones the better the diet. All of the testing I did was during the long winter periods we have here in central California when the bees do not fly at all but the temperature is not so cold that the bees can not make lots of brood if they are well fed. The results were amazing but not cost effective, but there was no problem rearing drone brood if the bees were kept well fed. From my personal experiences rearing drones it is easier in the early spring when there is a good mix of pollen coming in. The normal for pollen is that the mixtures are better then single source pollens. There is one exception and this pollen was used as a standard in tests, but it is not a pollen that is available to many so I won't go into detail. Bees will draw out full sheets of drone foundation very early in the spring if it is provided and a good diet is used, or provided by mother nature. They will bypass regular brood foundation for the drone and the queens will lay it wall to wall. But feeding must continue if you want the bees to rear the drones to adults, and even then if you can not keep conditions more or less flush for the hive the drones will be in constant jeopardy when bad times approach for the hive as they will not take care of most of them without your help. Some pollens are not good at all for anything but to plug up the frames until the bees can work it out when other sources are available. Many of the fall pollens fit into this category and many beekeepers find to their dismay that sometimes hives that they thought were OK a few weeks prior dwindle down fast but still have heavy amounts of pollen in the combs, no bees but lots of pollen. Most of the California fall Tar Weeds fit into this category as do pollen from some of the grasses, (rice), and corns. Poor pollen and no pollens are about equal in the long term effects on a bee hives populations and general health. They go from being big strong "ball busters" to weak little "dinks", sometimes in a short span of man's time. I have seen it work both ways, that is bees on a freak winter honey flow fill up with honey and at the same time dwindle down to nothing because of the lack of pollen and little brood rearing to replace the ageing field bees. Poor quality pollen produces poor quality bees that are not long lived, can not invert sugars, or produce brood food without prematurely ageing. Diet is the one thing that makes the difference between having good bees or not having them for long. The same can be said for the number of drones tolerated in the average hive. When things are good, lots of drones, and when things go bad, death to the drones. But never all of them, at least I have never seen it reported that a virgin queen did not get mated because there were NO drones available to do the job not withstanding the normal flight restrictions due to bad flight conditions or beekeepers overstocking a drone deficient area, as some areas will not allow for the attraction of drones no matter how many are in flight range. Bee breeders soon learn which areas are good and which are poor or get a lot of complaints about queen supersedure. One of the worries early on with the plague of vampire mites which the preferred hosts is drone brood was that there would be no drones to mate the queens, but as far as I can find out this has only been a fear and not a realized or reported fact, yet. The down side to all this is that drones in most stock have no sense of belonging and when they fly with vampire mites holding on for dear life they will venture in to just about any hive between here and there. Doing so spreads the little blood sucking mites, and good and bad things of every description. I am sure all this has something to do with the Einstein's Big Blast Theory or some such variations on a theme, but thats the way it is and some will not accept it and work their whole beekeeping life killing and discouraging the rearing of drones and if they do enough of it for a long enough period of time they will for sure see every kind of disaster that nature can reward a beekeeper with, but so will the keeper of bees that makes an effort to have a abundance of his favorite drones ready for any job that ventures into the air within several miles of his hives. Not sure who is right, but I like my drones and do nothing to discourage the hives from rearing them. I have noticed that when a hive has real drone foundation combs available to the queen there will be less of it in the worker brood combs. Dadant's at one time had the die's to make drone foundation and would run it on special request, but I don't know what is available today. What was the question?, Aaha, yes you can encourage more drone production by having drone combs that the queen can lay in, and providing supplemental food when needed, and sometimes that will bee during a fall wildflower bloom that produces pollen that is not the best for rearing brood. ttul the OLd Drone- (c) Permission is granted to freely copy this document in any form, or to print for any use. (w)Opinions are not necessarily facts. Use at own risk. --- ~ QMPro 1.53 ~ Let the honey flow!!!!! And the Drones GO!!!