By searching the archives I see that these little bugers have been talked
about quite extensivly. However I could not find any reference to my
problem. As you may notice by my tone in the first sentence I am losing
respect for the Russian Queen. Acttually I have some animosity towards
them! I requeen three strong hives this spring and not one of them was
accepted. Being a little bullheaded I chose to try to force the issue
with one hive. After it killed the first queen I waited 1.5 weeks and
installed another that did not work. So I released the third one into a
comb cage after which the bees chewed under the cage killing the queen.
But not before she laid quite a number of eggs. Well I have one queen
left and I have run out of ideas. Interestingly enough I also installed
five 5lb.packages of Italians with Russian queens all were accepted and
are doing quite well. So I am looking for some ideas as how to handle my
last queen.
Almost Queenless and pretty much broke.
Garrett Martin