>LARVAE TRANSFORMATION
>1. Hand “grafting” into home-made wax cell cups.

I don't like these.  They are more work and not as safe during transfer.
I'm a new commercial queen producer (small) and I am trying to develop
systems that eventually can be taken over by others whom might not be as
interested in the welfare of the cell as I (laborors/helpers).

>2. JZ-BZ cups.

These are best for me.  I breed from several different breeder queens.  Each
is assigned a color.  Again it is another way to take the difficulty out of
the system.  It also helps in bee identification from larvae to nuc.  I need
this information for the breeding of certain traits.  Don't get me wrong, I
write everything down but this is another way to insure quality control and
it is completely visual.  I could go on and on about the merits of these
cups but I have some queens to pull so I will try to stay short with this
particular point.  However, the bottom line is I love them.

>3. Nicot cupularvae system (non-graft system).

Tried it-don't like it.  However, I do use the bars that are fitted for
Nicot cages.  They are very handy and brilliant in design.  I like to double
queen my nucs and the Nicot bar/cage system is great.

>4. EZI-Queen system (non-graft system).

Never tried them.

>5. Other (if so which?), e.g., Jenter.

Used Jenter and will be glad to sell you mine ;)  Too many parts.  However,
the queen seems to lay better in these than the Nicot.

Keep in mind, I still have fairly good vision.  If I get less stable in my
hands and poorer eyes, I will probably use the Nicot or a hybrid graft
systems.  I will be breeding queens for a long time if God is willing.

>STARTERS
>1. “No-name” A and B super system where bees are smoked up into
>B through an excluder. B is removed and placed some distance from
>A and used to start cells. These bees can fly. A, with the queen, is
>sealed for 24 hours. A and B are later again united.
>2. Swarm boxes, where around six kilograms of young bees harvested
>from various hives are used to start cells. Swarm box is sealed but
>ventilated for 24 hours.
>3. Cloake system, where a (metal) screen is inserted between two
>supers, over an excluder. The bees in the upper super are
>“queenless” and field bees are drained from the lower super by
>opening a back entrance. The field bees have previously been trained
>to use an entrance on the other side of the hive between the two
>supers.
>5. Other, e.g., Farrar system (see ABJ February 1977).

My favorite is what I call a Fert starter.  I name it this after Giles Fert
because he talks about it in his new book.  I know he isn't the one that
developed the system but it is easier for me to remember it that way.  I
just switched to it this spring and wonder why I haven't done it for ever.
I use to use a swarm box and got great results but it was much more
laborious and not as simple.  It is similar to your number one but has some
differences.  Also, I have instituted my own changes to better fit my
locale.  I have two hive bodies but the queen is kept on the top hive body
which has only 8 frames in it.  Only 8 because I want lots of ventilation
and it is easier to smoke most of the bees down through the excluder into
the bottom hive.  I keep two well filled pollen frames and two uncapped
honey/nectar frames in the bottom hive body (starter).  I heavily smoke the
bees down into the bottom HB in the morning of the day that I want to graft.
I then pull the top HB off and place it a short distance (at least 20 feet)
away upon a bottom board.  I don't use screen.  Instead I place an entrance
reducer.  Cool nights and robbing are not that big of a problem for me.  I
graft at about 1700hrs.  I always provide syrup with a board feeder so that
I can see, at a glance, if they need syrup.  Also, when I separate the hive
bodies, I take a frame of young brood out of the top queenright HB that I
just smoked the bees out of and place it between the pollen frames in the
starter which was the bottom HB.  Therefore it looks like this: nectar,
pollen, BROOD, pollen, nectar.  When I get done with my grafts, I pull the
frame of brood from between the pollen frames and shake the bees off it.  I
put the grafts into that slot.  It looks like this: nectar, pollen, GRAFTS,
pollen, nectar.  I then put the frame of brood back into the queenright hive
which is 20 feet away, pointing in a different direction, without a screen
and with a entrance reducer.  I use this starter for no more than three
grafts.  It gets at least two days rest after rejoining.  I will also add
capped brood to it (1 or 2 frames) at the rejoining.

>FINISHERS
>1. Under starters 1 above, super B is used for finishing above an
>excluder, after re-uniting.
>2. Under starters 3 above, the upper super is used for finishing above
>an excluder after the metal screen has been removed.
>3. “Conventional” horizontal finisher, using an excluder.
>4. “Conventional” vertical finisher, using an excluder.
>5. Other.

I use a queenright two hive body with honey supers and excluder between the
hive bodies.  I add nurse bees and capped brood to it when it starts to look
weak.

>INTRODUCTION TO MATING NUCS
>1. Ripe sealed queen cell, unprotected.
>2. Ripe sealed queen cell, protected e.g., in a cage.
>3. Emerged (and marked) virgin in cage, with “eatable” exit, e.g.,
>candy.
>4. Other.

Usually I use unprotected 10 day old cells.  Sometimes I will use a double
queen system.  I don't like to mark my virgins anymore.  I "believe" that
they are more noticeable to predators.


>Separately, would there be any such thing (size-wise) as an “industry
>standard” mating nuc?

I use shallow and medium two or three chamber nucs.  They are much less work
and more efficient than anything else.  The baby nucs aren't any good in my
opinion.  The only thing good about them is that the books seem to support
their popularity and therefore they are easy to sell.  The deeps are not as
good on queen acceptance, are harder to find the queen in a hurry, are more
aggressive (I don't use smoke with my breeding nucs), and not an efficient
use of bees.  However, they are more stable once established.  I don't agree
that they are better to use for introduction.  I usually try to direct
introduce laying queens into my own production hives during a honey flow.
We have two major flows.  I find that carrying 100 laying queens in a
battery box much easier than lugging around that many Nucs.  Now if I was in
the business of selling 5 frame nucs then I would find some use of this size
of nuc.  However, I would not produce multiple queens from them, just the
one that is going with the nuc in which I am selling.

>SHIPPING
>Which cages are seen as the most reliable for safe delivery of
>queens? Which cages are the most economical, including both
>material and shipping costs?

I like JZ/BZ.  More convenient and look more professional.

I hope I did not bore you.  I never spend this much time on the computer.
Please let me know if you see things differently.  My definition of an
expert is someone that knows it all and doesn't need to learn anymore.  I
definitely am NOT an expert.

I hope that others will respond to the survey.

Dann Purvis

Happy beekeeping.