As long as we are sharing views:

1. I don't know how long some breeders have used the practice of shipping
queens in banks with attendants shaken in for the entire bank, but I have
been getting them this way for perhaps the past 5 years.  At first I hated
the practice, principally because I invariably need to use the queens in
several yards.

I found that every time I opened the box containing the queens and
attendants, I lost attendants and by the time I got to the last yard (a few
days after I started with the first yard), there were very few attendants.
Then it dawned on me, shake some bees from my own frames into the box to
replace the attendants that flew!
Duh...

Now I have a high preference for shipping queens in a bank with attendants
on the outside of the cages.  I generally buy no fewer than 20 queens at a
time, and usually more like 40.  (For 2001, I have orders in for 40 for one
shipment and 50 for another.)  If one is buying 20 queens and get 8
attendants for each (a high number), that is 160 attendants.  With a bank, I
think one could expect more like 300 attendants!  Moreover, the attendants
form clusters around the queen cages and it "seems" as if the queens get
more attention than they do from the caged attendants.

2. Once one has dealt with a few hundred purchased queens, it becomes very
clear that some breeders pay more attention than others to the quality of
the attendants.

My understanding of the theory is that young bees are best geared to taking
care of the queen. Older, field bees, are less likely to properly groom and
feed her, their food is of lower quality, or both.

The attendants from some breeders are a mix of older and younger bees.
Other breeders seem to only ship very young bees as attendants.  The
difference is easy to discern.

Very young bees are likely to be found in the immediate vicinty of the
queen. Breeders hand-picking from that area will likely get a high
percentage of young bees.  However, hand-picking bees is very labor
intensive and painful...finger stings are unavoidable.  Several breeders are
now using a mechanical device to first shake bees into a box and then
automatically pack attendants in cages.  I think this results in a higher
percentage of field bees getting into cages.

That said, I have seen a marked difference in the ages of attendants put in
with queens in banks.  As these are also shaken, it seems that some breeders
just plain take more care than others...or consider the age of the
attendants to not be of importance.


If one is ordering fewer than 10 or so queens, I guess that breeders will
not agree to use the banks.  Wile understandable as the shipping box (the
container for the bank) will probably hold up to 100 queens, that is a
shame, as I think this is clearly the superior way to ship and receive
queens.

 Lloyd
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Lloyd Spear Owner, Ross Rounds, Inc.  The finest in comb honey production.
Visit our web site at http://www.rossrounds.com.