sometimes things have to be explained like I am 2

[slacker361]

Ok i think I might be wrapping my head around some of this. Like the NUC

If I would like to start a new hive , I could use a nuc, take some frames of uncapped brood, and place them in a nuc with bees and some stores. The bees will realize no queen is in there, and start a new queen. Then I could have a new hive. This is a use for a nuc , right?

[asprince]

Yes, that would be one. The reduced space in the NUC would be easier to defend with the reduced quantity of bees while they are raising a new queen. They are also easier to transport.

Steve

[iddee]

""take some frames of uncapped brood,""

The larva must be 3 days old or younger. I would be sure there were eggs in the frame, just to be sure they had the youngest larva to begin with.

[T Beek]

Ideally, a frame w/ open and closed brood, even some eggs would be great with all the nurse bees that are on them and some more if you can spare.

thomas

[kathyp]

i get eggs also.  it gives them a couple days to start multiple queen cells and choose the best.  more options.  better queens.  some capped brood means you'll get more young bees in to keep house and still have foragers.

[Lone]

Now this was something I hadn't done before to produce a new queen, but when my hive in town went queenless, the beek gave me a frame of brood and eggs, and bent back the walls of 4 or 5 cells that had eggs and preferably royal jelly too, to enlarge the cells.  The hive had no problem producing a queen.

I don't think I'll ever learn all the tricks of beekeeping in a lifetime.  It's amazing how many things I keep learning and how many mistakes I keep making.
Lone

[FRAMEshift]

and bent back the walls of 4 or 5 cells that had eggs and preferably royal jelly too, to enlarge the cells. 
Lone

That's a clever trick.  I don't think it's necessary if the comb is young and soft, but with old comb it could make a difference.

[skatesailor]

Ok i think I might be wrapping my head around some of this. Like the NUC

If I would like to start a new hive , I could use a nuc, take some frames of uncapped brood, and place them in a nuc with bees and some stores. The bees will realize no queen is in there, and start a new queen. Then I could have a new hive. This is a use for a nuc , right?

Make sure that before you move any frames you find the queen and leave her behind in the original hive. If you are taking day old eggs she is probably close by.

[Robo]

Ok i think I might be wrapping my head around some of this. Like the NUC

If I would like to start a new hive , I could use a nuc, take some frames of uncapped brood, and place them in a nuc with bees and some stores. The bees will realize no queen is in there, and start a new queen. Then I could have a new hive. This is a use for a nuc , right?

If you are content with emergency queens.

[slacker361]

Ok i think I might be wrapping my head around some of this. Like the NUC

If I would like to start a new hive , I could use a nuc, take some frames of uncapped brood, and place them in a nuc with bees and some stores. The bees will realize no queen is in there, and start a new queen. Then I could have a new hive. This is a use for a nuc , right?

If you are content with emergency queens.

But if it is a good strong hive that you do this with, then wouldnt the queen be of good stock?

[slacker361]

Ok i think I might be wrapping my head around some of this. Like the NUC

If I would like to start a new hive , I could use a nuc, take some frames of uncapped brood, and place them in a nuc with bees and some stores. The bees will realize no queen is in there, and start a new queen. Then I could have a new hive. This is a use for a nuc , right?

If you are content with emergency queens.

But if it is a good strong hive that you do this with, then wouldnt the queen be of good stock?

[Grandma_DOG]

But if it is a good strong hive that you do this with, then wouldnt the queen be of good stock?
[/quote]

Good strong queens are unusually made during a good honeyflow. So an emergency queen during a dearth would be suspect. The odds would be against her.

[slacker361]

But if it is a good strong hive that you do this with, then wouldnt the queen be of good stock?

Good strong queens are unusually made during a good honeyflow. So an emergency queen during a dearth would be suspect. The odds would be against her.
[/quote]

ahha   good info to know thanks

[kathyp]

however, the bees will use the best of the resources to make their queen. if your hive is well stocked with food and pollen, a dearth should not impact.   lack of genetic diversity from limited drone supply would worry me more.  robo doesn't like home made queens   

[iddee]

Hey, Robo, send me all yours. I like emergency queens when selected by the beek. Good supplies, good flow, strong genetics, strong colony.
I'll tak'em all day.

[Robo]

Hey, Robo, send me all yours. I like emergency queens when selected by the beek. Good supplies, good flow, strong genetics, strong colony.
I'll tak'em all day.

Maybe in the south where winter are weak, mediocre queens can survive.   Real winters separate the good from the bad.   I still believe a large portion of winter losses are due to poor queens and not "weather".

http://robo.bushkillfarms.com/can-you-afford-emergency-queens/

[Robo]

however, the bees will use the best of the resources to make their queen.

Yup, even drone eggs if that is the best they have.

"It's not just good, its good enough!"

[Brian D. Bray]

Any queen reared as a result of human interference with eggs from the brood nes may be suspect, IMO.  In 50+ years of beekeeping I still can't tell a good egg from a bad egg.  My bet is that the bees are much more in tune with what constitutes a good egg over a bad egg than I am.  Given a quantity of eggs from which to choose to rear a queen from I will put my money on the expertise of the bees over that of the human under any given set of conditions. 

It is true that the best queens come from hives with lots of bees, large brood nests, in the midst of a honey flow, but that is the time of maximum egg production by the queen so the ratio of superior eggs to poor eggs still gives a large selection.  As the time of year and weather conditions change so does the size of the brood chamber and, hence, the ratio of superior eggs to good and poor eggs decreases.  Come drought or dearth, or new queenn lost on mating flights, conditions a the selection of acceptable eggs from which to rear a replacement queen can range from difficult to non-existant, even for the bees.  But they will still try.

But, the premise remains that the bees, under any given set of circumstances, will choose a better candidate egg than a human can, except but sheer dumb luck.

As a result I will accept a queen the bees rear at their own initiative when they choose to rear one with the qualifier that that queen will be replaced once conditions for optimum egg selection exist, and that selection will come from the brood nest of my best , by all measureable or desirable, standards.

When I start my queen rearing in my queen castles, I choose to prime it with brood frames from by best 2 or 3 hives.  This keeps the divirsity of genetics alive with in the hive and will usually reult in quality candidates from each of the source hives.
From the queen castle I can then pull  new queens, add a few frames of bees from another hive and have an established nuc or hive with little effort.  Since I use a 4 section 12 frame queen castle (13 when used as a single hive) It is easy to pull the individual sections out of the castle and place in nucs for finishing as hives.

In other words, all of my queens a reared using queens reared from eggs choosen by the bees themsleves and I have nice calm hives albit of a muttified heritage.

[Michael Bush]

What nucs are good for:
http://bushfarms.com/beesnucs.htm#goodfor

[kathyp]

robo, i was referring to the resources used to raise the queen.  not the egg.  BTW...i have real winters.  other than my moment of weakness year before last, i have not purchased a queen in over 5 years.  guess which queen i lost year before last?   

this is one of those thing that people will have to try, to evaluate.  in my case, i have gone to the trouble of digging bees out of walls, etc.  why would i buy queens and lose the genetics of the (hopefully) survivor stock?  + i know that there are lots of resources in my area for genetic diversity and proper fertilization of my queens.

it's the dang swallows that do me in