Altigoo-Apiculture

Mated queens' introduction

JMF64 — 2016-11-30T07:38:55Z

The queens insertion is a delicate step. The queen's acceptance depends of her intrinsic qualities (possible alteration during the carrying), but the success of this step mainly depends of the insertion technique used.

General points:

In the following cases, the chances of success are more uncertain:

if we insert a Buckfast (Brother Adam) queen in an aggressive colony,
if we insert a queen during the breeding period (from April until June),
if there are many old bees in the colony.
Conversely, the success rate increases if:
it is the end of the season,
when the colonies can't breed anymore (absence of open brood),
there are only young bees,
we feed them during the insertion,
we let the colony alone after the queen's insertion.

Operating method for introducing mated queens:

In fact, many methods actually exist. You are free to choose the one that suits you the most. Do not hesitate to share ideas with other apiculturists, especially during the special event organised by ANERCEA.

This is our procedure:

Prepare in a small hive a swarm with 2 frames broods (opened and with a cap) + 1 frame for the reserve,
Move the small hive of 50m. The foragers (old bees) will return to their initial hive. You can move again the small hive of a few meters, the next day.
Put the identity card on the small hive when the queen will be inserted in it.
Place the small cage on the frames' top, without opening the access strap to the candy. Turn over a nourishing hive's top to create an enclosed space above the brood chamber,
The following day, verify if the colony is orphan: the bees must agglutinate around the small cage. In this case, let the small hive closed for 48 hours (2 nights),
Break the strap and insert the small cage between 2 frames, or even better, let it on the top of the frames,
Verify the laying one week later.

Important:

It can happen that the bees don't accept the new queen if there was already a queen (virgin?) in the colony. In this case, there is no chance that the new queen gets accepted.
In the case of a very aggressive colony, it happens that the bees let the young queen lay for several days or even weeks. Then, they will kill her to raise a new one.

Virgin queens' insertion

JMF64 — 2016-11-30T07:23:06Z

The results of the virgin queen's insertion are more random than the insertion of royal cells or fertilized queens. You will find below our different ways of proceeding, depending of the season;

introducing virgin queens on package bees

It is undoubtedly the best technique because it doesn't leave the bees with a good possibility of breeding.

introducing virgin queens in Kieler type in nuclei:

-* In the nucleus, add the equivalent of a 500 g jar filled with bees,
-* Insert the virgin queen directly in the cluster,
-* Shut the nuc and let it 3-4 nights in a cool room,
-* At nightfall, move the Mini+ on your fertilisation emplacement and open them when the bees will be calm down (still during the night).
-* One week later, verify the laying and the reserves.

introducing virgin queens in Mini+ type in nuclei:

-* Add in the Mini+ the equivalent of a 1000g jar of filled with bees,
-* Insert the virgin queen directly in the cluster,
-* Shut the nuc and let is 3-4 nights in a cool room,
-* At nightfall, move the Mini+ on your fertilisation emplacement and open them when the bees will be calm down.
-* One week later, verify the laying and the reserves.

introducing virgin queens in 6-frame hives:

-* Add 1,5 kg of bees in the hive provided with 4 embossed wax frames + 2 frames for the reserves (without egg nor brood)
-* Insert the virgin queen by suspending the queen cage between 2 frames and break the access strap to the candy,
-* Shut the hive and place it in a cool room for 3-4 nights,
-* At nightfall, move the hive on our fertilisation emplacement and open them when the bees will be calm down.
-* One week later, verify the laying and the reserves.

On buzz colonies:

Paradoxically, the orphan colonies made of very old bees will accept more easily a virgin queen than a fertilized one.
-* First of all, shake all the frames 10 meters from the hive so that all the laying bees fall down,
-* Remove the attendant bees from the queen cage, place it at the top of the frames and break the strap to the candy,
-* Turn over a nourishing hive's top to create an enclosed space above the brood chamber,
-* 48 hours later, check carefully if the queen has been released. It not, slide the safety barrier of the queen cage in order to open the access to the candy and ensure that the queen can't go out directly.

Struggling against diseases

JMF64 — 2016-11-15T22:05:47Z

As a consequence of our good behaviour (very fast rotation of the frames and 90% of our queens are less than 1 year old), we maintain a low rate of diseases in our colonies.

Foul brood:

The cases of American Foulbrood are very rare (1% to 2%). They generally appear at the beginning of winter, on the weak colonies of the previous year- Apiaries' intoxication cases (supposed or proved).
We often find them on hives that had impressive results the preceding season.
Why? We know that the prevalence is very important in the south-west area of France. In fact, a 2010 study realized by INRA from Montpellier showed that there are Paenibacillus larvae spores in 10% of apiaries and in over 80% of hives.
-* The cases of European Foulbrood are a bit more frequent (3% to 5%). They generally appear between the acacias and sweet chestnuts blossoms.
-* Black disease: we usually notice some symptoms of this disease on our apiaries at the end of summer. Some of our colonies are very affected by this disease letting many bees on the alighting-board. Unfortunately, it often touches the best hives. It is closely related to the pedigrees.
-* Nosema Ceranae: according to what we read on the subject, we suspect Nosema Ceranae to weaken a lot our colonies. It especially happened during the 2008 season.

Treatments:

We never use any kind of antibiotics, neither for Foulbrood cases nor for Nosema (Fumidil, Fumagiline).
-* Foulbrood cases: We consistently burn all the frames. We only kill the queen bee if she is more than 6-month old. The colonies usually come back to normal very quickly. Until now, the relapse cases are very rare.
-* Nosema Ceranae cases: since we have modified our summer treatments against varroa, our colonies reveal a good dynamics during the whole season. We noticed that there was a significant link between the treatment's effectiveness in August and the pressure of Nosema the next season. Varroas and associated virus weaken the immune defence system of the bees, which make them more vulnerable to the parasite, still a little pathogenic. However, even if the winter treatment is really effective, it strangely doesn't seem to have repercussion on Nosema.

Thymol and Oxalic Acid

JMF64 — 2016-11-15T22:02:45Z

Until 2008, we were struggling against varroa with thymol treatments, in summer, and oxalic acid, in winter, by following the standard recommendations.
-* In September (maximum temperature < 25°c): 2 thymol treatments (10g per hive and by treatment) at a 10 day interval,
-* end of December (without brood): 1 oxalic acid treatment.

We were not satisfied with the effectiveness of the treatments on Varroa and above all, we noticed that our colonies were not at their best during spring.

Between 2008 and 2011, following Dominique Micheletto advices, we modified our summer treatment:
– 3 treatments of ¼ dose with a smaller interval, instead of 2 treatments of ½ dose each 10 days.

Use:

-* Conditions of use: Do the treatment during hot temperature (>25°c). Noteworthy, there is no maximum temperature (until 40°c). The treatment must be ended by the end of August, before the winter laying.
-* Dilution of the Thymol: 1 kg of thymol + 1 L of 90° alcohol. Calculate 1 kg of thymol for 65 hives or 130 small hives.
-* Dilution of the oxalic acid: 40 to 50 g of oxalic acid (dihydrate) in 1L of diluted syrup at 50%.

Treatments:

-* For the hives, 1 piece of cardboard on the top of the frames, more precisely 50g of thymol ( 50 cc on each cardboard),
-* For the small hives, we only put half a cardboard for each treatment,
-* For the Maxi+, it is ¼ of cardboard.

- Number of treatments in summer: 3 treatments with a 5 day interval,Number of treatments in winter: 1 treatment without brood (when the queen stops laying eggs).

Comments:

-* We realized the importance of controlling the Varroa during the month of August, just before the bees' winter birth.
-* In a case where the summer treatment is not effective, but the winter one is very effective, the colonies' potential will strongly be limited for the next season.
-* By improving our summer treatment, we strengthened the immune defence of the colonies. Even if the thymol treatments don't reduce sufficiently the Varroa pressure, we succeeded to improve significantly the colonies' dynamics.

The warm partitions

JMF64 — 2016-11-15T22:00:12Z

It's in February 2007 at the ANERCEA d'Armeau event that mister Marc Guillemain presented for the first time his “high performance partitions”. We did our first tests the next year, however it's only in 2010 that we started using this technique on 50 hives and on 300 colonies in 2011. Since 2012, almost all our hives, Maxi+ and divisible hives are equipped with at least one reflective partition.

Principle and use:

-* The insulating material (aluminium paper) reflects the ray produced by the bees on the cluster. Consequently, it restricts the honey consumption and above all, it limits the risk of cooling down during spring.

Depending of the colonies' strength, the warm partitions are located differently:
-* For the weakest colonies: the partitions are placed at the bottom of the cluster of bees (honey frame outside),
-* For the strongest colonies: they are placed on the frames of the sides.
In order to let enough space to the colonies, we remove the partitions once the colza blossoms.

The results:

They are spectacular, especially:
-* in cold regions, for example in Ukraine where this technique is used a lot,
-* on micro-colonies or on the weakest ones.

Evolution:

We first made the same “high performance partitions” that Marc Guillemain created,
- extruded polystyrene at the center,
- reflective insulating material (4 layers) on the outside
Afterward, we replaced the polystyrene with an isorel slab,
Finally, we removed the slab to keep only the insulating material. This is what we call a “warm partition”.
We are less exposed to cold temperature than the apiculturists located in the continental area. This is an advantage for us because those lighter partitions are faster produced.

Standard precautions:

The only precaution is to keep away the partitions from the mice (in the hives or in the building storage). In fact, they often use the reflective partitions for their nests.

Insulating material and hives' top

JMF64 — 2016-11-15T21:59:04Z

The insulation of the top of the hive is a determining element in our work, especially if we consider the colonies on the shallow-frames (on divisible hives or Maxi+), where the cluster is horizontally elongated.
This step helps to:
-* reduce the reserves' consumption during winter,
-* improve the colonies' dynamics during spring,
-* maintain the quality of our honey during summer (rise of the HMF rate).

- Beekeeping techniques

Altigoo-Apiculture

Mated queens' introduction

General points:

Operating method for introducing mated queens:

This is our procedure:

Important:

Virgin queens' insertion

introducing virgin queens on package bees

introducing virgin queens in Kieler type in nuclei:

introducing virgin queens in Mini+ type in nuclei:

introducing virgin queens in 6-frame hives:

On buzz colonies:

Struggling against diseases

Foul brood:

Treatments:

Other solutions:

Thymol and Oxalic Acid

Use:

Treatments:

Comments:

The warm partitions

Principle and use:

The results:

Evolution:

Standard precautions:

Insulating material and hives' top