Installing queen cage?

[Lori McAllister]

I will be making 2 hive splits tomorrow.
I have not used the little plastic queen cages that Mann Lake sells. It looks like this is what my queens are in, so I am wondering how these install or are hung?
Is there something I will need to remove?
Are there any good links that show pictures of these cages being used?
I don't want to mess up.
Thanks for any advice!

[BULLSEYE BILL]

If they are the ones from JZ BZ and have an extended tube on one end, the tube is pluged with candy and there is no cork.

If you do not want the queen released right away, put a piece of tape over the candy.

If you want her released in two to three days, just install the cage inbetween the frames. Between two well populated frames would be best.

If you want to have her released in two days or less, drill a little hole in the candy. When they can see her on the other side of the candy they will remove it faster.

There is also an excape hatch that you can open for direct release.

Usually when there ARE attendants in the cage, you want the escape hole up so any dead attendants will not block the egress. Since there are none in your cage it is not important to point up. Another consideration is that there should be access to the queen through the ventilation holes for the bees to be able to feed the queen.

[wayacoyote]

I've heard it suggested that the candy end of a queen cage should point down so the candy won't drown the queen should it melt. I'm not sure that ever happens, but I make it a practice to follow the advice.

WayaCoyote

[Jim Fischer]

The whole "up versus down" issue has been
debated forever, but I think both sides
have their heads up their... no, I can't say
that here... ummm, "have serious cases of
rectal-cranial impaction".

Think about it - a queen cage in a vertical
orientation has drawbacks no matter which
way is "up". If "candy up", wayacoyote's
concerns are valid. If "candy down", a
dead attendant or two might block the
exit hole.

So, what to do? Horizontal sounds nice.

I have a good supply of small strips of
thin metal flashing that I attach to wooden
queen cages with thumbtacks to suspend the
queen cage between two frames. The only trick
is to make sure that the screening is exposed,
rather than up against comb.

Another good trick is to remove the attendants
from the queen cage when requeening. It is
the attendants that most often make the bees
in the colony "hostile" to the queen.

With the plastic queen cages, I suspend them
between two frames with a thin strip of
duct tape, again with the cage in the horizontal
position. If hung in the vertical position,
these cages contain far less candy than the
wooden type, so there is little chance of
the candy melting and "getting on the queen".

[Michael Bush]

I always go horizontal with the screen down also. Nothing else quite makes as much sense does it? They can easily move a dead attendent out of the way horizontally. They can get to the screen easily. They can get to the candy easily. Even if the candy melted it can run out of the screen. I often use a scrap of #8 hardware cloth stapled on the back of a wooden cage like wings so it will hang between two bars and not fall. I only do that because there are scraps laying around. But I've also stapled cardboard or whaetever else was handy at the time. That's if I can get it between the top bars. Sometimes I use a Imirie shim and lay it on top of two top bars with the screen down between them.