GRAFTING TOOLS

[eaglesbee]

IM GOING TO BE BUYING A GRAFTING TOOL BUT I DO NOT KNOW WICH ONE TO GET THIS WILL BE MY FIRST GRAFTING TOOL THERE ARE A FEW OUT THERE WHAT DO YOU ALL USE AND LIKE THE BEST AND WHERE DO I GET IT?
THANKS

[Michael Bush]

Some people make their own. The Chinese grafting tools, especially the ones made of a feather, require a bit less skill to learn to operate them.

[BjornBee]

I have the straight plastic type. I have the chinese bamboo with the plunger action to dislodge the larva. And have just ordered the metal type with magnify from Kelly's after using a friends. They all work. But if your going to do more than one graft or graft year after year, pay the extra and get the one with the mag. It is amazing how much easier it is.

[tarheit]

I never had much luck with the chinese grafting tool myself. The end always seemed to want to curl the wrong way not sliding under the larvae. I like the stainless steel german one. No magnifier, but I'm sure it would work just as well if not better.

[eaglesbee]

THANK YOU ALL FOR THE GREAT INFO

[eaglesbee]

WHAT IT THE BEST WAY TO PRACTICE AND KNOW YOU HAVE DONE IT RIGHT I KNOW DRONES ARE A GOOD WAY BUT THEN WHAT ????? THANKS FOR ALL THE GREAT INFO

[justgojumpit]

Practice... Practice makes perfect. Why not just keep rearing queens until you get it down? You could crush whatever ripe cells you don't need into a jar of rubbing alcohol to make a nice swarm lure! Maybe you could even filter the swarm lure if you get a lot, but it into little vials and sell it to other beekeepers. That would surely be able to pay for your grafting equipment.

justgojumpit

[Michael Bush]

>WHAT IT THE BEST WAY TO PRACTICE AND KNOW YOU HAVE DONE IT RIGHT I KNOW DRONES ARE A GOOD WAY BUT THEN WHAT ?????

For grafting I'd practice on worker larvae. No real reason to do drones.

The first trick to grafting is to learn to judge the age of the larvae. That's CRITICAL. That's why I started with a Jenter. Since you confine the queen you know the age of the larvae and you learn what the correct age looks like.

The correct age of larvae is practically invisible. When the larvae has just hatched and just been lavished with food it's transparent and very hard to see. A day later it's quite white and visible. The correct age is when it's transparent.

The next trick to grafting is to pick up the royal jelly AROUND the larva so you don't actually touch the larva and you don't injure the larva and the larva doesn't dry out before the nurse bees start feeding it.