Effects of rainy weather during early stages

[Jeffrey Todd]

The other night as I lay awake making queen-raising plans, I got to wondering what effects rainy weather might have on the raising of queens, especially in the days before the cells are capped. On one hand, there would not be much new nectar or pollen coming in: does the inflow of these affect the way the bees treat queen larvae (act as a stimulant)? The assumption is, of course, that the bees have plenty of stores on hand already but could their "mood" and care of larvae be better on sunny, productive days?
On the other hand, there will be more bees and a greater density of bees in the hive during inclement weather, and although the nurse bee presence should be almost the same as during good weather, is there a positive or negative effect of having the foragers there all day?
Your thoughts and experiences are appreciated.

Edit: this is all hypothetical, of course, as rainy weather is only an untested hypothesis in these parts . . .

Jeffrey

[RayMarler]

For raising queen cells, you need a good nectar flow and pollen stores or pollen coming in as well. If you don't have these, then you feed sugar syrup and pollen supplement. If it's raining, there's now flow. Also, a nectar flow or feeding is needed when the queen hatches and thru mating and the first round of laying.

[Michael Bush]

Everything affects queen rearing. Feeding is always good insurance in any iffy condition such as rain. But real pollen is essential for top quality queens. Stocking the cell builder with pollen frames would be a good plan if there is any question about an adequate supply.

[tecumseh]

jeffrey sezs:
The assumption is, of course, that the bees have plenty of stores on hand already but could their "mood" and care of larvae be better on sunny, productive days?

tecumseh replies: like michael bush the first thing I would suggest is that everything will effect queen rearing (and success or failure rate however you might wish to measure this).

most of the queens I have reared in the past have been in a swarm box and all the requirement are provide including a trickle of syrup (to mimic a flow and a good pollen frames is essential for any level of success). if for some reason this trickle of sugar water stops the decrease in percentage take is easy to notice.

the primary thing I think I see is the quantity of royal jelley is significantly effected by flow/no flow. you can witness this yourself in a typical queen right hive that you might use for grafting purposes. outside the major flow the quantity of food provide to worker larvae becomes quite limited (so limited that lifting the very young larvae becomes difficult). this is why when I am grafting before or after the main flow that I consiously feed 'breeder hives' sometimes as much as two weeks ahead of the grafting process.

[Jeffrey Todd]

Thanks for the replies. There is some good info in there to be gleaned.
My primary question, however, regards the presence of all the extra bees in the hive during inclement weather, not the amount of nectar coming in (as that would be supplied by the beekeeper in each case anyway in the form of syrup)
Are better queens reared when there are more bees in the hive because of the bad weather, or are better queens reared when the bees can go about their normal routines with good flying weather? Or something else?

[Joseph Clemens]

With the weather we have here in Tucson, I may never be able to guess at the answer to your question, though it seems like a fair question.

Though we have had a fairly decent amount of rain this season, I don't remember a day where it has remained inclement all day - usually storms form over us in the afternoon and persist somewhat into the night. The bees are flying every day.

I have been providing "Tucson Bee Diet" to my cell builder and mother queen colonies. I mix it so it is almost liquid with 1:1 sugar syrup instead of feeding syrup separately. This has worked well, so far, the young larva are usually floating in their cells which are nearly half full of royal jelly.

[danwyns]

From my experience the weather/season has little impact on the success rate or size of queen cells built. We had a huge low 2 weeks ago which brought steady rain for 4 days and was followed by strong wind for 2 days. Result 155 cells of 180 graft (6 started X 30). The past week has been settled, fine flying weather and I pulled 151/ 180 yesterday.

I feed breeders about 1L 24~36 hrs before grafting regardless of flow. This results in a bigger portion of RJ and larvae are much easier to pick up without damaging. Starters get fed when the graft goes in. Gorse is in flower nearly year round so pollen is always available during queen rearing season. Starters get bulk bees every week or 2 to keep them strong.

The weather has the largest impact on queen rearing during the mating window. Generally mating nucs yield 75~80%. We get really unsettled spring weather and success can run lower(50-60) if we get hammered, but trending up as we get into settled summer weather to as high as 90.

[tecumseh]

jeffrey todd writes:
My primary question, however, regards the presence of all the extra bees in the hive during inclement weather

tecumseh: caste determination (job description) is a not so easy topic to discuss since even the science folks seem to have limited understanding of the subject (ie limited prior research).

I have been looking thru a number of old bee magazines and Taber suggested (reflecting on someone else's research) that 500 young nurse bees are required to produce 1 queen cell. a number significantly less than this should produce fewer or inferior cells. a number greatly larger that this will also not produce anymore cells than started since the field bees will not so easily revert to being brood bees.

queen rearing (superscedure) in the various seasons might perhaps present some clues on this question. in the spring when population is signicant but the equipment is not crowed the bees will rear a goodly number of queen cells. on the other hand in the fall when the equipment is crowded superscedure cells will typically be quite limited in number.

at this point in the story it would be easy to assume that crowding has an inverse effect of cells produced. mathmatically modeling would lean more towards some tolerance limit being required to produce X number of cells and anything over this number as being redundant with no positive or negative effects.

[Michael Palmer]

When raising queen cells, the cell builders must be fed constantly before the cells are sealed. True, there may be a flow, but...what if it rains every day? What if the farmer cuts the fields where the nectar/pollen is coming from. You just never know. So, feeding is essential.

Imitating a nectar flow is easy. Just include some type of feeder with the cell builder, and feed 1:1 constantly....never allowing the feeder to run dry until the cells are sealed.

Providing a pollen source is a bit more difficult. You can search production colonies for combs of fresh pollen, but that's time consuming and fresh pollen combs aren't always available. Feeding pollen substitute is a poor substitute at best. Fresh pollen is the best feed. So, how to provide fresh pollen?

I trap pollen for feeding cell builders, and freeze it while in storage.

Dump a pile of pollen on a dark worker comb.
http://i241.photobucket.com/albums/ff61/frenchhill/scan0021.jpg

Work it into the cells with the palm of your hand.
http://i241.photobucket.com/albums/ff61/frenchhill/scan0020.jpg

Feed pollen combs like this one. Place pollen comb next to cell bar frame.
http://i241.photobucket.com/albums/ff61/frenchhill/scan0024.jpg

[Jeffrey Todd]

I want to thank the last 4 respondents for excellent, objective information. The above responses are worth their weight in gold, or would be if they had any actual weight :)