Requeening a Package

[Honey-4-All]

Basically I'm looking for stock that receives no treatment. They survive on their own. There are also places where the queens a bred for these traits. You have to understand I'm going the no treatment route. My own experience shows little success with treating and so I am simply looking for bees that come from stock that has shown it has what it takes to make it on its own. It cant be any worse than buying bees every year because the "over the counter" bees dont make it.

And who would be on that no treatment list? Are they willing to let you put a lie detector machine in front of everyone involved in the operation when you ask about "no treatments? How long is "surviving on their own?" 3 months, ! year, 2 years? Forever like the old days? Is this for mites, viruses, Afb? Efb?

[xcugat]

I dont want to sound argumentative, but how do you know treatments do not work--what treatments have you personally used that have led you to not want to try any?

[Goldprospector]

I am not in your area...but you can find "treatment Free" queens for sale in a lot of different places. You can find supposed mite tolerant bees in tons of locations. As far as what bee would adapt to the cold? I can say. I have read that Buckfast has good adaptability, and Russians are supposed to be cold hardy and mite tolerant. So I would suggest, trying a few different types of queens and see what does best. If you use several types of queens and they still don't survive, then it may have something to do with management practices. My bees are treatment free, but they are well managed. IMO

Anyway, whichever bee makes it out of the winter the best...maybe stick with those.

[whalers]

Gold prospector - explain well managed if you would please. I feel mine are well managed but when they die off each year and you are starting over, there is not a lot a guy can do.

[Riskybizz]

Whalers you have been getting some knowledgeable advice but you should also expand your horizons a little bit. Maybe instead of fooling around with importing package bees each spring loaded with mites and poorly adapted queens you should seek out the advice of an experienced local beekeeper and look for a source of local bees such as a nuc to purchase. You also need to realize that there is no super breed of queen that is going to be 100% foolroof against varroa.

[whalers]

Risky bizz. I agree entirely. However, there are no local sources of bees. Period. Its a cold short season and we all experience the same issues. Believe me, if I can find a strain that works well here I could sell everything I can produce. I also understand there are no "foolproof" queens against varroa. My goal is to pull splits out of my own hives that make it through a season and attempt to use them to restock each year. So rather than use the "dime store" varieties that i know are going to die, there is no reason not to attempt to find and upgrade to a little little better stock. last year I bot 2 nucs of quote, survivor bees. I had to drive four hours to get them and four hours back. one of them survived and I will pull as many splits out of them as I can. I also bot two packages of Carnies. Mites got one and the other didnt winter even though it was extremely healthy going into winter. Just looking to find better stock to be able to raise my own bees. The opinion I seem to be getting here is you just have to go out and buy them each year and I dont want to do that.

[beeman2009]

Whalers,

I think I understand where you are coming from. I don't treat and my bees have survived for 5 years without anything. I will not say they are totally mite free, but I have never seen any, never found any on sticky boards, not 1! I have SC mutt bees from Wolf Creek in TN. John has been working on this breed for years. I know his bees survive & thrive in Warre hives in Michigan and I have personally seen mys bees flying on sunny days at 35 degrees. Yea I know all you nay sayers are cranking up, but facts are facts.

Whalers if you care to look, check out his site wolfcreebees dot com. Call them, decide for yourself. Also be open-minded, you can treat for pests & diseases w/o harsh chemicals. Just a thought. Like I said, I haven't treated yet, but I not going to lose my investment or my bees just to say I don't treat. I treat myself when needed, so do you.

[Riskybizz]

I visited Randy Olivers website a few weeks ago and I kinda like the method he described for sugar dusting and introducing his home-made brood combs for cutting out drone comb (with mites) on an adapted schedule. I don't use any treatments here personally and I have never removed any drone comb either but I do plan on experimenting a little bit this spring and fall.

[oldforte]

Beeman9000
Also bought bees from Wolf Creek last spring....1 nuc and 1 package.. nuc had mites from the start..and bugged out in the fall...the package also had mites but were hanging on with only a few survivors..certain they won't make it through the winter. Lost another feral hive to mites this year.
Have 3 packages from John from 3 years ago that are doing very well.

Lesson learned thehard way....treat