1 laying queen 60 bees

[seamuswildflower]

those queens failed because of late splits, BEEKEEPERS FAULT and not because of their quality. l do not think that in any way Michael Palmer sells an inferior queen! lt was poor management on my part!

[bluegrass]

I agree Mike Palmer doesn't sell inferior queens. I wasn't suggesting that he did and I am sorry if it sounded that way. I also would not write it off as "late splits" given your location. Here in the Northeast we have to stop rearing queens long before it is too late for somebody as far south as you to make splits.

Mike's bees may just not be well adapted for life in South Carolina. They probably stopped laying too soon and started again too late, because that is what they have been bred to do. They likely don't know what to do with a SHB as they are not really an issue in Northern VT/NY like they are in the south.

[seamuswildflower]

l split in october and november

[kilocharlie]

Well, boo-hoo. The fact is that late-season, small afterswarms (baseball size and smaller) have little chance of making it except in optimal conditions. You gave it a good shot, and I would like to have seen the setup. Feeding, artificial springtime conditions (heated room and insulation) and excellent dead-air volume control might have bucked the long odds, but it is not easy to beat them when mother nature throws you a late cold spell.

Good try, and keep on plugging away at it. The real beekeepers learn from their losses and keep building boxes and frames, hiving swarms, getting stung, raising queens, cutting honeycomb, etc. The phonies cry in their milk and quit.

Now make up some insulated outer covers, insulated inner covers with fondant boards inside, some double-screen boards, some hive dummies, some foam hive wraps for next season - you may have a success next time off what you learned this time. Another trick is to put a pet reptile "hot rock" under a hive floor and turn it on on the cold nights. We're from the warm states, but it pays to know cold-country beekeeping anyways.

[KevinR]

l split in october and november

I think your similar weather to West TN. Splits that late in the year would be pretty rough. You'd need to make a healthy split and feed like crazy.

Late Sept/Early October is the latest that I'd make a split. I'm usually thinking about feeding them up to make it through the winter at that point, not splitting.

I had 3-4 late season splits that didn't make it, but another 5 that did. Better genetics or did the bees just fly the right direction for the late food. *shrugs*

I had a few that made it through the winter, only to starve in the spring. IMO, it is much sadder to sweep out 8lbs of dead bees than 60.

Keep chugging, more bees/honey to be made.

-Kevin

[JRG13]

They lay opposite each other to maximize heat exchange since bees will be clustered opposite each other.