[Freon11]

I have 2 hives one established and one new they have both been Re-queened and are doing well . I would like to start a third hive and have the equipment to do so . How would I go about it I am getting a little confused ,does this sound right or am I missing something.

1. Take 2 frames of fresh eggs, 2 of pollen and honey all with the bee's that are on them and No Queen put them into a NUC which I have .

2, Close off the NUC for 48 hours they will create a new queen , check in 14 days for queen cells .

3. Then check the NUC again at week 4 for the new and hopefully mated queen.

All the while feeding 1:1 syrup as well as pollen to the NUC.

PLease correct or add anything I am missing I really want to get this right
any help you can give is greatly appreciated.

 

[AmericasBeekeeper]

That should work. You can buy a mated queen if they fail to make their own.

 

[broodhead]

Should be fine with that plan, but buy a queen and you will be a month ahead.

 

[Freon11]

Should be fine with that plan, but buy a queen and you will be a month ahead.

I would love to buy a mated Queen but everyone has told me they would not be able to deliver till 3rd week in june

 

[Scorpster]

An often suggested alternative is to let the mother hive raise the queen, having more resources to do so. And let the nuc have the original queen so it has no break in the brood cycle and will build faster. If you short the nuc on bees (which is easy to do if don't add extra, or they can fly back to the mother hive), your new queen may not be of the best quality, if the shorted nuc has the queen, she will just not be able to lay at full capacity right away. Of course there are so many factors to consider it has to be your own decision for your situation and goals.

 

[Red_SC]

I would love to buy a mated Queen but everyone has told me they would not be able to deliver till 3rd week in june

Any particular breed you're looking for? BeeWeaver is showing availability for the week of 5/24, I have one of their queens coming next week for a split.

 

[Freon11]

Any particular breed you're looking for? BeeWeaver is showing availability for the week of 5/24, I have one of their queens coming next week for a split.

Thanks for the info , I located 2 queens out of Glenn apiaries in Georgia

 

[balhanapi]

I would take 1 frame of eggs and young larvae, 2 frames of capped brood(almost hatching) and one frame of honey and pollen and give them an extra shake of bees from another frame with brood to give them more young bees. I would feed them 1:1 sugar water.
Check back in one week - you should see at least 8-9 cells on the frame with eggs. If you wait 14days to check the queen cells the queen may already have hatched out and killed most of the remaining cells. queens hatch out in 15days so if they started with a 3 day old larva on day 1 then on day 12 the queen will be out.
I would try to make my own queen and not buy a queen because you learn a LOT by doing it yourself. I would locate a queen for backup if you are short on time. You can always try again.

I actually go a step further, when they make good queen cells I cut out about 3-4 queen cells from the frame and give them another frame of capped brood and make a mating nuc if you would call it that. This way I have a back up. one of these will have a queen by the end of 4 weeks if not both.

All the best :thumbsup: