So I just tried my first round of grafting with a queen derived from Michael Palmer's stock. I got 7/8 takes in a very small but strong starter colony. I need about 8 mated queens for the year and have 4 mating nucs. Do I need to make a finisher colony for my tiny goal, or can I just keep the cells there until day 14?
First Grafting Attempt
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that is good very good my first graft I only go 1 out of about 15 that has several years ago
Just keep them there being strong cell starter they will finish them Just keep feeding until they are sealed. make sure in about 2-3 days after graft (to reduce computation on royal jelly usage) and on day 7 after graft knock of the rough queen cells on the comb and shake off the bees so you can see the combs good if you don't look close you will miss the nubbin of a cell, it will ruin the whole project
Just keep them there being strong cell starter they will finish them Just keep feeding until they are sealed. make sure in about 2-3 days after graft (to reduce computation on royal jelly usage) and on day 7 after graft knock of the rough queen cells on the comb and shake off the bees so you can see the combs good if you don't look close you will miss the nubbin of a cell, it will ruin the whole project
Thanks for the imput. Although I do not know if I will do this again, this particular colony was hopelessly queenless as the queen was caged, removed, and then a very expensive breeder unsuccessfully introduced :-( Sooo....They went queenless for 7 days after being eggless for 7 days.
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