It is raining like crazy up here for weeks and we get a clear day every now and then. I need queens and need to do some splits so I was thinking that this type of a system might be easier to do in bad weather.
I have never tried grafting but here is how I believe they compare in a couple ways:
SCHEDULE: With the Nicot/Jenter system, there is less flexibility on the schedule for grafing than using a grafting tool. The queen has laid eggs on the day you imprisoned her in the cage and those eggs must br grafted no more than 5 days later. Period. With standard grafting there are always fresh eggs being laid and fresh larvae hatching, so if it raining on the planned grafting day but the next day will be sunny, it is easy to wait another day (or two, or three...).
GRAFTING: I had to graft with the Nicot System in the rain (with a large umbrella on a stand). It was possible and I believe with standard grafting it would have been much more difficult if not impossible (unless you happen to have a grafting hut nearby
). With the umbrella on a stand over the hive, I opened the hive, removed the frame with the Nicot Cage, opened the back cover off of the cage, and brushed the bees hanging on the frame back into the hive. For grafting, I could see the few cells that were not full of nectar and transferred all 6 of them to the top bar (in the end, only two had larvae). When I had finished grafting the top bor I opend the starter cell I had prepared and inserted the graft. The Nicot Cage was then put back in the donor hive and the hive was closed up.
The act of Grafting with the Nicot/Jenter system involves much less precision than standard grafting and is much faster (which is why I wanted to give it a try) but it is muchless flexible in terms of schedule.
What is the difference between the Jenner system?
I think the Jenter system is now out of production (though recently I heard that it may be back). The two systems are very similar from what I hav read and about the only real difference could find is that the Nicot system ha an extra piece on the top bar. Both systems have cups that go in the cage and are transferred to the top bar. Both systems have cup holders that hold the cups and are attached to the top bar. In the case of the Jenter system, I believe that the cell cup holder is nailed to the top bar, while in the Nicot System there is ann additional piece called the 'Cell Fixture' which is nailed to the top bar and holds the cell-cup holder through friction (press-on). You can see the Brown Cell Fixture and the Yellow Cell Cup Holders of the Nicot System in my picture.
I originallythought this was an extra and unnecessary piece, but now that i hae used it, I think it is a small plus. You can easily move Cell Cups after grafing with the Nicot System by pulling off and moving the Yellow Cell Cup Holders from the Brown Cell Fixtures. In this way you do not need to touch the Cell Cup itself or the wax queen cell that the bees have started to build onto both the Cell Cup and the Yellow Cell Cup Holder. With the Jenter System I think it would b very difficult to move Queen Cells once they have been started and you would probably damage them in the process.
I actually ended up using this feature because the two cells that started were on the outsides of the 6 that I had grafted. After 24 hours, when I moved the graft from the starter cell to the queenright cell finisher, I saw that there were only two cells, one on each outside edge, and I thought it would be better to move the two cells next to each other and to the center of the bar. Piece of cake with Nicot and not sure it would have been possibe with Jenter. For a full successful graft where all cells are full, this capability would not be needed, but being able to rearrange the sequence of cells after they have been started is a small plus for the Nicot set-up in my book.
Also who has the best price on the one you recommend.?
Mann-Lake has a Nicot kit with enough cell fixtures and cup holders to graft 10 cells. It is less expensive than most of the other kits I have seen because most Nicot Kits seem to come with the parts to graft 20 cells. The Mann-Lake 10-cell kit is $70 and another 10 Brown Fixtures and Yellow Cupholders can be added for total of $12, so it comes out to about the same tat most of he bee equipmet outfits are chargng for a 20-cell set up but gives you the opportunity to start with only 10 cells at lower cost.
-fafrd
