Queen Rearing
2008 was the first year that we began raising queens. They were started from larvae that was grafted from one of the hives that came through winter with sufficient bees and reserves. The selection process was no more scientific than that. In the past too many of the queens that have been purchased failed our expectations. Fast forward eight years and today we have three queens we are using in our breeding program. A VHS Carnolian artificial inseminated from VP Queens, a F1 Caucasian survivor from Strachan Apiaries Cobey's AI breeder, and an exceptional queen that headed a third year colony that showed no sign of swarming even though the queen was down to a small space to lay. The colony had also amassed an extrodinary amount of honey in comparison to the other colonies in the same area.
This year we are using a incubator to insure the cells develop at a constant temperature, and humidity. This will also
allow us to use fewer cell builders.
