Queen rearing 2011

[GRIZZLY]

Is anyone going to organize a Queen rearing course next year (2011) accessible to us in the wilds of the S.W. i.e. not north of Perth ???
We are prepared to travel reasonable distances. :) :) :)

[Roger Patterson]

Grizzly,

The Local Queen Programme http://www.bibba.com/local_queens.php has been set up to help beekeepers and local BKAs raise queens to suit their own locality.

I don't want to tread on toes, but BIBBA covers a wide area.

Roger Patterson.

[GRIZZLY]

Grizzly,

The Local Queen Programme http://www.bibba.com/local_queens.php has been set up to help beekeepers and local BKAs raise queens to suit their own locality.

I don't want to tread on toes, but BIBBA covers a wide area.

Roger Patterson.

Not down in the S.W. corner of Dumfries and Galloway Roger.I am a member of BIBBA however so live in hope.A listing would be useful.

[gavin]

We had hoped that the Fife format - with the inevitable wrinkles ironed out - may become a model for other parts of Scotland next year. SBA and/or BIBBA, the people running the Fife one are all in both organisations. Would there be enough interest in S Scotland for one do you think?

But don't you have speakers travelling even longer distances to come and tell you about honeybee communication?! :p

[Jimbo]

Mike Thornley who was at the Fife Bee breeding day was talking about a possible event in Helensburgh but not on such as scale and similar to the Fife event. I know it is still a few hours drive up from the South of Scotland but just a bit closer than Perth

[GRIZZLY]

We had hoped that the Fife format - with the inevitable wrinkles ironed out - may become a model for other parts of Scotland next year. SBA and/or BIBBA, the people running the Fife one are all in both organisations. Would there be enough interest in S Scotland for one do you think?

But don't you have speakers travelling even longer distances to come and tell you about honeybee communication?! :p
I believe we have a certain Dr Ramsey coming to see us next month.This would be a good time to discuss possibilities for next year !.

[gavin]

i.e. not north of Perth ???


Maybe I should have spotted this before the Fifers start having a go at you ...... the summer workshop was about 40 km *south* of Perth, and the November workshop maybe 30 km south!

Stranraer to Dunfermline is maybe just a little bit further than Stranraer to Helensburgh, but not much.

I had a feeling that there was some sort of aspiration to run one in the north next year (I'm talking *real* north!). What you need is a few folk enthusiastic enough to set up the day, some with local experience of some kind, and I'm sure that you could lure someone with better experience from afar. Terry Clare was great at the summer Fife workshop, and is again helping us out in November, but there are others. In fact, just a short ferry hop across the water there are Ulstermen with ever-increasing experience of Apideas and a penchant for creative uses of discarded election propaganda!

Self-help is a wonderful thing. Might this be an enterprise to get several SW associations collaborating? If you don't know John Mellis I could sound him out to see if he uses mininucs and is willing to help. Or others in Dumfries. Willie Robson? The Ayr association?

[Alvearium]

A lot of work involved but every area has it's own needs and peculiarities; I am all for using the expertise within BIBBA but never forget the skilled people on your own doorstep. Once folk get involved things just gather their own momentum. It would be good to see a course like this as an annual event travelling around Scotland. Those who have been involved before would be able to offer their experience in helping to set things up. Make a decision locally whether to hold a course or not. Look for a suitable apiary and get a small committee going. Plan the course to coincide more or less with your local time for queen rearing. Aim for something manageable in size.....looks like Roger is willing to get involved.
Alvearium

[gavin]

I believe we have a certain Dr Ramsey coming to see us next month.This would be a good time to discuss possibilities for next year !.

Dr Ramsay (two 'a's, its OK, I forgive you ...) will happily advise but I just want to point out that the summer 2-day workshop was entirely organised by Fifers. I was lucky enough to go on the second day. As far as I could see there were the two main local organisers but they were supported by around a good half a dozen or more local volunteer stewards, caterers, registration supervisors, gazebo-erectors, chair shifters, car park attendents and litter pickers. And of course those who contributed to the very well-run association apiary that hosted the event, and the gazebo-supplier from Ayr.

Of course you could do it differently - one day, smaller group, fewer methods on display, one expert invited in to help if you don't have the expertise locally.

G.

[Calum]

I'd do a course in Lindau am Bodensee, its is just a hop a skip and a ryanair / easyjet flight flight away.
Queen raising with Jenter system, queen raising in a queen right colony and drinking german beer.

[GRIZZLY]

I'd do a course in Lindau am Bodensee, its is just a hop a skip and a ryanair / easyjet flight flight away.
Queen raising with Jenter system, queen raising in a queen right colony and drinking german beer.
NOW we're talking Calum.With such an inducement - who could resist?.
Seriously tho' we're so widely scattered here in the s.w. and have so many beginners that I think we would rather attend someone elses course if only we know where they will be held.Given a venue etc etc I could probably round up a few like minded souls but to form a local group might prove impractical. Yes I do know John Mellis but at a recent visit to his set up I got the impression he raised queens / requeened from swarm cells rather than grafting.Belfast could be an option if we got in touch with Jon.

[Jon]

Hi Grizzly.
Give me a chance!
(Thanks for volunteering me Gav!)
Belfast is probably handier than Perth and I believe the ferry is a bit better than it used to be.
It's at least 20 years since I was last on it.
I don't have my own group set up properly yet.
The stuff we did this year was informal and I still have to establish a few rules and regulations - or more to the point, delegation of responsibilities.
Bear in mind that I am also a first year grafter so no expert in that area.
I intend to speak to Mervyn Eddie, Norman Walsh, Alan Jones and some of the local Bibba folk over the next week or so to thrash out a few guidelines.

PS. Who wants that German froth when you can get a decent pint of Stout in Belfast

[Jimbo]

Hi Grizzly,

How about this for an idea. You shop at Tesco wait until they send you the Tesco cash vouchers. Go onto their web site and trade them in for 4 times the value for a free trip to Belfast on the Stena line. We did this few years ago and went to Ireland with our car for a holiday.
If you like the German offer use the vouchers for Eurotunnel. We use them all the time for our trips to Europe

[Jimbo]

Hi Jon,

We set a group up a few years ago but it no longer functions as a bee breeding group.
The biggest problem was there was a lot of interest but the beekeepers were not that experienced at beekeeping. The majority of the group had only been keeping bees 1 - 2 years
At that time it was also difficult to find a bee breeding workshop in Scotland to get bee breeding experience.
The Fife breeding weekend solved that problem for me as it helped me get the right experience and I picked up many ideas
I put that experience into practice this year and managed to raise queens in apideas for the first time after a few years of trying and failing

[GRIZZLY]

Hi Jon,

We set a group up a few years ago but it no longer functions as a bee breeding group.
The biggest problem was there was a lot of interest but the beekeepers were not that experienced at beekeeping. The majority of the group had only been keeping bees 1 - 2 years
At that time it was also difficult to find a bee breeding workshop in Scotland to get bee breeding experience.
The Fife breeding weekend solved that problem for me as it helped me get the right experience and I picked up many ideas
I put that experience into practice this year and managed to raise queens in apideas for the first time after a few years of trying and failing

Thats what we need to do again!!!

[Jon]

The biggest problem was there was a lot of interest but the beekeepers were not that experienced at beekeeping. The majority of the group had only been keeping bees 1 - 2 years
At that time it was also difficult to find a bee breeding workshop in Scotland to get bee breeding experience.
The Fife breeding weekend solved that problem for me as it helped me get the right experience and I picked up many ideas
I put that experience into practice this year and managed to raise queens in apideas for the first time after a few years of trying and failing

That's the same experience I have.
The people who have shown the greatest interest are all relatively new beekeepers.
Unfortunately, a lot of the older guys who have kept bees for many years tend to snipe from the sidelines.

This summer I ended up doing practically everything myself, but next year I want to plan the thing so that there is much more participation from all involved.

Part of the problem is that it is hard to do queen rearing if you are nervous around bees and wear heavy gloves.
Apideas really need to be worked bare handed or with just nitrile gloves, and queen cells are fiddly to manipulate.
You need the dexterity to take cells off the cell bar and place them in apideas without damaging them.

There are other general problems such as the many beekeepers who say they can never find the queen.
With a queenright system like I use, you have to find the queen once a week without fail when you rearrange the frames between the upper and lower box making sure that the queen always stays in the bottom box below the excluder.

Everyone gets hung up about grafting but that is the least of your worries.
If you graft and check a few hours later or the following day you will see which larvae have disappeared. The trick is to graft again and replace them as soon as possible.

What I am thinking of at the moment is getting 20 people to chip in a tenner each which would enable bulk buying of cell cups and roller cages and all the bits and bobs.
Patricipating individuals would be responsible for buying their own Apideas and group members would get as many queen cells as they wanted.
Apideas could be taken away or left for mating in the association apiary or a couple of others which have decent drones.

One of the first steps would be to teach participants how to fill apideas as I had people arriving last year with brand new Apideas with the frames unassembled inside.

Further down the line the problem is requeening and queen introduction as a lot of beekeepers seem to have problems with this.
That's the most frustrating part.
You graft a larva, it emerges as a virgin queen 12 days later, mated two weeks after that, lays 2 weeks in an apidea - then gets balled on introduction to a nuc.
If nothing else beekeeping teaches you patience.

[Trog]

A course in Helensburgh would be easier to reach by folk in Oban and Mull, perhaps, than one in Perth or Fife. It's at least on the main railway line to Glasgow. Likewise, folk from anywhere near Mallaig or Ft William could get to Helensburgh.

[Alvearium]

There are other ways to organise a queen -rearing course. Set straight forward objectives and keep it a smaller affair. You could split into a couple of different days.
a) one day for relatively inexperienced beekeepers showing and doing a couple of simple opportunistic manouevres using swarm cells/swarm control methods to make increase by nuc production. This would help to increase the number stocks in the association area. We had a couple of new beekeepers in their 2nd year making nucs for complete beginners.
b) Invite someone to come along to do a grafting procedure on a queen right stock. This should only be attended by those likely to use these skills the following year. The numbers would be limited and very much 'hands on'.
This would be far easier to arrange than the Fife Queen Rearing weekend course.
Did you know that 30 years ago Craibstone was providing grafted queens in their hundreds for associations in the north and east of Scotland. These were from selected breeder stocks of local bees. Sometimes started larvae were collected and transported and sometimes virgin queens and also mated queens from mininucs. I would like to see this happen again......it is quite possible!
Alvearium

[ian]

Hi Grizzly.
read your post the other day.I am a member of the Ayr club and was on a Queen Rearing course last year at Stoneleigh run by Clive De Bruyn and Margaret Thomas.Last night the club had a lecture on why does the be do what it does,by Margaret Thomas.After the lecture i asked if she was willing to run a Queen Rearing course at our club apiary near Ayr,and she said yes she would possably in June.No prices or numbers were mentioned but that will be arranged later.
Hope this is of help.
Ian

[GRIZZLY]

Hi Grizzly.
read your post the other day.I am a member of the Ayr club and was on a Queen Rearing course last year at Stoneleigh run by Clive De Bruyn and Margaret Thomas.Last night the club had a lecture on why does the be do what it does,by Margaret Thomas.After the lecture i asked if she was willing to run a Queen Rearing course at our club apiary near Ayr,and she said yes she would possably in June.No prices or numbers were mentioned but that will be arranged later.
Hope this is of help.
Ian
Hi Ian,I would certainly help to swell the numbers if a course os run.Perhaps get one or two other bodies from our Ass'n involved as well.
John

[ian]

Hi Grizzly
When we get it organized any info will be posted on the club web site www.ayrbeekeepers.co.uk.
So if you have a look from time to time .
Ian

[GRIZZLY]

Thanks Ian for that
John

[Calum]

:) New toy (well two of them) for queen raising (http://www.sbai.org.uk/sbai_forum/album.php?albumid=2&attachmentid=479).
Now I have my own I really feel like a beekeeper!