Queens-to clip or not to clip

[Jon]

You find you queen then lay the frame down flat on top of the box when she is near the middle of it. Put the open tube in front of her and shepherd her in with your fingers, then lock her in with the plunger. if a couple of bees go in with her, no odds. Use the plunger to hold her still when she puts a wing up through the mesh. It is actually not that complicated. Sometimes the queen will put a wing up immediately and you can clip, mark and have her back on her frame in 2 minutes but the odd one acts the eejit and takes 10 minutes before sticking a wing up. I have never seen one stick a leg out at the same time as the wing so no chance of damaging it.

[Adam]

I clip and mark. I pick up in disposable gloves (cheap thin washing up gloves also work for me). I have - so far-never damaged a queen. I leave a queen for a few weeks before I mark and/or clip her and make sure that both are done before she leaves a mini-nuc. If she is wriggly and distressed I will leave for later or clip and then let her go and mark her later on.

Iv'e had a couple of swarms this year where the queen was clipped and got her each time. I tell a lie, three. Each time was when I had missed an inspection due to time pressures or I was away. One swarm was 1/2 hour before we had 30 people arrive for our eldest sons 18 birthrday party. Wife stressed - "OMG they'll be here soon and we're not ready!" I slipped out, veil on, picked her up from outside the hive, dropped some bees that were hanging on the hive into a mini-nuc and she was caught. Job done in 5 - 6 minutes. Bees came back. Wife didn't even know. Result.

Last week I collected a swarm from nearby that went inside a chimney. I suspect I know the 'keeper who let them go. If the queen had been clipped it would have saved me a great deal of time!

Yesterday I had another call about a swarm and managed to get someone else to collect it and donate it to a new beekeeper.. It was near my out apiary but I was comforted in the fact that it was not mine.

[Adam]

Another technique for marking I have tried recently a couple of times is simply to hold the queen on the comb with thumb and forefinger of my left hand. There is a natural gap between them when you press down (gently) so the chances of squashing are minimal. It's really quick. Hold. Dab with paint. Let go. Less than 10 seconds. The paint doesn't get licked off it seems, so no need to hold for a while 'till it dries.

[Jon]

Last week I collected a swarm from nearby that went inside a chimney. I suspect I know the 'keeper who let them go. If the queen had been clipped it would have saved me a great deal of time!

Oh I've been told on forums and in person that my not clipping queens is irresponsible, swarms in chimneys blah blah blah. .

Mind your language Adam. there is no need for the C word on this forum!

[Adam]

Here's a photo of a clipped queen NOT swarming. Her daughters did but they came back of course. I could see the queen being pushed out but she didn't go and walked back in again.

(Probably not dark enough for some).Queennotswarming1.jpg

[Jon]

(Probably not dark enough for some).Queennotswarming1.jpg

yep,the black bee police would be taking that one down a dark alley.

The other thing about clipping is that it saves you time as you can inspect every 2 weeks instead of every week.
I checked one today after 16 days and found several sealed queen cells - only just sealed by the look of them. I thought the queen might have gone as I was away at the weekend but she was on the next frame. I did an artificial swarm and left the queen with the flying bees and the supers on the original site and immediately introduced a mated queen in a cage to the other part from one of my apideas. I also saved a frame with a particularly nice queen cell in the middle and put it in a 2 frame nuc with an extra shake or two of bees. I was planning to graft from this queen but haven't got round to it yet. She is a crafty bugger - flew out of a 2 frame mating nuc and into a queenless colony with queen cells which she took over last summer.

Clipping + spare queens is the way to go.
I have to admit it was Adam and Roger Patterson with their relentless mantra about the benefits of clipping who convinced me - along with my mate Tim who is a second year beekeeper but clips everything and never stops talking about bees in chimneys. He is on the swarm collector list and has had loads of calls to bees in chimneys in the greater Belfast area, the most recent one the day before yesterday.

[Mellifera Crofter]

...and I've just discovered that she's gone.

No - I found her again on Wednesday. She was hiding in the supers, and being very busy there as well.
Kitta

[The Drone Ranger]

I don't clip because at the end of the day its the bees that decide to swarm not the queen
If your queen is lost in the grass they will still have the swarming urge and first opportunity or hatched virgin off they will go
A couple of bait hives can work wonders if you miss something.

[Rosie]

Very few of us clip in my neck of the woods - especially our best queens. We think that if a swarm leaves with a clipped queen the queen dies and the bees return. If she's not clipped they take off to be collected by another beekeeper and the genetics live on and a new colony is born. If your motivaton is the bees rather than the crop it makes more sense not to clip. In a urban environment the balance might switch and clipping might be better to avoid frightening the neigbours.

Rosie

[EmsE]

I haven't clipped my queens before but am seriously considering it for next year. If the bees try to swarm with a clipped queen, she has a chance of crawling back to the hive (hopefully the right one) therefore allowing me to artificially swarm them (One of my hives swarmed 7 days after the previous inspection where there had been no sign of queen cells, not even a play cup).

What are the chances a swarm has of establishing itself as a successful feral colony? First they have to find a suitable place to call home (a chimney is fine until winter). Secondly are they able to tolerate varroa & other diseases without the bee keeper? If they can overcome these 2 then I'd be all for helping the feral numbers but after 'contributing' 2 swarms to them this year I feel guilty that it's not in their best interests from a survival point of view, and am praying that they didn't venture to any residential areas.