Beekeeping | Raise & Hold Your Own Queens In Limited Space

now wait a minute before you think you can never raise your own Queens I want you to think again I'm here to tell you I've done it for years it's easy it's not hard it's not complicated it's too difficult to try to order a queen it's too difficult trying to wait for the queen to arrive and time it out just right from the queen that you bought from states away so much more easier for you as a beekeeper to raise your own Queen take control of the timing when you need a queen you need it now and so we're at the mercy of Queen producers finally producing a queen and shipping it to us and hoping it survives shipping you can take control of this it will transform beekeeping for you when you learn the simple simple art of raising your own Queen quite honestly I wonder if some people don't try to make it sound complicated so that they can sell more to you I don't know I just think that I want to help you learn learn to raise your own Queens let's get started thanks for stopping by my Channel today I'm Eis certified Master beekeeper David Burns for those of you that are first time dropping in welcome to my channel and for those of you that are loyal subscribers hey how you doing nice to have you back today we're going to answer some questions I have been doing a series on Queen rearing and I'm going to do that for the next probably a few weeks because it's so much material that's so fun to get into now before I get into this let me tell you I have a free book that you can download it's a PDF file Dr John zavishlock and I wrote this book several years ago on how to raise quality Queens it's not a real big book but it just gets right down to the basic facts you know just jump in there and we just made it simple to follow I'm gonna have 100 copies of these available in a few weeks at Hive life conference at serville Sarahville cereville Sevierville somewhere in Tennessee Hive life and um John and I will autograph those for you if both of us seem to be at the same place at the same time we get those books autographed for you but pick one of those up we're selling the hard copies over there at Hive life again we're limited to 100 copies that's about all we can pack and load over there but anyway this book you can download if you don't want to buy it you can just download it I'll leave a link in the description below and it will walk you through how to raise quality Queens I also have a queen rearing class online that you can purchase it's a queen rearing online beekeeping course many of you have purchased it said you love it it will walk you through Hands-On with me showing you how to raise Queens but I'm gonna give you a good education on Queen rearing in the next few weeks here on my Channel today I want to answer three questions that commenters viewers like yourself have left in my comments section because I think it's really important to get into because these questions are fundamental but before I do some of you may have not heard my story so let me just tell you my story real quick how I got started in Queen rearing I was wanting to make a living on uh making honey I thought if I had enough hives I could make enough honey and make a living well boy that didn't work out very good I mean I had a lot of hives at the time but it takes a lot of work and honey wasn't selling for much it was like a buck 50 at the time of pounds you know and so it wasn't making enough to for me to raise my family so I actually was at a conference and I heard Joe landshaw present Queen rearing and he was talking about how he raises breeder queens and he's a really nice guys so I got a hold of him either email or called him up I said Hey Joe can I bring my couple of my kids over that are interested in raising queens and and would you teach us how to raise Queens I will pay you to teach us all day long whatever you want to tell me it caused I'll pay it because I knew I could make money raising Queens guess what he invited me and two of my children over who were teenagers at the time and spent the day showing us how to raise Queens Priceless he wouldn't take a penny for it it was so nice of Joe to do that and so I came home and started raising Queens with my a couple of my kids my daughter Curry really got into it she was a very good grafter and she just took off and started helping us so much raising queens and I soon learned that I could make more money raising Queens than I could selling honey plus I needed Queens I'm making nucleus I'm selling five frame nukes to people I'm expanding my own operation I was buying queens and paying 70 80 dollars by the time I paid shipping it was breaking my bank and I thought I need to find out how to raise my own Queens just to save money and to give me the flexibility of having Queens at the right time when I need them to make a split or to add more colonies sometimes you catch a swarm and you think oh good I got a swarm and two weeks later the Queen's not in there and wow they're not raising one now what are you gonna do if you're raising queens and you have some Queens banked ready to go they're an armed Force ready to jump in there and fight your battles when you're go when you go queenless having these Queens banked at your disposal whether you want to sell any or not if you're a beekeeper you know how easy it is to lose Queens quite honestly it's challenging isn't it to keep a hive Queen right Queen right means you've got a good laying Queen in there here's what happens a lot of you probably have experiences leave a comment below if this has happened to you you have a nice Hive but all at once the queen has a poor laying pattern you look at the capped over pupae it's spotty what are you gonna do you can't find a queen maybe you've called around nobody has one there's going to be a month before they can ship you one you need it now that spotty brood is getting worse without the proper brood in that Hive they don't have a good future you know the one video that I made a couple of videos ago about explaining a brood Gap how devastating it is to a hive if you haven't seen that video drop back a couple of videos and watch that one because when you have a brood break from a failing Queen it is bad and it can make the whole Colony just eventually perish so you need to have a eye on the queen and her productivity at all times and get ready to replace that Queen when she starts failing it's okay to replace the Queen the minute she stops producing good quality brood you just gotta replace her and so I was really inspired to start raising my own Queens so that gave me more control over keeping high quality Queens in all of my hives that allowed me to have more honey to make more nucleuses to sell because how does it make more honey well if you have a good playing Queen she's laying a Workforce of foragers gathering up nectar you have a poor failing Queen not much brood not much foragers they don't make much honey people come on this is I'm here to inspire you to raise your own queens now a lot of you might be thinking oh I can't do it my hands are too shaky my eyes are too weak I just don't know what I'm doing hey don't wait to become perfect before you start I didn't I jumped in there and I just said I'm gonna raise queens and what was my first month or two like it wasn't good it wasn't pretty but I just stayed in there I stayed in the game and kept experimenting where am I failing why why am I not able to do this way I want to oh I see I need to change this I need to change that I I just sat self-taught myself how to raise good quality Queens over and over again failing and then trying to make it right like Thomas Edison I think it took him 1200 experiments to finally get something that worked in the light bulb he didn't give up I think he even burnt the whole building down once trying to but you know he just stayed in the game that's what I want you to do some of you are thinking uh Queen rearing is just for you know endomologists that are specialists in their field no it's not I've trained a lot of entomologists how to keep bees come on you can be a scientist and really sharp in biology and still not know how to raise Queens but you can be someone who is a citizen scientist your own backyard you can start raising high quality queens that will just power up your beekeeping side Hustle come on I'm excited if you've tried Queen ring in the past us and failed I get it I had I I failed too I started with what was called a Nikon kit and it came with all these special little things where I didn't have to graft but I could just put all these things in the hive raise my own queens that way I couldn't do it I just couldn't it was not going to work for me it failed miserably until I got in there and learned how to do my own grafting of my one day old larvae into these Queen cups that I showed you in a previous video how to make these Queen cups these Queen cups go into hives that they make into Queen cells hey I really started succeeding and it wasn't that hard I'm nobody special I don't have any special skills as far as Queen rearing up to the point where I just jumped in and figured it out and I and so you can save yourself so many time consuming mistakes because I'm gonna guide you through it you don't have to does flounder like I did day after day failing until you figure it out I've already hey I'm like one beggar telling the other beggar where the water is I found the water and I'm not holding back I'm just going to let you know what it is but I want to answer three of these questions and let's get started on it first question I want to answer is from George George says is there a video on how to bank Queens I don't know how to save them from when I need them that's a good question George because so many of us wonder if I make a bunch of Queens I can't necessarily sell them all at one time and so what do I do where do I hold them well a couple of things that I do in holding my queens that I'm going to sell or use myself is that I can hold them in a queen bank one of the ways that I do it is with this Frame now I made this Frame myself I don't know if anybody else makes these I didn't get an idea for this off of anything other than how do I solve a problem and that's what is unique I think to most beekeepers that succeed is they don't try to figure things out where they can buy something out of a catalog or you know who has the best this or that instead they say what do I need what can I solve with something that I need so I needed a way to hold these Queen cages so once my Queens return from their mating flights and they start laying a good brood pattern solid brood I will take them out of their mating nooks and I will put them in these California cages California mini cages and I put a little candy just you know I'll show you how to make candy in a future video Queen candy but you can use a marshmallow but a little bit of candy right in the hole right there and then I would just I built this Frame it was beautiful when I first made it years ago but now it's aged and well used like me and I would just push these in there I made this just the right spacing and I just played around with it until there was tension that would I could slide these in with a little tension but they would stay right here and then that allowed me actually to bank my Queens right here like this and they would sit in cages like this I learned that if I kept the cages kind of like in a brood Nest Circle like this they're well taken care of by the bees once I put all these mated queens that had already been laying for a couple of weeks in these cages then I could take this banking frame and I would take a regular Hive that has two deeps on it and I would put a queen excluder between the two deeps holding the queen down in the lower deep and then I would put these Queens mated Queens in the top deep in the center what would happen is it works every time the bees start caring for these mated Queens the queens start and hear wanting food they started asking for food and the all the B trees in this large Hive start feeding through this screen and so these would be held I could hold these a long time weeks upon weeks I could hold them somebody dropped by who wants to buy one I can go out and pull one out now you can't Bank virgin Queens you don't want to do that virgin Queens won't go out on on a mating flight if you hold them more than 21 days they'll never go out on a mating flight they have to go mate and then come back let them lay for a couple of three weeks before you Bank them they need to they need to be able to produce a lot of eggs get into the Rhythm start laying well at that point you can grab and Bank them now you don't want to bank them you know don't don't think you want to bank them forever try to bank them as minimally as possible like if you only Bank them for three days five days a week I just don't want to bank them very long and that way I want them to go right back to work laying eggs now you can Bank them longer I've experimented with it the longest queen that I ever banked and put her in a hive and she started laying beautifully was uh four weeks and one day she stayed banked four weeks in one day and once I let her out she did beautifully laying that that year but that it may not always work that way so don't keep them Bank forever but that's one way you can Bank them another way that you can Bank your Queens is to Simply put them in a five frame nucleus and that way the queen can keep laying now she's not banked in a cage she has a freedom to just roam around in this five frame nucleus easy to build I'll show you in a future video how I make these five frame nucleus out of plywood and it really works great but once you drop your mated Queen in there or if you're using it as a mating Nook just When She Flies back to that five frame mating Nook let her lay let her stay in there don't need to take her out until you need her how many maintenance can you have one two five five hundred depends on how many you want to manage but once you have mating Nooks they can hold your queen they're just a tiny little Hive now you might say well what if that meeting Nook swarms who cares they'll make a queen and then you still have a queen right if you don't want to fool with it you just want to hold like 25 mating nooks and you don't want to manage them they will swarm maybe you don't want to do swarm management let them swarm let them raise another queen I have found though that I can manipulate my mating Nooks very easily so if I have five frames in there once they draw the five frames out I pull out two frames and move them to a a new mating nuke with a queen cell and let them start that's how I continue to expand my mating notes I just let this one get full pull a couple of frames out let that one Go full pull more out it doesn't take any time at all Beads build up really fast in little uh boxes little mating Nooks like that so I always like to use deep frames deep full-size frames I don't like to use small ones that are mismatched if I keep everything the same size I've always had a frame available so whether it's my deep High bodies my mating Nooks my banking frames or whatever deep nine inches nine underneath long so two ways to bank your Queens George is to put them in a queen Bank like I just explained or put them in nucleuses or mating looks let them sit out there and lay eggs until you need them now I want to answer another two more questions listen up these are important I know that if some of my YouTube viewers are asking these questions that most of you are asking these so I'm answering this on behalf of one person but all of you Kim asks what happens if you replace the queen and it turns out there's a lame Queen in there you couldn't find Kim I think you have a great question here's what's going to happen if you fail to remove your old Queen if you don't move remove the old Queen her pheromones are kind of in or a part of the whole Colony so all the bees are transmitting transferring her Queen mandibular pheromone around the high if you introduce a foreign Queen they don't accept her they're like nope I don't recognize that pheromone off with their head so they'll never accept her even if their feet Queen is failing they won't accept your better Queen because they have the pheromones of their mama so you have to get rid of the old Queen wait 24 hours before you introduce a new queen always introduce a new Queen not directly but in a queen cage this one a plastic one uh one with three holes a Benton three-hole Queen cage whatever but you need to have candy let them eat through the candy have a slow introduction to a new Queen but you have to get rid of the old one wait 24 hours to introduce a new one always do it that way whether you're making you know a replacement of a queen or whatever you have to introduce her behind candy so let me give you a few tips on what you can do to find your queen if you need a replacer she's not laying well or it's a mean Colony I sometimes have to do that with Queen excluders let's say you have two deeps and a honey super so you have 30 frames and you're looking all through those frames trying to find one bee that's a queen well what I do is go out there and suit up smoke them drop a queen excluder between every box it takes two of them one between the two deeps one between the deep and the super on top so I got two queen excluders now I have three spaces three boxes that are contained or the queen is contained she is in one of those three boxes I do this in case I'm having a really hard time finding her or she's real running I can't locate she's just jumping between boxes now what I do in this situation it aids you in identifying where the queen is you start with your super if you think she could be laying up there and you've already put in your two queen excluders wait about two weeks go back in look in that super do you see eggs do you see brood if you don't see eggs larvae or any brood in there she's not in that super set the super aside take the queen of scooter off go into the top deep because remember you've had two Quinn excluders surrounding that top deep in that top deep do you see eggs larvae or brood if you scan it real quick and see nothing she's not in there guess where she is she might be in the bottom deep now right now whatever box she's in to find her you only have to look at 10 frames and usually the three on the wall sides don't really contain brood so that's six that means you have four frames to look at isn't that that's you're just thinking man that's brilliant hey if you like this video give me a thumbs up I'm telling you tips guys when you can't find your queen isolator with some Queen excluders and that way you minimize how many frames you have to look at and she won't jump to the box of below you while you're looking give me a thumbs up let me know you're getting value in the comments sections below from these videos that I'm making so Kim that's one way that you can isolate your queen is with Queen excluders to your finally finder then you just kind of pinch her fire her and wait 24 hours and introduce the queen of your choice that's what you have to do please all of you listen up closely don't introduce a queen hoping that your old Queen is going to die off no the bees around her her Queen court all the bees that have her pheromone will defend her till the end against all other queens that you throw in there you're wasting your money now let's ask her another question Dave says great information I had a queen event last summer and ended up with a laying worker I wanted to start Queen rearing because it's so hard to get your hands on a queen when you need one can you please discuss Queen rearing in limited space well Dave I think all of us have limited space I mean we don't know most of us don't own 500 Acres that we can just make us sea of hives across Rolling Hills as far as the eye can see most of us are limited to some degree if you're not limited by space you might be limited by sheer muscle and back muscles and a Workforce so you know space isn't so much the problem is how much time do you have to fool around with your hives and raising Queens but let's say let's go pretty average let's say you're a beekeeper with a backyard now how many queens can you raise in your backyard it let's say you have one Hive let's make it as small as we can and let's say that Hive is too deep so the honey super that's all you have and you're thinking I saw David's video about raising Queens I'm kind of excited he got me excited about this can I raise Queens in this backyard with one Hive yes I want you to do it this way I was going to make a whole video about this I'm going to sneak this in there really fast I want you to take this Hive that you have and if you're pleased with how it's performing I want you I want you to raise Queens from a successful Hive not a weak Hive but if you see good root pattern a lot of Honey production they're not dying from mites and diseases hey it's it's a good hydrophy it's Queens from and all you need to do is find a frame with eggs on it and now you need to find a one day old larvae graft it and remember I showed you a few videos back how we made these Queen cells with this special little thing I my father-in-law made for me make these Queen cups and you can take these Queen cups and put them on a frame like this and drop them in to a five frame nucleus you can make your own I'm going to show you how you make your own you can buy one but that five frame nucleus is going to become your best friend so now in your backyard all you have is a hive and a five frame nucleus five frame nucleus nine inches wide you know about 20 inches long it's not a big footprint in your backyard you have a big Hive and one tiny little five frame nuke so what you're going to do is you're going to build up that five frame nucleus I'm going to show you how to do this as a starter Hive basically you put young beads in there six to twelve days old brush beads off of Open brood from your big Hive and then drop this in there after doing your grafting and then you don't have to move it to a finishing height let's just save time and say you want them just to raise Queen two or three queens for you or just one then you just drop it in there and leave it that'll make a queen sell they'll raise that Queen she'll go mate she'll come back you've got a queen sitting in a five frame nucleus box in a small space I'm going to show all of you how to do that I'm gonna in the next few videos that I'm gonna make I'm going to show you how to start very simple with just one Hive and one nucleus I'm going to teach you how to raise Queens all of us are going to raise at least one Queen and if it's a wrong time of the year for you you're watching this video in the winter that's okay you can save it somewhere watch it again or take notes or whatever so that when spring gets here you can do it it's gonna be so fun so these are good questions limited space is not a problem and especially starting learning how to raise Queens we're going to take a very simple I'm going to take them most simple way for you to learn to raise queens and then we're going to expand it in case some of you do want to raise more for spring splits spring swarms at loser queens or maybe just the failing queens that happen to us all pretty regularly anymore or maybe you're wanting to expand where you can start making money selling Queens I'm here to help you kind of Hold Your Hand it's okay you don't have to know everything I don't care if you're a farmer a banker a lawyer I don't care if you're a mechanic an airplane pilot a doctor whatever your occupation is but you want to play with raising Queens high five we're going to learn together now I want you to watch this last video in case you have a lot of honey and you've never experimented with cooking with honey join me and Sherry in our last video Christmas holiday cooking with our honey I'll see you over there

Channel: David Burns

Views: 56,256

Keywords: Beekeeping, beekeeping 101, Beekeeping tips, beekeeping training, honey bees, how to inspect a hive, smoker, keeping a smoker going, smoker fuel, beekeeping classes, beekeeping basics, beekeeping for beginners, how to start beekeeping, why keep bees, save the bees, lighting a smoker, david burns beekeeping, varroa mite, when to start beekeeping, packages of bees, queen bee, where to buy a queen bee, bee suit, beekeeping business, raising queens, queen rearing, queens

Id: OY4w_JmIEf8

Length: 24min 53sec (1493 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 21 2022