[prbolding]

Hi everyone,
My name is Paul, and I live in south central Oklahoma. I am a newbee (first year). I have a couple of successful hives and have recently captured a few swarms. My question is; What is the best method to use to raise queens? I would like to have a few on hand for captured swarms and requeening. Thanks in in advance, Paul

 

[stormranch]

I found some interesting info about queen rearing at [email protected]. Not being experienced in queen rearing I cant vouch for its correctness but I would assume it is accurate. Good luck!

Mark

 

[Iddee]

I can vouch for Micheal Bush. His site is well done and accurate in facts. There is some personal preferences that you must decide if you like or not, but his knowledge is vast and his facts are accurate.

 

[BjornBee]

For every extra queen you desire, you must have a place for her. So get a few nuc boxes. Then as part of your swarm prevention/management, utilize extra queen cells they provide to you. You can also open up the brood chamber every year and suppress swarming by taking out a few frames during swarm season, thus starting small nucs. These provide boosting nucs for weak hives, allow extra queens to be on hand in requeening later in the summer, or for those swarms that always seem to go queenless.

The BEST (as you asked) way to raise queens, is grafting your own. It allows you to select the genetics, time the queens to your schedule, and uses the least resources.