Queen Rearing

5/4

Bees. We buy 4 queens from a Mennonite beekeeper, from whom I have been buying queens and small cell foundation for the last few years. We (Apple & I) re-queen 2 of our hives that we have labeled “defensive” (mean!); the energy of the entire hive is determined by the queen’s pheromones and her disposition is largely a matter of genes. How does one “re-queen”? We have to find the old queen and kill her (squish her between my fingers) and then I rub her remains on the cage of the new queen, which we carefully install in the hive. The cage has a candy plug (sugar & honey) in the entrance – the bees have to chew/remove the plug to release the new queen (it usually takes 2-3 days, during which time they get used to her smell/pheromone and accept her as their new matriarch). We also divide 2 hives and introduce one of the new queens to the queen-less divides.