Queens... when to mark and clip?

I only mark and clip queens once they have overwintered and are laying abundantly and bringing on drones ( about this time of the season)

[Exception being II queens.... clipped and badged up whilst drugged!]


any thoughts????


Yeghes da

icanhopit said:

I only mark and clip queens once they have overwintered and are laying abundantly and bringing on drones ( about this time of the season)

[Exception being II queens.... clipped and badged up whilst drugged!]


any thoughts????


Yeghes da

Click to expand...

I am always cautious when marking and clipping and tend only to do so when the colony has a chance of getting a successfully mated replacement in case of beekeeper cockup.
The other approach is to clip and mark successfully mated queens whenever you see them.

icanhopit said:

I only mark and clip queens once they have overwintered and are laying abundantly and bringing on drones ( about this time of the season)

[Exception being II queens.... clipped and badged up whilst drugged!]


any thoughts????


Yeghes da

Click to expand...

My queens emerge into a nicot cage in an incubator. I mark them with numbered plastic disks before they go to the mating nucs. I want absolute certainty that the queen is actually the one I think it is. If I find a queen without a mark, I know that colony has been compromised. If she is laying, I will mark her with a Posca pen until I can get around to requeening.

Your II queens will be at least 6 days old when they are narcotised for the first time. Presumably, there is a queen excluder material over the nuc to prevent her from flying but, do you II one queen at a time? If you do more than one at a time, do you mark their cages in some way so you know which queen it is? I just find it easier to mark them from emergence so there is no possibility of confusion.

I would mark open mated queens straight away with a Posca pen. If it is a virgin, I would wait until she had started laying or the paint could get rubbed off during mating. I wouldn't wait until the next spring unless she was a "hider" and I just couldn't find her (but this is rare)

due to work problems last summer I left clipping of new 2014 queens until this spring~~~mistake, most of my hives had Queen cells by mid april and the inevitable swarm when you miss that lfirst Queen cell tucked away in an odd place or those that got capped before i even got around to first inspection due to bad weather

so this year the scissors come out early and no February/March fondant to biuld up my OSR hives

I mark as soon as she has her own capped brood. Not too confident about clipping yet but will try this year - if the weather improves enough.

I mark any overwintered Queens that didn't get marked the previous year now and re-mark any where the paint has just about rubbed off.
During the season I will mark Queens only when mated and proven and then only as and when I spot them.
I do not bother marking in Autumn as any problems and you are left Q- !!