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I have a relatively simple approach to things, talk before throwing away a good situation but if the answers aren't what you need then don't hesitate to walk away.

Well I'm not going to even try to get my head around those figures, nor do I trap but I do know that two nests were found within a couple of miles of me last summer and I don't live a million miles away from @The Poot, so to my simple way of thinking it doesn't seem "stupid" if some people in...

Is that because rye is the only place where Asian hornet queens can overwinter?

Can't believe that it ever was a question.

Another, recent paper from Dr.Tarpy"s lab which complements this thread: Group size influences maternal provisioning and compensatory larval growth in honeybees...

I think the use of the word supersedure might be an unintentional red herring, I got the impression that he was talking about emergency response despite the word used. As for how these genetic lines exist, that's another interesting conundrum to add to this thread.

Jay Smith's 'Better Queens ' lays out the events that led a prominent queen breeder to move away (after decades) from grafting to a method based on total confidence that queens raised from eggs were better. Now, there's stuff in that book which doesn't stand up to modern scrutiny and of course...

When I first read of Moritz's research on the royal families I was mistaken (due to the way it was being put across by the people reporting it) into thinking that it was a positive selection method, Delaplane's explanation turned that idea on its head. Has anyone read Moritz's 'Dark side of the...

Delaplane's take on the matter:

This is the fascinating thing, a very high degree of selection at a time when under most pressure. I think there was some research which suggested that eggs laid in cups were on average heavier than those in ordinary worker cells, I can't remember where/who that claim came from but if it were...

Thank you, I doubt I'll be back to full dexterity and strength before the end of the season, maybe never, that's not really my plan but it's got to be kept in mind to avoid a meltdown if I don't retrieve full use.

Yesterday... two buses to hand therapy clinic followed be a bus out into the countryside and just short of a ten mile circuitous walk to check on two apiaries that I haven't seen since messing my hand up. Got to admit I did start to think that there "must be easier ways...." then I got to the...

The thing I find odd is that this three day egg selection seems to exclude eggs laid directly into queen cups in favour of later, worker selection.

I'll read link tonight, I mentioned Delaplane's lectures in particular as he has a very negative view of these royal families and makes the argument that beekeeper grafting drastically removes the opportunity for these, as he says, parasitic lines to perpetuate themselves.

It's fairly widely excepted I think that they always know something that we don't, bit like the business of workers vibrating on certain queen cells as they approach maturity, there must be a reason. There are a couple of lectures by Keith Delaplane on YouTube (apologies for not having a link...

Removing all the drones makes no sense at all to me. Everything you've written so far points to an incredibly healthy colony which probably doesn't need any help from you at present.

Another possibility is mouse/moth eaten combs rebuilt with drone cells to give a natural drone population which *might* be higher than what you normally see in your hives.

Well I'm neither qualified or interested in judging who's sensible or not. Plenty of room for everyone.

Well, my initial scepticism has just evaporated after a quick net search for wax preserving of fruit.

Great article