I need to put a queen from a hive I'm trying to save in to a mailing cage so as to introduce her to a few frames of bees/brood from an existing hive I have in a nuc. What I'm wondering is when pack the queen in how many workers should put in and does it matter which ones I put in? If so how do itell which ones they are? Thanks for your advice...
If you are going to introduce it to the new hive within a few hours, skip the workers. They are only there to care for the queen and if she don't need any attending...
Otherwise, if it is going to be a few days, then 2 or 3 workers from any comb will do.
I try to pick bees from the frame she came from. I look for one sucking up honey in the corner, a fuzzy new one, one or two right in the middle of the comb. I want nurse bees, young bees, and bees that are full of honey.
As for "any" frame...... I don't want field bees, which tend to be aggressive and perhaps antagonize the other bees through the cage.
Does it make a difference....who knows. But in all the queens I have mailed over the past 5 years, I lost two. So the bees I have chosen did a good job. And I get almost no beekeepers telling me of bad introduction problems.
Caging queens can be very educational. You may even find one of the old-time myths being wrong. The one about queens not feeding themselves...... :shock:
If she's going into the nuc immediately, don't put any workers in. If she isn't, pick the fussiest, white ones from a frame of open larva. As Bjorn said, you want the youngest ones possible.
She is going straight in but will be in the cage until the other bees eat her out...
The nuc bees will feed her through the wire, or holes if it is the plastic cage.