Hi Folks,
While checking hives in the past couple of days, I decided to continue marking queens if they were found during the inspections. I?ve been doing this for a while now in preparation for the arrival of varroa. As I don?t handle queens all that often, my technique is poor and I?m quite clumsy. A few that I found were successfully marked but I ended up damaging one through a rough approach. I?ll check in a week or so to see the outcome of my actions but I?m not confident. How do you guys handle queens? I?d like to get away from using fingers if possible to reduce the risk of queen injury. A few months ago I purchased a queen cage which came with a queen catching devise. It looks promising and it will be given a run in the next couple of days. Would love to hear about techniques that you all use to catch queens. After losing a finger 18 months ago, some tasks are a little more challenging these days and catching queens is one of them.
Are you required to mark them? I never found it to be necessary in my own yard but then I never have had a huge number of hives and didn't sell queens. I just tried to keep track of laying patterns and do/allow replacements based on performance.
I have one of these and my mentor uses one of them as well. It might help if you have someone show you how to use it but there are probably youtube videos out there to guide you.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/256055732431
Hi Kathy,
I?m not required to mark them but in my situation, hives don?t become broodless over the winter period. I plan on confining the queen at times to force a brood break. The other situation is that the regularity of alcohol washes will increase when varroa arrives. Having a marked queen seems like a way of saving time in the long run. Finding the queen is much quicker when she is marked. I have almost given a queen a swim in ethanol a couple of times in the past. Can?t afford this to happen during the winter.
I?ll have a look at that Terri. Anything that makes life easy suredoes help.
Les,
I also use the same device. Mann Lake calls it a One Handed Queen Marker. They work real nice.
To handle the queens I teach new beekeepers to catch drones and practice marking them. You will have lots to work on and you will confuse your neighboring beekeeping when they find them in their hives. 😆
Jim Altmiller
I started out using the queen catcher that you all are describing. It does work, but I finally got enough of monkeying around with it. One day, I had a line of nuc hives with newly hatched laying queens, which I intended to mark. The queen mark Cage was just a hindrance. I decided to go ahead and take the plunge. what I do is pick the queen up, let her grasp the side of my middle finger, then gently, use my first finger and thumb to hold her gently in place. This is simple and works very good for me.
Phillip
I'm another that loves the one handed catcher. I'm too heavy handed and don't have enough feeling in my fingertips to grasp a queen without losing or squishing her. The first one to come out is made by a S. Korean company "Yasaeng", it's the best one. The yellow economy ones don't work as well. Spend the couple extra bucks and get the blue one made by Yasaeng. Mann Lake sells them.
Well Phillip, that?s the way I used to do it but without that middle finger, it?s a bit more difficult. LOL. Thanks for the tips about the queen catcher. I?ll get hold of one of those and give it a try.
Quote from: Lesgold on August 28, 2024, 01:10:29 AM
Well Phillip, that?s the way I used to do it but without that middle finger, it?s a bit more difficult. LOL. Thanks for the tips about the queen catcher. I?ll get hold of one of those and give it a try.
Thats right Les! I forgot that you lost that finger a while back. Sorry.... You are not alone. Bruce of Bruce Bees lost a finger also while making bee equipment.
Phillip
These are what I use Les, google "press in cage queen marking". Dead easy to use. You trap the queen underneath on the comb. This gives you plenty of time to get your pen (and scissors if clipping) ready. Gently press in further to trap queen firmly against comb and mark her. I often clip at same time, but tendency is to cut through the threads and cage needs rethreading, which isn't a lengthy job.
(https://www.thorne.co.uk/uploads/media/ProductImage/0001/16/thumb_15755_ProductImage_big.jpeg)
I like that Nigel. That looks like a better way than >grabbing< her. How does it work out with the worker bees which might be within the circle? No problems I assume.
Thanks,
Phillip
The pegs are spaced so the workers can get out, but workers will stay with queen but this not usually a problem. Sometimes you have to raise the cage a little to let queen wander into a more convenient place before pressing down and immobilizing her against the comb.
I?ve got a cheap plastic version of what you have shown but it is useless and doesn?t work very well at all. Nigel, what you have shown is an excellent design. It would be easy to pin the queen and mark her. Thanks for the photo. It would be a good project to make on a wet day.
I would suppose the trick would be knowing the exact space between the pins so the thread would be rightly spaced to allow the workers to escape yet keep the queen confined . Or if it was a little snug I doubt it would matter whether the workers could escape for the purpose intended?
A few of the old technical drawing skills may come in handy here.
A nice project indeed.
Quote from: Ben Framed on August 29, 2024, 10:02:42 PM
I would suppose the trick would be knowing the exact space between the pins so the thread would be rightly spaced to allow the workers to escape yet keep the queen confined . Or if it was a little snug I doubt it would matter whether the workers could escape for the purpose intended?
The workers tend not to leave the queen despite the peg spacing. They usually don't get in the way, although sometimes you need to let her wander around to a more suitable position.
They are quite expensive to buy but I found these on amazon https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0B9GVKSGT/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 which are quite cheap. They have a metal grid which I remove and re-threaded with strong cotton. Be warned you need more than one :smile: I'm forever dropping them losing them inside hives etc.
Agree Les, the plastic versions are next to useless
Thanks Nigel. You come up with some good ideas. Should be able to make one quite simply using the gear that I have in the workshop. Just need to get the brain into gear as to how could be done.
If it helps. Thickness of wooden circle is 0.5cm, outer diam is 5cm, inner is 4.5. Total length of needles, includes bits in the wood is 1.5cm. Although I don't think that it needs to be made to those exact specifications, any approximation should do fine.
Oh, and 24 needles.
With that trap that I use, the workers climb out of it and leave the queen behind. Then I push the plunger up to get the queen positioned so she can be marked. The top of the plunger is medium density foam so the queen can't get squashed.
Thanks Nigel. I did some maths after making a few assumptions. I decided to use 24 pins to follow your plan and have each pin 5mm apart. At that point, the brain started to hurt a bit as I had to think about the diameter of the circle required to get the spacing correct. That?s where the old high school maths came into play. Used the old Sine rule to figure the radius of the circle at just over 19mm which is not far from what you mentioned. I also have a bunch of blue cut tacks which might do the job. Tomorrow is going to be windy so I won?t be into the bees so it will be a day in the workshop. I?ll post what I come up with in the ?Today I Made? thread.
Les,
With those dimensions it would bee very easy to use your laser engraver to cut out a bunch of them. You can even drill or at least mark the holes with the laser, for the pins. When I get home, I plan on making some just for fun. I can give them away at BeeFest.
Jim Altmiller
This is also a good tool to use when you are inspecting your hive or making splits so that once you find her and cage her, you know where she is at so that she doesn?t end up in the wrong place or above your queen excluder. Just bee sure to let her out when you are done.
Jim Altmiller.
Good thinking Jim. I was going to use my wood lathe with its indexing head but the laser will be even better. As you said, once the file is made, it would be easy to make a bunch of them. I?ll get onto that tomorrow.
I used a twist drill to measure the distance between wires of a queen excluder and then used that to
determine the distance between the pins I placed on the catcher.
If you are as clumsy as I am, you can still kill queens with it, so be forewarned and very careful.
Les,
To make the nail holes, make one and use the circular tool set to 24. The whole job can bee done with circles. 😊
I have a couple of live oak boards, think of the wood that they built Old Iron Sides from, that were very thin cuts that I planed down to 1/4? thickness probably 20 years ago and just dug it out of the wood pile a few weeks ago. It is very strong and hard but cuts perfectly on the laser.
Jim Altmiller
Quote from: jimineycricket on August 30, 2024, 10:03:31 AM
I used a twist drill to measure the distance between wires of a queen excluder and then used that to
determine the distance between the pins I placed on the catcher.
If you are as clumsy as I am, you can still kill queens with it, so be forewarned and very careful.
Thanks for the good idea and warning Jimmy.
Phillip
I used the circular array tool to design the nail holes and their spacings and concentric circles for the basic shape. It only took about 3 minutes all up to draw the project. Cut time will be only a minute or so. Will need to play with sizes until I get exactly what I want but that?s part of the fun. Will cut a few variations of the design after breakfast.
Thanks for the warning Jimmy. The last thing we want is more squashed queens. The oak will look nice on this type of project. I will probably use either MDF or plywood as I have plenty of offcuts lying around. Plywood would be the strongest choice as it has cross grain veneers to give strength in all directions. Most of the timber that I have doesn?t have the strength needed in the long grain and would tend to split.
Cut a couple of blanks to see how things would work out. The pin holes in the first attempt were just a bit too tight so the hole size was increased by .1mm. The pins need to be tapped into place but shouldn?t split or distort the timber. I?m just making up a simple jig to hold the washer in place while pins are hit into position.
Looks good Les. Since you drilled a small hole in each pin place the main wood piece shouldn't?t split?
Thanks Phillip. I wanted the pins to be a tap in fit so that they wouldn?t fall out. If the holes were too small, splitting could be an issue. That?s where a bit of trial and error is needed. I just turned up a block of wood to support the washer while the pins were tapped into place. I used cut tacks as that is what I had on hand. Might try using some frame tacks as they are a bit thinner and slightly longer. Will see how it goes after this first model is completed. I?ll have a go at stringing the tennis racquet next.
The winding of the cotton only took a couple of minutes. (Thanks for the idea Nigel). As the cut tacks are slightly tapered, a spot of superglue on each tack would help to hold the cotton firmly in place. This would make this a throwaway item as it would be difficult to rebind it. That?s not an issue in this situation as a new one would only take a short period of time to make. In hindsight, the 15mm frame tacks may be a slightly better option. Back to the drawing board to make a few modifications.
The frame tacks are a much better option than cut tacks. Parallel sides make attaching the cotton a much easier task. One was made from 3.2mm MDF and the thicker one was made from two pieces of 3mm plywood with the face veneers offset at 90 degrees. This will give extra strength but I?m not sure if it is needed. I was changing over bottom boards on a couple of hives so it was the perfect opportunity to test it out. Found the queen and pinned her with ease. She was already marked so there was no need to pull the pen out. Thank you so much for the idea Nigel. This will simplify the marking process and be a bit safer than using my chunky fingers. Jim, I?m pleased that you mentioned the laser printer for this task. I must have had blinkers on when thinking about how to make it using the wood lathe. It must be the fading brain cells taking effect. Lol. While I had the smoker going, I went back to the hive where the queen was given a squeeze cuddle about a week ago. Found some eggs and eventually saw her walking around on a frame. You just get lucky sometimes I guess. At least she will be replaced if she is not up to scratch.
How is the queen marking going for you now Les since you have this tool? No more damaged queens, I presume.
Hi Phillip,
Just finished checking a hive a couple of minutes ago. I went in to cut it down to one box and add a new bottom board and see how it was going. It was a hive that had struggled through winter and came into spring with only one frame of bees. It had a marked queen that was laying at the time I inspected it last month. There was no signs of disease so I decided to add a couple of frames of bees and brood to see how it would go. When I inspected the hive, I noticed that the queen had been superseded. I found the young queen and dropped the cage over her and had her marked in about 10 seconds. It was excellent. I noticed the new queen was already laying and the hive was looking good. It should start to build up quickly now.
That is awesome Les. I have got to get one of those! My thanks to you and NigelP for bringing this to Beemaster at this time !
I have one. After I speared a fast queen with one, I quit using it.
Ewuuuu! Thanks for the waning Mr Bush. (Maybe I'm not doing so bad by making the queens by hand after all!! Quick and easy for me...) I suppose for those who do not have a steady hand, the above queen marking devise would work ok as long as the user knows when to stop applying pressure once the queen is 'trapped'. Your lesson learned and shared should be a good lesson for us all to being careful when in use. Thanks again!
Phillip
A few queens have been marked as I come across them during hive manipulations and inspections. This particular queen, once trapped, tried to turn around but her thorax was pinned and she looked a bit twisted under the cage. She was not damaged at all. Once marked, she was released after about 10 seconds.
Thumbs up Les.