placing eggs in starter hive

homer · July 01, 2009, 01:20:32 PM

Why is it that you need to wait for day 3.5 - 4 to place the prepared frames in the starter hive. If you're not grafting, but allowing the queen to lay in new comb (hopkins method) what would be the problem with just placing that frame in the starter hive as soon as you release the queen and prepare the frame?

homer · July 02, 2009, 01:14:36 PM

anyone...anyone?

danno · July 02, 2009, 01:18:41 PM

the 3.5 -4 days allows the eggs to hatch so you have day old larva

Robo · July 02, 2009, 02:45:42 PM

Not really following your question, but I think Danno has the right answer. I know if you take cell cups from the Nicot system with eggs and invert them in a cell bar without waiting for the larvae to hatch, the bees will clean them all out.

homer · July 02, 2009, 04:20:57 PM

Quote from: Robo on July 02, 2009, 02:45:42 PM
Not really following your question, but I think Danno has the right answer. I know if you take cell cups from the Nicot system with eggs and invert them in a cell bar without waiting for the larvae to hatch, the bees will clean them all out.

There's the answer that I was looking for. I just thought the bees would wait for the eggs to hatch and then use them when they were ready. I didn't know they would clean them out. Thanks for the info.

homer · July 02, 2009, 09:44:09 PM

Okay... why would the bees remove the eggs if you put them in too soon? That doesn't make sense to me. After all I know that you can take a frame full of eggs and brood from one hive and place it into another hive and they just raise up those bees as if they were their own, so why wouldn't they just wait till the eggs hatched so they could start building queen cells at just the right time?

Hethen57 · July 03, 2009, 04:35:42 PM

I'm guessing it has to do with the orientation of the comb in the starter. You will be placing them in the starter horizontally, so they can build queen cells down. I don't know why they wouldn't wait for them to hatch to make queen cells, but that must be the difference.

Michael Bush · July 03, 2009, 09:24:23 PM

They will care for hatched larvae and remove eggs. You are waiting in order for them to hatch.

Hethen57 · July 04, 2009, 01:32:49 AM

How can you tell if they hatched? I've seen the eggs standing on end, and I've seen small white larva curled around the bottom of the cell, but is a hatched larva about the same size as the freshly laid eggs that stand on end? Does it lay flat at the bottom of the cel? Also, why would they clean out eggs in this situation (they don't always clean them out...do they)?

Michael Bush · July 04, 2009, 11:21:31 AM

With a newly hatched larvae there is a wet spot on the bottom of the cell (royal jelly) with a slight imperfection in the surface the shape of a "c".