Go Green with a Hybrid Queen (sm)

Hybrid Russian Queens, Hybrid Italian Queens, & Hybrid VSH Queens 

 

 Quality Hygienic Hybrid Queens for Hobbyists, Breeders, Honey Production, and Practical-Sustainable- Pesticide Free-Organic Beekeeping

Now taking orders for Spring, Summer, and Fall 2012

Nucs with a 2012 Tier-1 Italian Hybrid Queens*

Nucs with a 2012 Tier-1 Russian Hybrid Queens*

Nucs with 2011 Tier-3 Italian Hybrid Queens*1

2012 Tier-1 & Tier-2 Hybrid Queens'*'

 

An Open Letter

Dear Fellow Beekeeper,

Although I could not profitably raise Pure Russian Queens here in the Piedmont of North Carolina due to the distinct nature and behavior of the Russian honeybee. I believe that the pure Russian honeybee queens that I once raised and sold while a member of the Russian Honeybee Breeders Association were equal to or better for their Varroa and tracheal mite resistance than most of the commercial grade Russian queens that are sold on the market today. The trait that Russian honey bees will not lay in periods of drought, periods of little or no incoming pollen or nectar flow, common here during our summer and fall months results in either consumption of eggs and larvae by workers or almost complete shutdown of egg laying by the queen.  This trait helps to make the Russian Honey bee resistant to varroa mites but makes it very difficult to raise queens here in the summer months without supplemental feeding of pollen, pollen substitutes, and syrup. I don't do that! I don't do that for many reasons. Another trait that gives resistance to both mainly varroa mites is specific hygienic trait. The trait is available outside pure Russian honeybee genetics; it is carried in some Italian stock as well as the VSH lines of honey bees. In fact the VSH lines of honey bees has demonstrated a higher varroa resistance to both the Russian and the Italian honey bee, (Ward, K., R. Danka, and R. Ward, 2008). To repeat myself I still believe that a certified pure Russian queen from one of the Certified members of the Russian Honeybee Breeders Association (http://www.russianbreeder.org) continues to have excellent genetics for Varroa resistance as well as superior tracheal mite resistance. I believe that pure Certified Russian queens are some of the better queens that you can buy and you need some of this stock in your apiary if you want to raise mite resistant queens.

But, it is important to know that there are other honey bee races and bee-lines with different or enhanced traits available to the queen breeder. One type or line -not a race- of  honeybees that has proven statistical superiority for varroa mite resistance is the Varroa Sensitive Hygiene or VSH line of honey bees developed by the USDA-ARS lab at Baton Rouge. The source of pure stock for this bee can only be purchased from  the USDA CRADA holder, Glenn Apiaries. We ordered VSH queens last fall and beginning in mid-April of 2012 we will integrate pure VSH queens into our breeding program and accordingly we have scheduled June 19th as our first ship date for our own VSH Tier-1 queens. These queens will have mated with drones from our own Russian, Italian, and Survivor Stock drone mothers placed in an isolated mating yard. In other isolated mating yards we will have VSH drone mother hives raising pure VSH drones added to our current drone mother operations with our own Survivor Stock, Russian and Italian drone mothers.  This addition will increase genetic diversity as well as provide within the Russian Hybrid and Italian Hybrid queens that we sell a percentage of workers carrying the inherited the VSH trait.

All this is why we are doing what we do: We are breeding quality queens that have defined genetic diversity, characteristics and parameters of resistance to disease and parasites from both parents, i.e. selected drone mother breeder queens and selected "queen mother" breeder queens; the control and placement of strategic multiple mating queen yards, and the utilization of quality minded procedures and inspections throughout the entire queen rearing process.

For further information on our breeding operations please read further.

Sincerely,

 

Chuck Norton

 

330 Irvin Street

Reidsville, NC 27320

Phone: 336 520 1097

Email: Carolinabeeman@hotmail.com

 

Notes on VSH from Tom Glenn of Glenn Apiaries in Fallbrook, California :

"The development of the VSH line of bees by the team of scientists at the USDA Bee Breeding Lab in Baton Rouge, is a true scientific success story. Through careful observation and experimentation, they painstakingly came to understand the natural defenses that the bees had hidden away in their genome. Selection for these beneficial genetic traits over many bee generations has resulted in not only resistance to Varroa mites, but also to American Foulbrood and Chalkbrood. The hygienic behavior of VSH bees, even extends to defense against wax moths and small hive beetles", Tom Glenn. See more on VSH at the end of this Web Page (Ward, K., R. Danka, and R. Ward, 2008) and visit http://www.glenn-apiaries.com/bbb.html for more insight on Breeding Beneficial Bees from Tom Glenn.

 

 

Please Note: If you did not receive your queens last year and want them shipped this year and you have not yet contacted me for a shipping date please send me an email with a primary and a secondary ship date  for shipping on or after April 17, 2012. I want to ship your queens to you as soon as I can; but, I don't want to ship then on any old day since that day according to Murphy's Law will be the day that you will be on vacation and they will cook in your mailbox or die on your front porch!

 

 

The Queens for Sale at Norton's Honey Farm

&

A Summary of our Operation

 

Quality Assurance:

Having started my career in the Aerospace Industry after serving in the US Navy QUALITY was and continues to be paramount and an integral part of my thinking and my business. I want to produce well mated varroa resistant queens that are also tracheal mite resistant while also being cognizant of the small hive beetle, Deformed Wing Virus (DWV), Nosema, American and European Foulbrood, Chalkbrood, and Israeli Acute Paralysis Virus (IAPV). I want to produce queens that are readily accepted and less frequently superseded; and, because of the genetics that these honeybees carry they must also have traits resistant to tracheal and varroa mites and exhibit hygienic behavior.  I believe that the queen must continue to mature in her own colony after she begins laying and that her brood be inspected as they cycle through metamorphosis and to continue inspection after emergence. In my opinion there are two ideal times to pull queens. The first time is when she is laying well and has given you a frame of at least 60% capped brood; the second time is about a week after her daughters have begun hatching out of pupation and are readily available for inspection.

Quality Assurance procedures are inherent to our queen rearing operations. The selection criteria of all queens are performed in a systematic manner with established quality parameters resulting in inspection and rejection at all stages of development. From the purchase, receipt, and installation of breeder queens from selected queen breeders; our own grafting and queen rearing operations; selection, pulling and shipping of mature queens all the way to a satisfied customer we believe a conscientious endeavor to maintain quality throughout our production and operations is paramount to successful queen rearing.  

Once Breeder Queens and Drone Mothers are selected and set up in dedicated mating yards many steps are taken along the way from grafting to imago to a mature laying queen in order to assure quality: We cull inferior queen cells; and we inspect and cull inferior queens throughout our production process and each queen has a history from the day she is grafted until the day she is shipped or dies because each queen raised has her own mating nuc box with an identifying tag and number that we now ship with our queens and nucs. We mark queens trice: by year, race and Tier. We also have shipping, packaging, and mailing standards in order to obtain and maintain our quality queens.  We ship only under conditions that are conducive to the health and viability of our queens, your queen.

 

Breeder Queens and Drone Mothers

I have been mentioning "breeder queens" and "drone mothers" without realizing that a lot of new beekeepers really don't know what I am talking about unless they have taken an advanced beekeeping class or have been curious enough to take the time to learn about genetics, queen rearing and queen breeding. It is really not very complicated; the young sexually mature virgin queen goes on a mating flight; the big eyed drone finds and mates with the queen, the drone dies in instant ecstasy; and the queen goes on to  mate with several additional drones before tiring and returning to her mating nuc. The next day the queen goes out on another mating flight and the same thing happens; and then the day after finally she has one last mating flight successfully mating with up to about 40 drones over a very short period. Sometimes it rains and the queen stays in her mating nuc; and then the day after it is too cold or too windy for her to go out and mate; and sometimes the virgin queen will never go out and successfully mate; then she can after several weeks without mating become a drone layer or even worse go about each day inspecting and walking over readied and awaiting empty cells never to lay even a single egg. Some times a queen will go out on a mating flight never to return having been carried back to a nest by a swallow; it should be noted that this is a part of the talk about the birds and the bees that you never learned from one of your parents.

The result of all this is that a virgin queen mated once will probably mate with many drones on several mating flights.

Now think about those poor dead drones. They are haploids, they have a single set of chromosomes, they have a mother but no father. As a result they reflect the genetics only of their mother. If their mother is a pure Russian they will be pure Russian; if they are pure Italian they will be pure Italian. They will also carry the genetic traits of their mother; if their mother has a hygienic trait they will carry that same hygienic trait. Now think about that queen that just mated with 39 drones over a period of 6 or 7 days. Inside that queen there is a "bladder like" sac called a spermatheca which will harbor for the rest of her life as a laying queen in a homogenous manner the sperm from the most or all of the 39 lucky drones that were successful in making the trip up from the vagina and into the spermatheca. When the successfully mated queen starts laying the queen will open the duct to her spermatheca to allow just one sperm from one single drone to fertilize a passing unfertilized egg from her oviduct. That egg once fertilized with one sperm from that single drone will create a female from two complete sets of chromosomes, a diploid that will develop from a fertilized egg into a female worker honeybee or even capable of becoming a queen honeybee. The queen's spermatheca will contain several  million sperm cells! Each of the drones that successfully mated with that queen had ejaculated over a million sperm carrying the genetics of the individual drone and the individual drone's mother, the Drone Mother. Now if all 39 of those successful drones had the same mother then all the workers would be sisters and all those workers would carry the same genetics. That is very rare for drones conjugate in what are called Drone Conjugation Areas and this multiple mating  helps assure genetic diversity by the mixing of sperm from many genetically different drones from many different surrounding hives.  By defining and providing enough Drone Mother hives with the desired genetic races, lines, and traits that will produce enough drones  thus having a high statistical probability of mating with a single virgin queen that you grafted from a selected Breeder Queen well, BINGO!  You got a queen with the genetics that you desire!

Our Own Survivor Stock

For many years prior to having been solicited for membership in the Russian Honeybee Breeders Association I had purchased Russian breeder queens from either Charlie Harper or Glenn Apiaries or both. I had also purchased through Glenn Apiaries both Minnesota Hygienic and SMR (Suppressed Mite Reproduction) breeder queens developed by Harbo and Harris at the USDA-ARS Lab in Baton Rouge. SMR was an established mite-resistance trait that suppresses mite reproduction; later in 2005 after further study the USDA folks in Baton Rouge appropriately renamed the SMR trait as VSH or Varroa Sensitive Hygiene.  The Minnesota Hygienic queens developed by Marla Spivak and Gary S. Reuter were first used as breeder queens because Italian queens with hygienic traits were also determined to have a higher varroa resistance than non-hygienic Italians. I also wanted to have the natural inherent traits carried by the Italians such as gentleness and having a natural resistance to American Foulbrood, European Foulbrood, and Chalkbrood as well as larger overwintering clusters able to cover brood while obtaining stored honey under the coldest of temperatures;  and, of course honey production.

That was the basis for my first breeding program and it was quite successful having very efficient summer queen rearing, excellent winter survivability, a strong spring buildup, varroa and tracheal mite resistance, disease resistance, honey production, and gentleness. Folks in the Dakotas, Northern Michigan, New York and Vermont were happy with these queens and they ordered year after year. They were also quite adaptable and suited to our often long hot, humid and dry summers; but, I still treated and I still had higher varroa related winter losses than normal so when asked by Charlie Harper in 2006 I went 100% Russian.

In 2008 my breeding strategy was changed to have both Russian and Italian breeder queens. I also developed a Survivor Stock from isolated yards having diversified climates from 735 feet above sea level in the Central Piedmont of North Carolina to over 3100 feet above sea level in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina that are used for drone mother breeder queens, honey production, research, and pollination. My drone mothers are at this writing currently Russian, Italian, and Survivor Stock drone mothers; the entire area around all my production queen yards is saturated with Russian and Italian genetics along with my own "Survivor Stock" that I have been developing over the past 7 years. These "survivor hives" gave over 88% survival rates for the last two consecutive years at two different Research Stations here in North Carolina, one at 730 feet and the other at 3100 feet above sea level having a Northern US-Southern Canadian type climate classified as Dfa on the Köppen climate classification scale. 

I really believe that the hybrid queens that I sell will do you well no matter where you live. Read on and see for yourself how quality queens are still possible in today's time and age and why you should invest a few extra dollars today in order to save a lot more tomorrow while getting away from chemical treatments and using proven and tested  hybrid queens that have higher rates of acceptance and lower rates of supersedure.

Tier-1 and Tier-2  Queens

I have always believed that the length of time that the queen is allowed to establish her brood nest in her mating Nuc is inversely related to supersedure and is directly related to acceptance by her new "adopted" colony after she been introduced. A published scientific study has confirmed this theorem, please see: Rhodes, Somerville, Hardin. 2004 Queen Honeybee Introduction and Early Survival - Effects of Queen Age at Introduction. Apidologie, 35:383-388. This is the reason for raising our Tier-1 and Tier-2 queens.

A Tier-1 Hybrid Queen*2

Once we have a mated and laying queen we want to know if she will be suitable for our customers and our own standards. About two weeks after she has begun her laying we will inspect her larvae and her capped brood for viability and pattern. An assessment of the first complete frame of brood (~70% capped brood) is inspected for brood pattern, health, and viability. If all looks assuring then this queen may be sold as a Tier-1 Queen. This defined Tier-1 queen is at least 42 days old from egg " to ship", that's 14 days older than a 28-day-old standard commercial queen.

A Tier-2 Hybrid Queen*3

During the next two weeks and longer a Tier-1 queen if not pulled as a Tier-1 queen will continue to lay and build up her colony. It is now possible for her to be at her peak of laying and pheromone production. Several days after her third week of laying, after her brood begins to hatch, her daughters are inspected as well. We inspect for Deformed Wing Virus, brood pattern, general health of the hive, and relative productivity. If things are not right she is culled! Only then after a long series of quality inspections will we sell that queen; that queen is now classified as a Tier-2 Queen. This queen is at least 56 days old from egg to "pull"; that's twice as old, 28 days older than a 28 day old commercial queen. This defined Tier-2 queen is now in her prime.

A Tier-3 Queen with Nuc*1

During late summer and fall we requeen our hives. This helps to reduce swarming in the spring and presents a young and vigorous queen to her new adopted home. We select the very best of our Tier-3 queens along with their proven complete hives to replace some of our own old and failing breeder queens and most of our drone mothers. The queens and their hives that remain and continue to maintain desirable characteristics are selected to be sold as a split nuc with the fall queen in the spring. Hives with such fall queens that exhibit poor brood patterns, loss of workforce, lack of productivity, change of behavior, or supersedure are culled and these hives are requeened. Hives with any contagious disease are treated if possible or are culled.

Nucs

Five Frame Nucs with either a Fall Tier-1 or a Fall Tier-2 Hybrid Queen will be made available   (Spring 2012 is now SOLD OUT, Get on the list for a Fall 2012 Hybrid Nuc now and/or a Spring 2013 Hybrid nuc by sending a business size SASE with 2013 or Fall 2012 above the left top corner of the envelope and we wil send you a price and availability sheet before we take it online.)

A lot of you are driving a great distance and I know weather can be a problem in travel as well as with the timing of honeybees so keeping that in mind a day or two leeway on either side can be arranged so that you can arrive and return safely; however I can not work on Sunday. While you are here you may also have the opportunity to see all five frames of bees and your queen as you transfer your nuc to your 10 frame hive. I will be sure to have the equivalent of between 1/2 to 3/4's of a frame total of honey on the colony that you will pick up. If you are coming down from Minnesota, Michigan, New York, New Hampshire, Vermont, or Maine please bring at least two extra frames of capped honey to place on each side of the five frame nuc that you are purchasing. You need to give your new hives with the nucs enough frames of honey to assure that your bees will have adequate stores to last until the honey flow starts in your area as the queen will most likely not interrupt her laying and soon will rapidly lay in the cells that hatch as all 5 frames will consist of a majority of capped brood, nurse bees, with younger field bees. If your area has had late freezes in the past such as what happened here in 2006 with the Good Friday Freeze when bee pasture was lost due to 19 degree weather during apple blossom weather for over two weeks. You need to be prepared with extra frames of honey to support your nuc to be placed next to the brood nest on both sides either here or at the final destination. It usually is better to do it here so that you won't have to go into your hive under cold conditions and before the queen has settled down and resumed her laying pattern. You can check quickly for eggs a week or so later to affirm that your queen was not injured or killed during transit. This happens statistically in about 8% of all hive movements. Some folks will install a frame of honey for a frame of bees often with high fructose corn syrup or sugar syrup drizzled into the frame; that will do in an emergency; but, capped honey is best.

I sell my nucs with five frames covered with bees. At least 4 frames should have at least 60% capped brood when transferred to your hive and the fifth frame should have at least 50% brood and capped brood with the remainder being stored pollen and ripe honey either capped or uncapped with the majority of honey preferably capped. When the capped brood emerges the hive population will explode and these bees  as well as the hatching and growing larvae need to be fed. Your hives will crash and die if they do not have reserves during periods of inclement weather. When you get back you should feed them 50% sugar water as long as they continue to take it up. You should also have on entrance reducers so as to avoid robbing. I hope that all this information helps as I want your honeybees to survive not only spring but the year as well and a good start is so very important. Some folks will want to take back their bees in a cardboard five frame nuc; however, it is not recommended simply because upon arrival if adverse and cold weather is present brood may freeze or chill upon transfer. Also a full five frame nuc carries insufficient space for stores unless a frame of honey is substituted for a frame of brood. This is especially true for those who live in the northern tier of states; nevertheless, if you like you may want to purchase our wooden five-frame nucs with a commercial migratory type top and a screened bottom board with or without a drilled hole that accepts a standard mason jar type feeder. This will ship with a stapled cover. That said, it is best that you bring your 10 or 8 Frame Hive complete with the necessary additional frames of new unused foundation and or honey. If you use medium or Illinois (6 and 5/8 inch) equipment you may order medium nucs as they are available in limited numbers for 2012. Deadline to order medium nucs is February 10, 2012; call or email for pricing.

You should bring a ratchet type of strap to secure your nuc/hive.

The Truth About Some Commercial Mail Order Queens and Why I believe That I Am Different Than Most by selling Tier Level Queens

Most commercial queen producers raise queens by placement of a ripe 14-day-old queen cell in a mating NUC then removing the queen for shipment exactly 14 days later. This is done strictly on a 28 day schedule as it is the most efficient manner to raise and ship commercial queens. Technically the queen is 28 days old; old enough to have mated and to have begun laying; but, there are many pitfalls. The queen removed to be shipped may or may not have been mated and often very little is known about her matriarchal abilities. The Italian race of honeybees in the USA is not the same now as it was when the US closed its borders to the importation of honeybees after the outbreak of the Isle of Wright Disease at the turn of the last Century; the Italian gene pool is becoming shallower with less genetic diversity. We need genetic diversity with defined and desirable traits. Sometimes a queen will mate but never lay; she will spend her whole life parading around her colony without ever laying an egg. Sometimes when laying is interrupted she will not retain her laying ability. Even if a queen is not a drone layer she may be superseded; or, she may become nothing more than a mediocre layer and her daughters marginal honey producers. And yes, sometimes she will knock your socks off with her laying ability; and, often a thought back to a year or two ago to that one marvelous queen will entice you to return to that commercial queen producer even though most of her sisters were average producing queens. Then there are shipped 28 day old queens that did not have the opportunity to mate until after their arrival to your bee yard or perhaps she may not mate at all and become a drone layer. That is why I sell Tier Level queens. We wait until our queens have established their brood patterns and their daughters emerge because we want to assure that our customers will receive a quality queen that will be an asset in their apiary. We put in a lot of extra time and effort but I believe that the result is a better quality queen and a very enthusiastic and satisfied customer. You will make more money on these queens and you will also spend less money on replacements and chemicals in the long run. These are proven queens with a history and they carry the genetics that are desired by breeders, producers, and hobbyists.  All this takes extra manpower and additional production facilities which results in a much longer throughput than most queen rearing operations. I hope that I have opened your eyes to better beekeeping and better queens.

 

Our Marking scheme for 2012 is as follows:

 

The need for our customers to assure that the queen found six months down the road is the same queen that they installed is imperative! That is important, with the increase of Africanized honey bees in America; it is important to know that your queen has not been superseded; or, that the colony has not swarmed while you were on vacation and a new queen carrying unknown genetics in her spermatheca is now laying in your hive. You are also assured of the Tier level that you are buying. Please note that from time to time sometimes when there is less demand for Tier-2 queens Tier-2 queens may be shipped in lieu of Tier -1 queens. This is strictly my call. Also I realize that a few men have some form of color blindness. If you wish special marking, please advise.

 

The following is our Triple Marking Scheme for 2012:

 

Front Left Thorax:         YEAR               2012 is marked: Yellow

Front Right Thorax:  RACE         Russian is marked:  Red

                                                                           Italian is marked:    Green

                                                                VSH is marked:       Blue

 

Rear left & Right Thorax:     Tier- Level  Tier-1 is marked: White

                                                                                          Tier-2 is marked: White Yellow

                           

I pull and ship the same day because I strongly feel that a laying queen should have minimal interruption of her routine. I do not bank laying queens as it is not a prudent practice for many reasons; in fact, it can be quite harmful at times to the queens being banked.

 

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