Looking for the Perfect Queen Bee

https://youtube.com/watch?v=AuOBoXvHamI%3Fversion%3D3%26hl%3Den_US%26rel%3D0

Hi it’s Kirk Jones from Sleeping Bear Farms! I’m back at our Florida farm once again to make the annual pilgrimage. Every year before we start the season, we go and look at all of our bees, and pick out the best hives. The hives with big populations of bees that are gentle, and then we can take that stock and make new bees.

Let’s take a look at some hives today, some of the breeders at sleeping bear farms. We’ve brought in some really good hives, ones that were really brooded up well with nice full cones of brood. That queen is really laying well, let’s take a look. There’s a few cells that aren’t laid, but there are always a few.

When we pick out breeders for making queen bees to re-sell or re-queen our own hives, we pick out the best house we can find out of all of our hives. And these particular bees are really light gold nice bees, prolific layers.

We’re peeking in another hive here, and very nice looking bee. The stock came from David last year, and we’re not sure of the lineage. She’s a little agitated because we just opened the hives up. She’s a really good layer, and the bees are quite gentle. The brood nest is layed up very good, so this is another one that we’re going to keep. I’ll probably name this one Lady Gaga. Can you see the similarity?

Sleeping Bear Farms – Bringing Just a Bit More Sweetness