QUEENS MUST BE ORDERED BY TELEPHONE ONLY. (800-632-3379)
Please have your shipping/pick-up date in mind with the options listed below. The dates represent tentative shipment dates; your queen(s) will be shipped on or after the date you choose. We suggest shipping queens via FedEx Standard Overnight or UPS Next Day Air.
If you're looking for a cost effective option, we can ship via Priority Mail or Express through the USPS depending upon where you're located from us here in New York. PLEASE NOTE: The USPS options are **At Customer Risk** , as unfortunately, we have had long delays and lost shipments through the post office.
5/15, 5/22, 6/05
FOR PICKING UP A QUEEN WITH PACKAGED BEES ONLY (as these dates also are pending) PLEASE INFORM OUR REPRESENTATIVES OF ONE OF THESE TWO OPTIONS: QUEENBEEDAY1 OR QUEENBEEDAY2 .
The Carniolan honeybee, Apis mellifera carnica, is one of the two subspecies of the Western honeybee commonly used in American beekeeping. The other subspecies is the Italian bee. Carniolan bees originated in Carniola (which is now part of Slovenia) and surrounding regions. They are known for their gentle disposition, resistance to mite infection and their ability to rapidly control hive populations in response to nectar flows. Brood production increases rapidly in the spring in response to nectar flow. Brood production also decreases rapidly at the end of the honeyflow. These bees typically are very frugal with winter stores, successfully over wintering with lower honey consumption than Italian bees.
The New World Carniolan (NWC) was established in 1982 by Susan Colby and Tim Lawrence using diverse Carniolan stock from across the US and Canada. The stock was carefully evaluated and the most desirable colonies were incorporated into the breeding program. Each year queens are selected from the best colonies, instrumentally inseminated and the resultant queens are put into full size hives which are tested in the field. The best queens are used as breeder queens the following year.
An exciting recent development in the NWC program has been the importation of Carniolan bee semen into the US and the NWC program. Imports of honeybee genetics from Europe into the US has been prohibited for the last 90 years. Sue Colby and Steve Shephard got USDA permission to import Carniolan bee semen from outstanding colonies in Eastern Europe. This represents the first new genetic material imported into the US Carniolan population in the last 90 years. These European genetics have been incorporated into the NWC queens offered by Betterbee.
FOR PICKING UP A QUEEN WITH PACKAGE BEES PLEASE SELECT EITHER QUEENBEEDAY1 OR QUEENBEEDAY2 .
**Please do not order merchandise with your queens; queens must be invoiced separately from merchandise.
SHIPPED QUEENS MUST BE ORDERED BY TELEPHONE.
On arrival
Avoid pesticides in all forms
Avoid direct sunlight. Keep queens in the dark at temperatures between 65 and 80 degrees.
Install queens as soon as possible. Place a drop of clean water on the screen upon arrival and repeat twice daily until installed.
Installing queens
Entire books have been written on successful queen introduction. Here are some basic principals which will help increase your success.
Hives must be queenless to accept a new queen. In general the old queen should be removed for a minimum of 24 hours before installation.
There is debate over whether attendant bees should be removed from the queen cage before installation. If you are not comfortable handling the queen and removing attendants you should install the cage with attendant bees.
Push the cage edge into comb in the center of the brood nest. The screen side should be exposed so that the bees can acclimate to the new queen’s scent. The candy end of the cage must also be exposed so that the hive bees can release the queen Check for release of the queen 3 or 4 days after introduction. If the bees have not released the queen she can be released at this time.
More complete installation instructions will be sent along with queens and is available on the website
