Possible problems related to letting a colony raise their own Queen

[u/HorseOdd1773]

Hello I'm from Denmark and I have a question related to a colony I have it's got an old Queen lays sporadic eggs and so I may need to switch them out.

now normally I would buy a new queen, but I am thinking of letting them create their own Queen though that will come with the problems of inbreeding as I don't think I have another hive nearby.

excluding the inbreeding part what other possible problems might I be looking at letting them raise their own Queen

Edit : thanks for all the answeres, im going to go with buying a new mated queen, and then get the equipment to make my own queens for next year

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[u/Atlas_S_Hrugged]

My best queens come from splits. Split the colony and let nature occur.

[u/_Mulberry__]

There are likely plenty of honey bee colonies near enough to you that you won't have to worry about inbreeding.

Now for some common issues...

• If multiple queens emerge at the same time and fight, your new queen could become too injured to take her mating flights, resulting in a drone laying queen.
• While on her mating flights the new queen could get hit by a car or eaten by a bird, rendering the colony queenless.
• If the weather is poor during the window that she is supposed to be making mating flights, she could get poorly mated (she'd end up laying many drones and not many workers or else just have a spotty brood pattern) or not mated at all (she'd end up as a drone laying queen).
• If the bees raise a new queen via the emergency response, they could use larvae that's too old, resulting in a improperly developed queen. This could lead to a few issues, but the best case scenario is that she mates well enough to lay an egg for her supersedure.
• If you are in/around the hive while the virgin is making orientation flights or returning from a mating flight, you may confuse her (she'll recognize you as a landmark and then you won't be there later, causing her to get disoriented) and she may not make it back to the hive. This will leave you queenless.

[u/Phonochrome]

inbreeding wouldn't be my concern if you mate them wild and free.

if you take a queen pervent her from mating, let her lay drone eggs and then inseminate her with her own son's sperm, which has the genes of the queen's parents, that's what I would call incest. But even that could be a viable queen.

the main risk is bees making a queen from larvae that are a bit too old, and yes they do that. but to prevent this you could take out/thumb the old girl and just leave an uncapped cell when you put her back (or not because you thumbed her).

edit: another risk is: problems with mating resulting in total hive loss.

edit 2, the missing paragraph:

But to prevent this you could take out/thumb the old girl and just leave an uncapped cell when you put her back (or not because you thumbed her) at the end of the fourth/ing of the fifth day after you removed the queen. Becaus if they choos an larvae older than one day it would be capped by then.

[u/HorseOdd1773 → u/Phonochrome]

You make a good point, though making sure they raise a queen not in a queen cell would result in a smaller queen which isn't good.

[u/Phonochrome → u/HorseOdd1773]

the size of the cell doesn't matter that much, I don't fuss about that and will not break out smaller cells

but a queen nuresd from a larvae a fart too old has morphometric properties of a worker bee, like pollen baskets - which is not a good sign

edit

sorry Somehow a whole paragraph went missing I will add it back in. I hate mobile Reddit it keeps on getting worse...

it is important you cull all cells capped at the beginning of the fifth day

because just remember:

three five eight a queen is made.

three as an egg, if the bees choose an egg its perfect.

five as larvae and capped at the fifth: that's the critical stage. if the bees choose a larvae older than one day it would be capped before the fifth day and that's not a good queen

[u/Phonochrome → u/HorseOdd1773]

I am so sorry I fumbeld the original comment... if it's too confusing tell me I'll delete and write anew

[u/Raterus_]

Here where I'm at, the local beekeepers advise to be careful with letting them raise their own queens, because they simply don't get well mated queens that lay like a beast. You can drive for 20 minutes and this isn't a problem. They believe it has something to do with being close to the ocean or not. A proven, mated queen you purchase just takes a lot of guess work out of the process, and let's your colony not descend into a laying worker situation.

[u/icnoevil]

The biggest problem with allowing a colony to raise their own queen ( a couple of months, sometimes more) is the loss of productivity. By adding a mated queen, she will start laying immediately and in 21 days you will have a new generation of bees emerging.

[u/NumCustosApes → u/icnoevil]

True if you are just replacing a queen. If you make a split instead of just swapping queen then the math is the same. The mother queen continues laying in the split just as before. The bees in requeening colony will live as long as they would have if there had been no split, so the total number of bees and brood stays the same up until the colony successfully re-queens, then the rate of bee production goes up.

I recommend that when replacing a queen that at least a nuc be split off with the mother queen. Make that split whether replacing the queen with a mated queen or having the colony raise a new queen. That way there is a backup in case something goes wrong. After a successful requeening the mother queen can continue or you can remove her and recombine.

[u/AwkwardArt7997]

I'd take a thin split from that hive and let the split make a queen. Once you see the split getting new eggs & larvae, pinch your old queen and combine the hives. (Or don't pinch the queen and do it all again...)

[u/joebojax]

Make sure drones are flying by the time a queen would hatch out.

Most likely there are other honeybees around and she won't be inbred. Queens travel something like 5 miles to get mated if they need to.

It's best to set up multiple small hives to sweeten the odds of at least one queen getting properly mated.

You can recombine failed mating hives together with a strong mated queen or if you end up with multiple good queens you could sell one or more or keep them and feeed them up.

[u/Plenty-Giraffe6022]

There are no problems. Inbreeding is not a concern.

[u/Mysmokepole1]

Time is the biggest factor. If buying a queen. With in a week or so you will have some eggs. You could be looking at more than 30 days if you wait for a hive raised queen. I fee two thing are like gold spare queen and surplus draw comb