Why I HATE The Nicot Queen Rearing System Part 2

About four minutes of my original video did not upload. Here is the remaining portion. Hopefully it will help answer any questions and tie up any loose ends.

[saintjohncoleman]

I had the same issue where the queen laid eggs, I went in and instead of larvae, there were still eggs, so I just pulled the cups with the eggs, used those, and got a dozen beautiful queens!

[LadyElk]

just watched a UoG video, while not all of us have islands to breed bees on, it is so informative about queen rearing and genetics....

(agree, the system is hard to work especially for older ppl like me with arthritis), for me the easiest way is pulling and installing natural queen cells, lol, have talked to a lot of folks who look at me like im nuts, its what works for the individual....

[StephenBiggers]

why wouldn't you release the queen from the cage after she has laid it full of eggs and then place the box in a queenless starter colony until larvae hatch? Then select cups and continue in the starter? perhaps they moved the eggs to keep the queen laying, or they consumed them due to lack of protein....would like to hear from others that used this system.

[kenlatham]

I love the Nicot system been using it for years. I place the queen in the cage and wait 5 days for her to lay up the cage. Never had any bees remove the eggs from cage.

[RoughAndWretchedRAW]

Just seems like far more hassle than it's worth. This year will be my first year raising queens and after looking at all the options I just picked up some JZ/BZ cups and a frame and i'll try grafting. My understanding is it's an art, a skill and a knack. Bright side if if you screw up you know within a day or two and can try again. Far more precise judging emergence also. My plan is to build a whack of bees this year, with the short season to do so. I cant waste 8 days hoping when in the same time I could have been the worst grafter known to man and in the same time grafted 3 to 4 separate times and surely had enough cells take to fill my needs.

[mwarrenhall]

very bad info here folks, he done everything wrong in this

[unitedwestand]

You are sabotaging the process by keeping the queen in the Nicot box. They know shes there, and they know shes laying. Because they want her to be productive they're removing the eggs to the empty brood frame cells giving her empty cells in the nicot box so she can keep laying..
I think if you removed her from the box as soon as she filled those cells with eggs, she could be productive filling empty brood cells without them moving the eggs from the box themselves.
Then when the eggs in the nicot box graduate to larvae you can remove the queen from the hive, and let the nursing bees feed the larvae in the nicot box royal jelly and create queens.
Does that make sense to you?

[mikethebeeguy]

Please try this - it is Failsafe
#1 - day 1 - Put queen in bottom box (#1) with a little open/capped brood (in center) & a resource frame, the rest s/b empty, pulled comb.
Leave her in that box.
Spritz the Nicot Grid with sugar water on the egg side of cell only (without attached Nicot queen excluder on). Spritz the excluder also & lay it across the top or next to the outside frame.
Put Nicot Grid in the VERY CENTER of box #2, wait 2+ days for them to clean/polish cells.
#2 - day 3/4 - In the Morning, move queen from box#1 into Box #2, Nicot Grid (put grid queen excluder on 1st).
Make sure frames on each side of the Nicot Grid has open larva & capped brood in those frames. (The more the better)
#3 - wait 24 hours.
#4 - Day 4/5 - Chk next Morning, Because the cells were polished & ready, plus the fact the adjacent frames are full of brood, the Queen will be stimulated to lay eggs within that 1st 24 hours, my Nicot cage always has enough eggs for the amount of queens I want, the grid doesn’t have to be full, as long as you have enough eggs for the queens you want, plus a cushion, your done.
If not, wait until that afternoon, then it will be ready.
#5 - take box #2 & #3 and put them on another bottom board, next to the original spot.
#6 - Pick a frame with lots of brood on it & shake that frame of bees into box #1, Take the Queen out of Nicot box#2 & put her into box #1 again, take box #1 queen excluder off. Close it up.
—- IMPORTANT —- now your Separate Nicot colony is queenless, the bees will know this, they will NOT remove eggs in the cage. Wait 3 days.
#7 - Day 7/8 - When the Nicot eggs hatch, cut out all new queen cells, now your colony is HOPELESSLY QUEENLESS!
Remove the Nicot Frame, Pop the Nicot cells with larva in royal jelly onto your cell bar & you are good to go.
Wait 3 days.
#8 - Day 10/11 -Check for any rouge queen cells, cut them out, now only the nicot cells will have queen larva.
If you can, get from another colony, a frame or 2 of lots of nurse bees, spritz the frames/bees with sugar water, shake them into a bin, allowing most of the foragers to fly away, then pour them into your Nicot colony.

#2 (above) Queen went into Nicot Cage,
#6 (above) The Queen left the Nicot Cage - elasped time = 1 1/2 or so, days in the Nicot Cage.

[pankajmakwana]

Thanks for the video, so the bees seem to move the eggs to the other larvae cells, right? Bees could remove damaged larvae out as well and what happens do they eat the damaged larvae or chuck it off the hive? Thank you again, we learn a lot from your answers.

[TheRainHarvester]

How does he keep bee robbers away? How long does he store supers like this?

[lawtonmurrey]

Thankyou for your video. I was thinking of trying the nicot system but now I'm re-thinking this decision. I'll problely go with the fat bee man's method now. Thanks again

[kennemuthl]

This may be a dumb question, but! Why can't you just move the egg to queen less hive?
The queen lays an egg in a normal hive, swarm cell.
Thanks for the info.

[tomahawkmissile]

Cawwww cawww sings the crow, piping piping sings a queen cell, now who is saying Nicot is different if it sounds the same as a brood frame. Seems like you need to put 30 of these together to get the hatch you would like to see. That queen laid up that frame the day you put her in there and kept laying until the workers removed them. Should of put some protein next to the frame brooding. And released the queen that laid after you saw eggs. Than come back after 18 hours and had some fun with making queens. Just a new beekeeper trying to raise bees like cattle. They deserve a bit more freedom than a tiny grid and will keep the production going if no other way. The bees choose to live in your box and will show you how they keep living if not in the right conditions.

[donaldsmith]

I have watched videos about how it worked for others that took the eggs and didn't want for them to hatch.

[whatjamesthinks]

Send me a PM if you want to sell your Nicot system.

[newbeebeekeepersguy]

ok so you told us that you dont like the Nicot system so now tell us what you have tried that you do like>>