Focused queen breeding and proven genetics for commercial and hobbyist beekeepers across New Zealand.
For commercial and hobbyist beekeepers alike throughout New Zealand, we breed Apis mellifera ligustica (Italian honey bee) and Apis mellifera carnica (Carniolan honey bee). Our variety gives us an advantage over most queen suppliers who only choose to supply either Italian queens or Carniolan queens. We have invested a vast amount of time and funding in sourcing queens from breeders all over New Zealand and will monitor these queens over a full one-year period.
We look for genetic diversities that we can include in our genetic lines, including production and hygienic behaviour traits, temperament, vigour, winter survival rate, Varroa Sensitive Hygiene (VSH) traits, and swarming behaviour.
We follow a strict, careful process when handling queen cells, creating the best possible environment to control the quality of our queens from the start. We transfer our queen cells from strong starter colonies to finisher colonies, feeding them natural pollen, MegaBee, and sugar syrup to promote vigorous growth and well-being. We have certain size criteria the cells need to reach before they can be placed in our mating colonies, once in our mating colonies the queens are left in there for a minimum of one month before being caged and sent to our customers. Our careful process ensures the queen is performing well, allowing time to highlight any potential issues an individual queen may have, and offering time for her to produce the right level of the five known pheromones (9-oxo-(E)-2-decenoic acid, (+)- and (-)-9-hydroxy (E)-2-decenoic acid, methyl p-hydroxybenzoate, and 4-hydroxy-3-methoxyphenylethanol). These pheromones play a crucial part in requeening. If the queen lacks certain amounts of each pheromone the hive may not accept her into the new colony. Due to breeding both Italian and Carniolan queens at the same time, we can only stock a certain number of queens per breed. If you require a few hundred of a certain breed, please book in advance.
