Queens and queen rearing

My attitude towards queen rearing can best be summed up by a couple of Homer Simpson quotes

and

I did attend a course on queen rearing a few years ago which convinced me that grafting [collecting eggs with a tiny spoon] was not for me. I therefore bought a load of kit, tried and failed.

However in those days things were a bit different as I had only a few colonies.
Now I have a lot more and three of the queens at Scald End have been there for a couple of years and conventional wisdom says queens need to be replaced after three years or else they will become 'drone layers' i.e. they only produce drones [male bees].

Also a couple of colonies at Ravensden have become queen less and not having anything suitable to hand and wanting to do something while the hives had enough bees, I bought a couple of queens.
A single queen normally costs about £40 and can be bought over the Internet.
The bees are packed in a small plastic cage with ventilation slots and she comes with about 6 retinue bees who take care of her. There is also a plug of sugar fondant in the cage to keep them going.
Clip here
Paul my postman was intrigued to deliver a pacel with 'With care live bees' on it.
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I took the cages out of the package and took a couple of photos. Then I heard something I had never heard before - a queen piping. This is a sound a queen makes when she's looking for a fight with another queen and she could probably smell the other queen. Unfortunately by the time I got my camera to record it she stopped.
However a video of a queen piping is here,

The process of introducing the new queen to the hive is quite straightforward [famous last words].
The new queen has a different smell to the old queen and if she was just dropped in she would probably be killed so she has to be introduced gradually.
A frame from either end of the hive is removed to make space for the cage which is put in between two frames in the middle of the hive. It has a loop in the top so its suspended by putting a nail through the loop and putting the nail across a couple of frames.

The cage is left for 4 days and a feeder added to the hive. Hopefully she and her retinue will have chewed their way through the fondant into the hive.
More later.............

This all has persuaded me to have another go at queen rearing.
As with all things related to beekeeping there are a vast array of methods, each with its fervent devotees who claim all the other methods are rubbish.
The method I will use starts with a plastic cassette set into a brood frame. This is put in the hive for the bees to clean it up and make it small nice. This takes a couple of days.

More later............