Detailed Explanation of Key Points in Bee Breeding and Reproduction Techniques

The breeding and reproduction of honeybees mainly covers: bee selection, artificial queen rearing, organization and management of mating nuclei, and artificial colony division.
Many varieties of Western honeybees have been introduced into our country, and these bees have been kept for a long time. Among these introduced Western honeybees, mixed and degenerated conditions are also relatively common. Therefore, further work is needed to purify and rejuvenate bee breeds and comprehensively improve colony productivity. In modern agricultural production practice, productive crossbreeding between different varieties and strains can greatly increase productivity in a relatively short time. In beekeeping production, making full use of heterosis is also an effective measure to increase yield. According to relevant reports, the first and second generations after two-way crossbreeding of introduced bee breeds increased honey production by more than 30% compared with high-yielding Italian bees, and three-way crossbreeding increased production even more.
　　
I. Bee Selection
Bee selection should combine superior selection and pure selection. Select in the current year, use in the next year, select every year, and the more you select, the better it becomes, so that the excellent traits of the bee breed are stably inherited and developed. Superior selection and pure selection include three interrelated aspects, namely colony productivity, biological characteristics, and morphological characteristics. Colony productivity mainly depends on annual honey yield, royal jelly yield, and wax yield under the same management conditions, which is an important criterion for selection. Selecting colonies with high honey, royal jelly, and wax yields as breeding colonies and nurse colonies to achieve higher productivity is an important purpose of selection.
Biological characteristics mainly include the queen's egg-laying capacity, ability to nurse brood, worker bees' foraging ability, swarming tendency, disease resistance, stress resistance (including overwintering performance, summering performance, resistance to enemies and pests, etc.), and degree of docility. Biological characteristics are also part of superior selection and are closely related to productivity. Without good characteristics in this regard, high productivity is impossible. Morphological characteristics refer to the body size, body color, hair color, cubital index (data reflected by positional variation in the junction of two veins on the bee's forewing), and down width that each bee breed possesses. Morphological characteristics can be used to distinguish breed purity and reflect the stability of inheritance of the entire breed nature. Pure selection is also necessary; if not pure, the excellent high-yielding nature of the colony cannot be maintained. The selection method that focuses on superiority and combines superior selection with pure selection is applicable in the selection of all bee varieties. Different bee varieties have different specific contents for superior selection and pure selection, so attention should be paid to the characteristics of each variety, promoting its advantages and overcoming its disadvantages; for the same bee variety, the contents of superior selection and pure selection are not fixed and unchanging, but continuously develop. The improved variety breeding of honeybees is precisely to break the relatively stable superiority and purity of the original variety and create a higher level of better superiority and purity. This is the cultivation of new bee strains and new varieties.
In bee selection work, the method of group selection is often adopted. First, based on productivity, biological characteristics, and morphological characteristics, a comprehensive evaluation is made for each colony in the apiary, dividing them into three groups: high-yielding purebreds as the first group serving as breeding colonies, medium ones as the second group used for production and colony division, and poor ones as the third group whose queens should be eliminated as early as possible while the colonies are used for production. Second is the selection and matching of breeding colonies. The queen determines the purity and traits of drones, drones reflect the queen, and worker bees reflect the comprehensive result of both parents and also reflect the drones of the paternal colony. When selecting breeding colonies, the maternal colony should be examined for the purity of worker bees and drones, while the paternal colony is mainly examined for the purity of drones. There are two types of breeding colony matching: heterogeneous matching and homogeneous matching. When the selected paternal and maternal colonies each have their own characteristics in traits, it is called heterogeneous matching. At the beginning of selection, this method is mostly used, and it can integrate and improve the breed nature of the bee breed; the other is homogeneous matching, that is, the selected paternal and maternal colonies are relatively consistent in traits, which can be used to consolidate their excellent traits. Also, in apiaries where bee breeds are mixed and degenerated, it is best to introduce queens or breeding colonies of the same variety from a breeding apiary to mate with the original bee breed, so as to carry out blood renewal and rejuvenation. The specific method is as follows:
In the first year, use the introduced breeding bees as maternal colonies, and the newly reared queens mate and reproduce with drones reared from the original breeding colonies of the apiary. In the second year, use these new queens as maternal colonies, select paternal colonies from the queen colonies introduced in the previous year to rear drones for backcrossing, or carry out the two consecutive generations of replacement and pure selection method, that is, introduce several breeding queens from a breeding apiary as maternal queens for queen rearing and mating with the apiary's breeding drones, and eliminate all the old queens in the original apiary and replace them with new queens. In the second year, introduce several more excellent breeding queens from another breeding apiary and repeat the first year's practice. After two generations of queen replacement and subsequent selection, excellent purebreds can be cultivated. There is another method in bee selection work called pure-line breeding. This method is generally carried out in breeding apiaries and is rarely used in production units. The method is to use the two consecutive generations of replacement method. If the offspring traits are relatively uniform and consistent, this colony can be established as a pure selection line, and successive generations of inbreeding selection for superiority and purity can be carried out. Pure-line breeding does not lie in the production effect of the pure line itself, but in its breeding value. Using several excellent pure lines from different sources and without blood relationship for inter-line mating can combine them into excellent purebred strains with greater economic value.
　　
II. Artificial Queen Rearing of Honeybees
　　
Artificial queen rearing of honeybees includes 8 elements: timing and conditions, preparatory work, tools for larval grafting and queen rearing, larval grafting method, management after larval grafting, using large eggs to rear queens, cutting comb for queen rearing, and utilization of supersedure queen cells.
The queen's heredity and egg-laying capacity have a great influence on the quality, colony strength, vitality, and productivity of the colony. Artificial queen rearing can rear queens according to the planned number and timing, can use larvae or eggs of a certain age from breeding colonies for rearing, can be combined with improved variety breeding work, and can create the most suitable conditions for the embryonic development of the queen.
　　
1. Timing and Conditions
After the new bees reared by the colony in the current year have completely replaced the old bees that overwintered and the colony has entered a period of development and growth, preparations for artificial queen rearing can begin. In the north, it should be carried out in early summer when daytime temperatures are stable above 20°C and there is a honey source, especially when there is an abundant pollen source. This can both ensure the quality of the queen and make use of the new queen to replace the aging queen early. Colonies with a current-year queen will not undergo natural swarming. Using early-reared new queens for artificial colony division, after 1.5 months of proliferation, they can develop into strong colonies and collect mid- and late-season honey sources. In early autumn, rearing queens at the beginning of the last major honey flow allows new queen colonies to rear large numbers of overwintering bees, which is beneficial for safe overwintering of the colony and the colony's development the following year. In the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, it is best to rear queens during the Chinese milk vetch flowering period. The conditions for rearing high-quality queens are:
(1) Warm weather and stable climate
During the mating period of virgin queens, the daytime temperature should be above 20°C, and continuous rainy weather should be avoided as much as possible.
(2) Presence of honey and pollen sources
During queen rearing, there should be good honey and pollen sources in nature, with an adequate pollen source being more important. Every evening, uninterrupted reward feeding should be carried out for the breeding colonies and queen-rearing colonies.
　　
2. Preparatory Work
Before carrying out artificial queen rearing, the following preparatory work needs to be done carefully:
(1) Select parent colonies: Through investigation, select healthy, disease-free colonies whose honey or royal jelly yield exceeds the apiary average, with weak swarming tendency and rapid colony development, as parent colonies. Use paternal colonies to rear drones and maternal colonies' larvae to rear queens. During artificial queen rearing, 1 maternal colony can provide thousands of female larvae; likewise, 1 paternal colony can also nurse thousands of drones. If one or two breeding colonies are used every year to rear virgin queens and drones, the entire apiary's colonies will form inbreeding, reducing productivity and vitality. Therefore, multiple colonies should be selected and used as paternal and maternal colonies; and queens (or colonies) of the same variety but different bloodlines should be regularly introduced from breeding apiaries.
(2) Rear breeding drones: The number and quality of drones directly relate to the mating success rate of virgin queens, and also to insemination effectiveness, thereby affecting the quality of offspring colonies. Therefore, drone rearing must begin 20 days before starting artificial queen rearing. To rear breeding drones, drone combs need to be prepared in advance, or the lower part of a brood comb can be cut off and inserted into a strong colony to be built into a drone comb. To ensure mating quality, rear drones at a ratio of 1 virgin queen to 50 drones. The development of a queen from egg to adult emergence takes about 16 days, and about 5 days to reach sexual maturity, totaling 21 days. While drones take 24 days from egg to adult emergence, and about 12 days from emergence to sexual maturity, totaling 36 days. Therefore, drone rearing must begin about 20 days before artificial queen rearing so that the sexual maturity periods of drones and virgin queens are synchronized. Usually, larval grafting for queen rearing can begin when breeding drones start emerging in large numbers. At the same time, all drones and drone pupae of other colonies in the apiary should be eliminated.
(3) Prepare queen-rearing colonies: Queen-rearing colonies are strong colonies used to nurse queen larvae and pupae. Colonies that are disease-free, free of Varroa mites, strong, and with at least 15 frames of bees should be selected as queen-rearing colonies. One day before larval grafting for queen rearing, move their queen and all unsealed brood combs with bees into a new hive box placed beside the original colony; the original colony with 6-8 combs (including sealed brood combs, honey combs, and pollen combs) forms a queenless queen-rearing colony, ensuring dense bees. Excess combs should have bees shaken off and be added to the divided queenright colonies. Feed the queen-rearing colony 0.5-1 kg of sugar syrup every evening. A queenright colony with an old queen, 18-20 frames of bees, and a super box can also be used as a queen-rearing colony. Place a queen excluder between the brood box and the super, confine the queen to the brood box for egg laying, place 1 frame of young larvae in the center of the super, a pollen comb on one side, sealed brood combs for the rest, and honey combs on the outer side. Queenright colonies do not have as high an acceptance rate for grafted larvae as queenless colonies, but they care for sealed queen cells better.
　　
3. Tools for Larval Grafting and Queen Rearing:
Tools for larval grafting and queen rearing include grafting needles, queen-rearing frames, wax cups, etc. The grafting needle is a tool for transferring young larvae into queen cell cups. It can be made from thick copper wire or a goose feather quill, with one end flat and thin like a tongue and the other end curved like a spoon. Grafting needles with springs are convenient to use. The queen-rearing frame is a frame for holding queen cells. It can be modified from a standard hive frame, with the top and bottom bars and side bars of equal width, about 13 mm. Inside the frame, 3 strips of wood 10 mm wide are installed horizontally at equal distances. The wax cup rod is a wooden rod for dipping wax cups, 100 mm long, with the end for dipping wax cups very smooth and round, with a diameter of 8-9 mm at 10 mm from the end. The wax cup is the queen cell base for rearing queens, made by dipping the wax cup rod into melted beeswax. Soak the wax cup rod in cold water for a period, take it out and shake off the water, vertically insert it into melted wax to a depth of about 10 mm, take it out and pause briefly, and repeat dipping 2-3 times, each time slightly shallower. Then put it in cold water to cool and remove. The finished wax cup has a thin rim and thick bottom, smooth inside without air bubbles. Plastic queen cell cups can also be used. In addition, prepare towels, basins, royal jelly, etc. Royal jelly can be obtained from natural queen cells on the spot, or collected in advance and stored in a refrigerator. When using, add 1 part warm water to dilute the royal jelly.
　　
4. Larval Grafting Method:
Larval grafting for queen rearing can produce the required number of virgin queens with consistent maturity periods in a planned way. First, attach 2-3 layers of foundation strips to the strips of the queen-rearing frame, or attach small triangular thin iron pieces at equal distances with melted wax, and attach 7-10 wax cups on them, with 3 strips totaling 20-30 wax cups. Place it in the queen-rearing colony and let the bees clean it for 2-3 hours, then take it out, brush off the bees with a bee brush, drop 1 drop of diluted royal jelly or honey into each wax cup, and then carry out larval grafting. It is best to graft larvae indoors in a clean, bright room, with indoor temperature maintained at 25-30°C and relative humidity at 80%-90%. If the humidity is insufficient, sprinkle water on the floor. When the temperature is above 25°C and there are no robbing bees, larvae can be grafted outdoors in the shade. Take out 1 frame of young larvae from the maternal colony, brush off the bees, and take it for larval grafting. First place the strips with wax cups side by side on the table, use a clean round-tipped thin glass rod or thin bamboo stick to drop rice-grain-sized diluted royal jelly into the wax cups cleaned by bees, and then graft larvae. When grafting, the needle should be inserted from the dorsal (convex) side of the larva, insert the tip between the larva and the cell bottom, lift the larva, and place it on the royal jelly in the wax cup. Larvae are very delicate, and the grafting motion should be gentle, steady, and quick. Each larva should only be lifted once with the grafting needle. Cover the strip after grafting with a wet towel, then graft the second strip. Install the grafted strips onto the queen-rearing frame and place it between the larvae comb and pollen comb in the queen-rearing colony.
　　
5. Management After Larval Grafting:
After adding the grafted queen-rearing frame to the queen-rearing colony, continue reward feeding in the evening. Check the next day whether the larvae have been accepted. Accepted larvae will have their queen cells heightened, royal jelly increased in the queen cells, and larvae floating on the royal jelly; unaccepted ones will have their queen cells bitten and damaged, with no larvae in the queen cells. If a queenless colony is used for queen rearing, transfer the queen-rearing frame to the super of a queenright queen-rearing colony at this time, and merge the queenless queen-rearing colony with the original colony. If a queenright queen-rearing colony is used for queen rearing, check the condition of sealed queen cells on the sixth day when the queen cells have been sealed, and eliminate small and crooked queen cells. Count the number of usable queen cells in order to organize the required number of mating nuclei.
　　
6. Using Large Eggs to Rear Queens:
Experiments have shown that large queens with a birth weight exceeding 200 mg have more ovarioles in their pair of ovaries and stronger egg-laying capacity. It has also been proven that using larger bee eggs can produce heavier queens. Confine the selected maternal colony's queen in a queen egg-laying controller, or keep the maternal colony in a small colony of 3-5 frames to limit its egg laying, and larger bee eggs can be obtained after 1 week. When the large bee eggs hatch into larvae, use larvae within 24 hours to artificially rear queens. The queen egg-laying controller developed by the Institute of Apicultural Research, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, is made of plastic, with internal dimensions: length 457 mm, width 54 mm, height 244 mm, just able to hold one standard comb. Method of use: 12 days before larval grafting for queen rearing, place a sealed pupa comb with almost no empty cells and recently sealed into the queen egg-laying controller, place the queen on this comb, cover with the controller's lid, and place it in the middle of the brood box in the colony. The queen's egg laying is restricted inside the controller, and only after new bees emerge successively does the queen gradually lay eggs. 4 days before queen rearing, take out the brood comb from the controller and place it in the colony for bees to nurse, and the next day 1-day-old larvae hatched from large eggs can be obtained. When producing royal jelly, confining the queen to lay eggs on one comb can obtain larvae of suitable age for grafting. The queen egg-laying controller can also be used to produce drone pupae.
　　
7. Cutting Comb for Queen Rearing:
If eyesight is poor and larval grafting is difficult, the method of cutting unsealed brood combs can be used to rear queens. When the colony has developed strong, take out 2-3 frames of sealed brood combs with bees from the maternal colony together with the queen and place them in a new hive box, add 1-2 frames of honey combs, and place beside the original colony. The maternal colony becomes a queenless queen-rearing colony. Take out 1 frame of brood comb with large numbers of eggs and newly hatched larvae, cut out a rectangular piece of comb 200 mm × 35 mm from the central part of the comb, exposing the eggs and larvae in the cells along the upper edge of the cut, and let the bees build queen cells at the upper cut. Check on the third day, and select and keep 10-20 queen cells with well-developed larvae and suitable positions. Cut off all queen cells with poor construction and feeding conditions, emergency queen cells sealed prematurely, and excess queen cells. Record the age of larvae in the retained queen cells in order to know the date of queen emergence. After removing the sealed queen cells, the queenless queen-rearing colony is merged with the original colony.
　　
8. Utilization of Supersedure Queen Cells
Select excellent colonies with old queens as breeding colonies. When they build supersedure queen cells, select and retain them. Natural queen supersedure can make the excellent traits of the breeding colony more stably inherited. When this natural supersedure phenomenon occurs, the colony generally only builds a few queen cells, and the quality of the reared queens is relatively good. Take out the comb with supersedure queen cells and place it in the super of a supered colony, with a queen excluder between the brood box and the super, confining the queen to the brood box. Natural supersedure queen cells can be successively taken from such old queen colonies.
　　
III. Organization and Management of Mating Nuclei
　　
A mating nucleus is a small colony for the new queen to live in. The time to organize mating nuclei is on the tenth day after larval grafting, or the seventh day after queen cells are sealed.
To organize mating nuclei, first prepare mating boxes. A standard hive can be tightly divided into 3 or 4 compartments with 2 or 3 partition boards, each compartment with 1 entrance 30 mm long and 8 mm wide, with entrances facing different directions. If there are two identical entrances in the same direction, virgin queens returning from mating flights may mistakenly enter the wrong colony, causing losses. The hive wall in front of the entrance is best painted in different colors such as yellow, blue, and white, so that the queen can recognize her own hive. In each compartment of the mating box, place 1 frame of sealed brood comb with young bees and 1 frame of honey-pollen comb to form a mating nucleus.
The method to obtain sealed brood combs with young bees is: prepare 1 hive box, take one or two frames of sealed brood combs from each strong colony and place them in the box, with 8 frames of sealed brood combs with bees per box, cover the hive lid, and place the hive box far away from other colonies. After a few hours, flying bees fly back to their original colonies, and most of the bees on the sealed brood combs are young bees.
The next day, check the colony, cut off emergency queen cells, and then introduce mature queen cells. Introducing queen cells using queen cell protective cages made of wound galvanized wire is the safest. The conical queen cell protective cage has a cylindrical small feed tube at the lower opening, and bees cannot enter from the lower opening. Because when bees destroy queen cells, they bite through the queen cell wall from the side and then sting the queen pupa to death. The queen cell protective cage precisely protects the side wall of the queen cell. The covering cloth of the mating nucleus is placed directly on the top bars of the combs, then the inner cover and outer cover are put on, so that bees of adjacent mating nuclei are completely isolated, preventing bees from mingling and biting each other. Mating nuclei are placed far away from other colonies, in places with open surrounding space and obvious landmarks, with adjacent mating boxes at least 2 m apart and facing different directions.
On the eleventh day after larval grafting, that is, the day before the virgin queen emerges, introduce the queen cells into the mating nuclei respectively. Mating nuclei have few bees and weak ability to regulate and maintain hive temperature, so it is not suitable to introduce too early, in order to avoid delaying the queen's emergence time. When taking out the queen-rearing frame from the queen-rearing colony, it must not be placed upside down or have bees shaken off. A small amount of smoke can be sprayed with a smoker to disperse the bees around the queen cells, and a bee brush can be used to brush the bees clean. In a warm room, cut the queen cells attached to the strips, or cut off the triangular iron pieces under the queen cells, eliminate small and curved queen cells, and introduce the thick and straight queen cells respectively with queen cell protective cages, or directly attach the queen cells to the middle-upper part of the brood comb of the mating nucleus.
The next day after introducing queen cells, check the queen's emergence, eliminate dead queen cells and virgin queens of poor quality, and immediately supplement backup queen cells to the mating nuclei. In order not to hinder the queen's mating flight and mating, try not to open the hive to inspect mating nuclei, and understand the situation through external observation. If small clusters of bees biting each other are found in front of the entrance, or a small number of bitten-dead bees are found, then open the hive for inspection. If the queen is balled, rescue her immediately. If the queen is not injured, she can be put back on the comb; if already injured, she should no longer be kept. For mating nuclei without a queen, another queen cell can be introduced, or they can be merged with adjacent mating nuclei. Under normal weather conditions, virgin queens generally mate 5-7 days after emergence and begin laying eggs around 10 days. Therefore, 10 days after introducing queen cells, comprehensively check the mating and egg-laying status of queens in each mating nucleus. If not affected by low temperature or continuous rainy weather, virgin queens that still have not mated or laid eggs after more than half a month should be eliminated.
For mating nuclei, work should be done well in heat preservation, shading, and preventing robbing bees, and feed should be kept sufficient. Mating nuclei have weak colony strength and many young bees. Once robbing occurs, they have no defense capability and are prone to queens being balled and injured or killed. When honey sources are lacking, more attention should be paid to preventing robbing bees, and the entrance should be reduced to only allow one or two bees to pass through. When feed is insufficient, supplement honey combs.
For new queens that have laid eggs for about 1 week, select again, and use queens with high egg-laying and large egg-laying area for artificial colony division, or replace old queens. Eliminate queens that lay drone eggs or lay few eggs. However, for micro mating nuclei organized with several hundred bees, the new queen should be taken out one or two days after she begins laying eggs; otherwise, due to lack of egg-laying space, the queen will fly away.
　　
IV. Artificial Colony Division
　　
Artificial colony division, also called artificial splitting, is the basic method to increase the number of colonies and expand production. It uses reared egg-laying queens, mature queen cells, or reserve queens, along with a portion of brood combs with bees and honey combs, to form new colonies. Artificial colony division can reproduce new colonies according to plan at the most suitable time. When individual colonies develop swarming fever, artificial colony division can be adopted promptly to divide the colony, which can stop natural swarming, avoiding the trouble of catching swarms and the loss of swarms flying away.
If artificial colony division is carried out without planning and without considering the apiary's equipment conditions and the local honey source situation at the time, it will inevitably cause all colonies in the apiary to become weak colonies without production capacity, and this should be avoided.
　　
1. Equal Colony Division
When there are more than 45 days before the local main nectar plant's honey flow period, this method can be used to divide one colony equally into two, and both colonies can develop strong by the time the major honey flow arrives. The method is: move the original hive box 30-40 cm to one side, place an empty hive box 30-40 cm away on the opposite side, put half of the bees and combs of the colony together with the queen into the empty box, and arrange the combs of both boxes well. After about half a day, introduce 1 egg-laying queen to the queenless colony. When flying bees return to the nest, they will fly into these two boxes respectively. If fewer bees fly into one of the boxes, move it closer to the original site. The disadvantage of equal colony division is that one strong colony suddenly becomes two weak colonies, and they need more than 1 month of proliferation before they can be put into production. It is not suitable to introduce queen cells to the divided new colony, because the new queen needs more than 10 days before she can lay eggs, so the nursing capacity of the new divided colony cannot be fully utilized, affecting colony development. If the new queen is lost during the mating flight, the loss is even greater.
　　
2. Unequal Colony Division
Unequal colony division is dividing part of the bees and brood from one colony into one strong and one weak colony. This method is suitable for colonies with swarming fever. From the colony with swarming fever, take out 2-3 frames of sealed brood combs and 1 frame of honey-pollen comb, together with the old queen, and place them in a new hive box. Place it far from the original colony. The entrance is loosely blocked with green grass, letting the bees slowly bite it open. Check the original colony, select and keep 1 good-quality queen cell, cut off all other queen cells, or introduce artificially reared queen cells or egg-laying queens. If there is a long time before the major honey flow, the divided colony can be gradually strengthened with sealed brood combs; otherwise, the divided colony can later be merged with the original colony.
　　
3. Mixed Colony Division
This is taking one or two frames of sealed brood combs with young bees from each of several colonies and, depending on the situation, mixing them to form divided colonies of 3-6 frames. The next day, introduce egg-laying queens or mature queen cells to the divided colonies. It is also possible in late spring and early summer, when colonies have developed to 10 frames of bees and 6-8 frames of brood, to take 1 frame of sealed brood comb with bees from such colonies every 6-7 days and mix them to form new divided colonies. About 15 days before the major honey flow, stop taking brood combs from the 10-frame colonies so that they can develop into strong colonies of 15-18 frames of bees at the start of the major honey flow.
　　
4. Strengthening Mating Nuclei
After the new queen of a mating nucleus begins laying eggs, 1 frame can be added every 1 week using sealed brood combs taken from strong colonies. At first, supplement sealed brood combs with young bees, and later supplement sealed brood combs without bees, gradually building it into a colony with more than 6 frames of bees that can develop rapidly independently.
　　
5. Rapid Colony Reproduction
Many apiaries adopt the method of large-scale colony division, dividing one overwintered colony into 5-6 colonies for concentrated honey collection. There are also newly established apiaries that, in order to rapidly increase the number of colonies, can adopt the method of rapid colony reproduction. The method is as follows: divide all colonies in the apiary into groups of 3, with 1 colony as the reproductive colony used for division and the other two as auxiliary colonies. In spring, when colonies have developed to 9-10 frames of bees and 6-8 frames of brood, begin using sealed brood combs from auxiliary colonies to supplement the reproductive colony. Take 1 frame of sealed brood comb from each auxiliary colony, place it in an empty hive box, cover the hive lid, and reduce the entrance. After about 2 hours, most flying bees have flown back to their own colonies. At this time, add the 2 frames of sealed brood combs with larvae respectively to the two outer sides of the reproductive colony, or to one side in the super. The next day, move these 2 sealed brood combs inside the honey combs, close to other brood combs. After 6-8 days, use 2 more frames of sealed brood combs without bees from the two auxiliary colonies to supplement the reproductive colony. After 2 supplements, the reproductive colony gains 2000-2500 bees and 4 frames of sealed brood combs, rapidly develops strong, accumulates surplus nurse bees, prompts them to develop swarming fever, and builds queen cells (of course, artificial queen rearing can also begin). Each time sealed brood combs are taken from auxiliary colonies, supplement them with empty combs or foundation frames at the same time.
When queen cells with eggs appear in the reproductive colony, use a safe queen introducing cage to confine its queen on a brood comb without queen cells, and place it in a new hive box. Take 1 frame of brood comb with bees and 1 frame of brood comb without bees from the auxiliary colonies and add them to this new hive box. Add one or two honey combs as well. Move it to a new location, keep it properly warm, reduce the entrance, and feed diluted honey syrup. Release the queen after 3 days, and gradually expand the hive thereafter.
After taking out the queen of the reproductive colony, after 1 week, the queen cells built have been sealed. At this time, place 2 new hive boxes on its two sides, and evenly distribute the bees, brood combs, and honey-pollen combs among these 3 boxes. If stored honey is insufficient, supplement honey combs. Keep only 1 queen cell in each box, and cut off all the rest. Then, move the old box to a new location, so that flying bees are evenly distributed into the two remaining new boxes. After the new queens of the divided colonies lay eggs, add empty combs or foundation frames to expand the hive.
After taking bees and brood combs from auxiliary colonies 3 times, expand their hives promptly, cultivate them to be strong, and put them into production. In this way, after the first artificial colony division, the colonies are doubled, divided from 3 colonies into 2 strong colonies (auxiliary colonies) and 4 weak colonies (divided colonies).
When a divided colony has developed to a full 10-frame standard box, follow the above method again, take out its queen and 1 frame of brood comb, and take 1 frame of sealed brood comb with bees and 1 frame of sealed brood comb without bees from auxiliary colonies to form 1 divided colony, placed in a new location. According to the equal colony division method, evenly divide the queenless colony from which the queen has been taken into 2 boxes. Over the next 6 days, gradually move the two boxes apart, 25 cm per day.
On the sixth day after the second division, divide each half-colony equally again. In this new divided colony, keep 1 queen cell for each divided colony, and cut off all the rest. If the queen of any divided colony is lost during the mating flight, merge it with the adjacent colony.
　　
6. Management of Divided Colonies
New divided colonies generally have relatively weak colony strength, and their ability to regulate hive temperature, nurse brood, collect honey and pollen, and defend the hive is relatively poor. Therefore, attention should be paid to heat preservation when it is cold, shading when it is hot, maintaining sufficient feed in the hive when honey sources are lacking, and reducing the entrance, paying attention to preventing robbing bees. According to colony development and honey source conditions, add combs or foundation frames to expand the hive, supplement honey-pollen combs, or carry out reward feeding.
When carrying out large-scale artificial colony division, it is best to establish a branch apiary at a place more than 5 km away from the original apiary, which can avoid divided colonies' bees flying back to the original colonies and prevent robbing bees.