Starter and Finisher Colonies

A starter colony is a queenless, very crowded colony that accepts grafted larvae and begins feeding them; a finisher colony is a strong colony that feeds the accepted cells until they are capped or until the royal jelly harvest. In queen and royal jelly production, giving these two jobs to separate colonies markedly improves both the acceptance rate and cell quality. Below you will find how to set up each colony, how to manage them and the most common mistakes.

What are starter and finisher colonies for?

The first 24 hours are the most fragile period for a grafted larva: the bees must adopt a foreign cup as a "queen cell" and immediately start feeding the larva with plenty of jelly. The colony that shows this urge most strongly is one that is queenless and packed to bursting with young bees. A queenless colony cannot be kept in that state for long, however; it wears out and starts drawing its own queen cells.

So the work is split in two: the starter only gets the cells accepted, while the finisher takes on the days-long job of feeding and capping. The same colony can do both (a starter-finisher), but a separate set-up gives more reliable results.

How do you prepare a starter colony?

A good starter has four features: queenlessness, overcrowding, an abundance of young bees and plenty of food. There should be no open brood; otherwise the nurse bees split their attention between brood and cells and start drawing emergency cells from their own larvae.

1. Make it queenless a day ahead: Move the queen and the frames of open brood from a strong colony into another hive. Frames of capped brood, honey and pollen stay.
2. Crowd it: If needed, shake in young bees from the open brood frames of other colonies (making sure you don't take the queen). The bees should completely fill the spaces between frames.
3. Make room for the cells: Leave a gap in the middle, next to a pollen frame, for the grafting frame.
4. Feed: If forage is poor, start giving syrup and pollen (or a substitute) a few days before preparation. Cells are accepted better in a colony that feels as if a flow is on.
5. Give the grafted bars: After grafting, the frame goes into the starter without delay, without being chilled and without being exposed to the sun.

Other starter set-ups

• Swarm box (closed starter): A few kilos of young bees are shaken into a well-ventilated box with a mesh floor; after a few hours of queenlessness the cells are added. This creates a short-lived, very strong acceptance environment; a day later the cells go to the finisher and the bees go back to their colony.
• Temporary divider board method: In a strong, queenright colony, the upper box is temporarily separated from the queen by a sliding board; for a short time the upper box behaves as queenless and starts the cells. The board is then pulled out and the same colony becomes the finisher.
• Queenright starter-finisher: During a strong nectar flow, very crowded colonies with the queen kept in the bottom box by an excluder can start cells in the upper box. The acceptance rate is more variable than with a queenless set-up.

How do you check acceptance?

About 24 hours after grafting, lift the frame out gently. An accepted cell has had its rim extended with wax, its inside is glossy and full of jelly, and the larva is floating on top of the jelly. A cell that has not been accepted looks empty, dry or has had its larva removed.

The acceptance rate varies from batch to batch. If it stays low, look first at larval age, then at how crowded the starter is, whether there is open brood and what the food situation is. Larvae drying out or being damaged during grafting is another common cause.

How do you set up a finisher colony?

The finisher is a strong, well-fed colony, usually queenright. The queen is kept in the bottom box with a queen excluder; the cells go into the queenless area of the upper box. Placing frames of open brood and pollen on either side of the cell frame gathers nurse bees around the cells.

A queenright finisher wears out far less than a colony kept permanently queenless and can be used all season. The bees may draw their own emergency cells on the brood frames moved up into the upper box, so a few days after the cells go in, check the upper brood frames and destroy any wild queen cells.

Starters and finishers in royal jelly production

Royal jelly production uses the same set-up, but the aim is different: the cells are not left to be capped, and the larvae are removed when the amount of jelly is at its peak.

• Harvest time: About 72 hours (3 days) after grafting the cells are removed; the larvae are taken out with tweezers and the jelly is collected with a small spoon or by suction.
• Continuous flow: Colonies used for royal jelly are given a new grafting frame every 3 days, so colony strength and feeding must be sustained.
• Hygiene: The collected jelly is immediately put in a dark, sealed container and into the cold chain.
• Clash with queen rearing: Taking both jelly and queens from the same colony splits the feeding; queen batches should be kept in a separate finisher.

Managing starters and finishers

• Topping up young bees: The strength of these colonies comes from young nurse bees. Keep renewing them by giving frames of capped brood about to emerge from other colonies.
• Protein support: If fresh pollen is scarce outside, give pollen or a pollen substitute; the jelly glands don't work without protein.
• Syrup: If there is no nectar flow, regular feeding with thin syrup signals that "a flow is on".
• Rotation: Don't use the same colony as a starter over and over; every few batches, return a colony to its normal arrangement.
• Varroa and health: Rearing colonies are checked at the start of the season; any colony showing signs of disease is not used.

Common mistakes

• Leaving open brood in the starter: Lowers acceptance and leads to emergency cells being drawn.
• Not enough bees: A colony that merely "looks strong" is not enough; the bees must be overflowing between the frames.
• Interrupting feeding: Even a few days' shortage leaves the cells small.
• Missing wild queen cells: A queen emerging unnoticed in the finisher can destroy the whole batch.
• Exceeding capacity: Giving a colony more cells than it can feed weakens all of them.