Bees 203 - 204: Queen Rearing & Colony Increase 2026

This series includes queen rearing and colony increase courses.

Location: 1400 Quincy St. NE, Washington DC

Colony Increase 204

Dates: April 18, May 2, 9, 16, (30th alt bad weather day)

Time: 10:am - 1:pm

Queen Rearing 203

Dates: April 18, May 2, 3, 9, 16, (30th alt bad weather day)

Time: 1:30pm - 4:30pm

Click to attend just: Queen Rearing 203 or Colony Increase 204

Both workshops consist of classroom sessions, demonstrations, hands-on lessons in the bee yard, homework assignment, and quiz.

Prereqresets:

• Completed a short course and have one year of experience in maintaining colonies

Or

• Two years of experience maintaining colonies and demonstrated knowlege

Course Description:

Participants must attend all class sessions to be eligible for the certificate of completion. In addition to in class time participants will be expected to complete homework and a comprehensive final quiz.

• Textbooks included
• Participants in the queen rearing workshop will get to take two queen cells home.

Queen Rearing Topics:

• Hive evaluations for selecting breeders and record keeping
• Equipment and instructions for starting queen rearing
• Setting up starters and finisher
• Grafting
• Care of cells and queens
• Setting up Mating Colonies
• Catching and Marking Queens
• Evaluating for success

Colony Increase Topics:

• The right time to make splits and nucs
• Assessing a colony for increase potential
• What's in a nuc
• Queen introduction techniques
• Walk-away splits
• Swarms
• Caring for new colonies
• Evaluating for success

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Host or Publisher Bee CARE Institute