Weather Permitting…
Unlike the favorable conditions found in southern latitudes, Pacific Northwest weather has its own set of unique queen-breeding restrictions: Cool, wet, coastal airflow causes unstable maritime conditions that persist well into late spring. The result is both good news and bad news…
The Bad news is: the challenge of producing predictably well-mated queens early in the season prevents us from offering spring queens.
The Good news is: by waiting for the weather to stabilize, and holding our queens until they are on capped brood prior to shipping, you can be confident of the highest possible success when introducing our chemical free, disease and pathogen resistant stock.
Because of its restricted availability, incorporating OWA stock requires a paradigm shift from the standard beekeeping model of acquiring spring packages, to a managerial plan that includes summer splits and fall re-queening.