Queen Insemination

20/08/2026

One of my favourite jobs, preparing a Rene van der Molen colony for winter. Beautiful beautiful bees, arguably better than Buckfasts as much as it pains me to say. Get booked on an insemination lesson with him in 2027 and see first hand some of the best bees in the world imo.

www.buckfastqueen.com

08/06/2026

Decided to set up the camera for the first look in a colony since last summer, no frills, some mosquitoes but no stings, no hive tool, smoker or suit, a mess but an honest one. Ended up setting up a queen finisher as it was quite a large colony.

23/11/2025

My solution that works to eliminate Asian hornets, costs only a few hours of your time.

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1DG491gUyo/?mibextid=wwXIfr

31/07/2025

Not one of our kits but check out the wear, love to see a kit being well used.
Inseminator Achim Waldbauer picture credit Andrew Sweet.

Achim has some bee semen for sale collected yesterday, Elgon, Paul Jungels and Ligustica.

www.buckfastqueen.com
Wja Bees

23/04/2025

A visit to Jurica Manestar in Croatia, helping slightly with some queen rearing, co2 for queens and setting up some inseminating for tomorrow. Some stunning scenery, valuable information and something I’ve not needed before, a bear fence.

Jurica is a registered queen breeder in Croatia, has some of the original old world Carnica from Slovenia, the same lines Sue Cobey took with her to the US.

His inseminated Carnicas will be available here www.buckfastqueen.com/store/ols/products/the-original-old-world-carnica-queen-bee

18/02/2025

The long awaited Rene van der Molen Insemination ebook in English available here

Long awaited ebook in English, instrumental insemination of honey bees by the pro inseminator Rene van Der Molen

13/05/2024

The first peek and the best overwintering colonies I’ve seen, no treatments last year, no varroa in drone brood is a good first marker, full testing of these colonies to come. Been a particularly tough winter for bees in southern Sweden and a late spring which never helps. VSH queens from Schweden Achim, he will have semen and queens available from June.



www.buckfastqueen.com

15/11/2023

Great video from Northern Spain, one of our customers Mattia who has an amazing business covering many aspects of beekeeping with unique challenges in his environment. He specialises in improving the native Spanish and Portuguese Iberian bee with instrumental insemination, the Iberian bee has a fearsome reputation which Mattia is taming, Enjoy!

https://youtu.be/sb0sMOeKkNo?si=BqlfIZ9xaRLQsmkB

07/06/2023

Great visit to Achim Waldbauer’s home in southern Sweden. Achim has one the best organised queen rearing setups I’ve seen so far. Achim is originally from Germany, a very knowledgeable buckfast breeder specialising in VSH, insemination and selection. We discussed varroa solutions for Portugal as many commercials are needing to treat as many as four times a year and as many of you know I have had my personal battles with varroa in Portugal, continuous treatment is no longer viable. I came away with lots of information including why plastic queen confinement cages don’t work and two beautiful selected VSH overwintered queens. thank you Schweden Achim.

Achim will have inseminated queens, open mated and semen available soon. He also has a holiday house, does beekeeping, gardening and fishing lessons, his website is still under construction but available below.

www.schwedenachim-ferienwohnung.com

www.buckfastqueen.com