This book explains why and how beekeepers can use increase nuclei to solve problems in the beeyard and use them to winter colonies and provide a reliable source of fresh bees, locally acclimatized queens, replacement hives and colonies for operational growth or sale. Connor draws on the concepts of Langstroth, Doolittle, Brother Adam, Mike Palmer and more while integrating his unique academic and commercial beekeeping experiences into this concise and thought-provoking second edition. Adding more methods of making increase colonies and recent developments in the science of bee biology, the second edition expands on its predecessor with rich, colorful photography and diagrams. In less than a decade, the beekeeping industry has made a wide-spread shift to increase nuclei colonies as a means of producing new colonies in the face of heavy losses from poor nutrition, pesticides, virus-mite interactions and general climate change.

Almost every emergency of management can be met forthwith by putting something into or taking something out of a nucleus, while nuclei themselves seldom present emergencies. --E.B. Wedmore, A Manual of Beekeeping

Increase Essentials offers beekeepers not only the science behind making nuclei, but more importantly the art and practical knowledge that the everyday beekeeper can apply or use to enhance this skill in their own bee yard. --Stephen J. Repasky, EAS Master Beekeeper, Author of Swarm Essentials

For all the talk about sustaining bees and beekeeping, this book is THE presentation for ideas to modern beekeepers on how they can plan and manage for their futures in bee yard colony growth and maintenance. --Robert Burns, Kansas Honey Producers Association Treasurer