Nicot® Cell cups

01 · HOW IT FITS

Support, block and cup: three pieces, one cell

The system is built from the bottom up. The CNE1 support is fixed to the bar of the raising frame; the CNE2 block clips on top of it; and the cup goes inside the block. Each trio holds one queen cell, so raising ten queens takes ten of each piece. The same cup also works in the cupularve, the patented cage where the queen lays straight into the cups and grafting is avoided altogether.

02 · THE LARVA

Six to twenty-four hours, and load more than you need

In grafting you move a larva less than a day old into the cup — the maker says 6 to 24 hours — with the grafting tool. The block of loaded cups goes into a queenless colony, which turns to the queen-raising instinct and builds the cells; ten to twelve days later the sealed cells are shared out to queenless nucs, where the virgins will emerge. Always load more cups than the queens you need: not all of them are accepted.

03 · CLEANING

It takes hot water without deforming

The plastic is food grade and non-porous: it does not absorb, so between batches it is washed hot, up to 60 °C, and disinfected without the wall losing its shape. That is the difference from cheap copies, which soften on the second wash and stop seating in the block. A deformed cup does not hold the cell properly and you notice it at collection. Against a hand-moulded wax cup, this one is reused season after season.

04 · BEFORE YOU BUY

Sold by the unit: the quantity you order is the number of cups that arrive.