I Call Bull on Princesses Dying after 200 Generations

You probably seen the rumours. The baffled questions of "Why did my princess disappear?" and "Where did my bees go?" then the replies.... "Oh, they die off after 200 generations or so..."

After running these bees in a chunkloaded area for best part of a month, it's pretty clear that they haven't popped their clogs after 200 generations, as some have alluded to.

1296 generations  

 1018 generations

 1273 generations

1249 generations 

1256 generations

So, what can we conclude has happened to all the missing drones and princesses?

Ignoble stock will die off eventually.
Natural pristine stock will do well provided the area is chunk loaded.
Carefully genetically modified pristine stock (i.e those made with the highest quality serum) will do well provided area is chunkloaded.
Poorly genetically modified stock (those made with poor quality serum) may be subject to changes in their genetic code that makes them unstable and may die off... who knows?!
You may have further issues with using bees that do not have "standardized traits" so that the drones all have different traits and won't stack.

So, for successful bee factories:

They have to be chunkloaded otherwise you may lose your bees for no apparent reason.
Use only pristine stock.
Genetically modify bees with only the highest quality serums.
If your having trouble standardizing traits, reduce the fertility to low so that there is no issue of drone stacking or overspill.

Tidy Orchard

Fixed it up. Looks much better.

Quick Fruit Tree Farm

I set up a quick fruit tree farm; I'm happy with the storage area for the fruit, but the farm itself looks pretty scruffy. I'll expand the farm at some point and set the trees in avenues, so that it looks more like an orchard.

New server, new bee factory.

Main Alveary Block

The old server is dead, and we're on a new server, we're again playing FTB Direwolf 20, and we're currently on version 1.7.10.

Thanks to some kind comments on the youtube videos, I decided that I still have a weath of knowledge to share with you all. Despite some extensive searching, it still seems that no one else has blogged/videoed their adventure into Binnie's mods. The new video series will build on what I taught you in the first set of videos, and I'll also be showing you some of the other aspects of Binnie's, such as alcohol and botany, as well as recapping some basics such as the lumbermill and its associated machines.

This factory has been built with the sole purpose of passing on some of what I have learnt, and getting some information about Binnie's Mods out there on the web. The server I play on is a whitelisted server, where I have the power of the admin. (So yes, a good chunk of this has been built in creative.) However, despite the fact I have basically cheated my way to making a nice little factory to teach you all, it is fully functional. There is no creative power, infinite resource barrels or infinite liquids.

This means, that when the video series is finished, and I actually start playing a survival mode game, the factory will be still able to function and run without any additional cheating required.

Enjoy the tour and check back for when the videos are posted. In the meantime, check out my previous videos in the links below.

Bee Base Intro
Genetic Machines
Making an Alveary

Lumbermill, wood worker, tileworker etc. Additional machines for processing bi-products and making polish. 

Genetics Area.

View of outside. The closest alveary is my "base bee" larvae spawner. (See previous videos for what I mean by "base bee".)

Genetically modified walnut trees, sporadically being bonemealed by autonomous activators.

Frame production and fertiliser production.

Seed oil tank. Impregnated sticks and casing production.

Underneath the walnut tree farm. Squeezers ready to make seed oil. Sag mill to smash up wheat to make seeds for even more seed oil. 

Mushroom farm, pollinated by Fungal Queen's. MFR fertiliser can be switched on for a quick boost of mushrooms. (Mushrooms are needed to make yeast for alcohol production.)

Power room. Good ol' fast engines converting EU to RF. 

Biomass and ethanol production.

Alcohol production area. WIP.

Forestry Trees

I've been messing around with forestry trees the last few days, and got frustrated that I couldn't find anyone else sharing what they're doing.

Here's what I'm currently growing. Walnut, Kapok and Red Spruce.

The walnut are the large shorter trees, have 2x2 stump. They dropped when I was growing silver lime-apple oak hybrids, and cherry trees.

The kapok trees are the really tall ones. I was growing all sorts when they dropped, so no idea who their parents are.

Dark green ones are the red spruces. Standard.

Industrial bees are doing the pollinating. They've been inoculated to be fast workers, with an elongated life. They're also nocturnal and strong fliers. (Tolerate the rain.) They have also been acclimatized to tolerate +/- 3 both conditions.

We'll see where this blog goes. I might pretty it up if I actually stick at it. :)