This is the day I’ve been waiting for. Actually getting bees and putting them in the hive. I picked up two 5 frame nucs from Stone Hill Honey Farm in Spotsville, KY this morning. Of course, while I’m taking pictures I get stung on the pinky while we’re transferring the frames into my boxes. I’m starting to think they are honing in on the black camera. I’ve gotten stung on the right (camera) hand twice now when shooting pictures in two different bee yards. My stings don’t bother me for about 12 hours. Then I get some swelling then in about another 12 house the sting site starts itching.
Unfortunately the Carniolan queens I wanted weren't ready yet so I have Italian for now. I’m planing on replacing the queens when his stock of new Carniolan queens are ready in a couple of months. We’ll see, I might change my mind.
I shot some video of the install. I’ve edited it down, but it is still 10 minutes long and a little boring.
Everything went smoothly. The hive on camera right is a lot ‘hotter’ than the one on the left. It also has more bees. I’m going to wait around 3 to 4 days and then move over two frames and put a top bar in between to start drawing out their own comb. I’ll see how long this takes and then add in more to that schedule and eventually start removing the frames. I need to get these frames out as they are causing some trouble with bees finding ways into the roof area above the bars. Putting the extra bars on top of the frames to block them didn’t work to well as the height of the whole mess interfered with the lid. So I cut some thin strips of wood and swapped them out.
Here is a little more video of inside of the hive through the window and some of the front of the hives. They started bringing in pollen a before nightfall which you can see in the video.
I also had a chance to talk with some of the neighbors (finally) and they seem fine with them. One mowed the alley only a few hours after I put the bees in and didn’t have any trouble. That was a relief.
Like the title said, I HAVE BEES! More to come.
