Newbees 4 May 2011
4 May 2011 – my 6 frame nucleus of bees is ready to collect from Maisemore Apiaries. How exciting! I had already built two hives during autumn of 2010 and begun to collect various bits of equipment. Not a cheap business, setting up hives. It also involved much carpentry and banging in of very small nails into small pieces of wood. Sore fingers. The most important thing I did do, before we got the bees, was to join Herefordshire Beekeepers Association and attend their beginners course over 4 weeks in March-April. It was intense but really provided a kick start to any bee knowledge. I then joined the Malvern and Upton Branch of Worcestershire Beekeepers Association, as I live on the border between the two counties, and attended their hands on beginners sessions with the hives in Hanley Castle.
So, on 4 May I borrowed my dad and we set off to Maisemore, collected our box of bees and drove home with the patter of thousands of little feet in a box on the back seat. When we got home to dismantled the waiting Hive A and then took out the frames from the nucleus, finding the lady queen, and installed them into the empty brood box, adding 4 more frames to make up the full 10. Then we shook the lingering bees out of the nucleus box and left it on the ground, giving the stragglers a ramp to climb up into the hive.
To get the girls going because they had work to do, using a super as an eke, we added a plastic feeder with a batch of sugar syrup (1kg sugar to 1 pint of water) and then left them to settle in.
May 10th, 2011
Topic: Bees, Hive A original Tags: None
