Bees in a Box

So I dumped 3lbs of bees in a box to free their queen and . . . now what?

Now, it's time to wait.  It was really difficult not to look inside the hive, but very important that I gave them time to settle into their new home.  After a few days passed, however, it was time to take a peek!

On Friday, I fired up my smoker for the first time, zipped on my jacket and veil, and was ready to see how my little gals were doing.  I very lightly smoked the entrance and took off the lid.  The first thing to do was pull up the queen box and see if she was released.  A quick look showed that she was out and about.  A good sign!  One by one, I removed top bars to check for comb being built.  It did not take long to find some!

The yellow on the new comb is pollen the bees collected.

I quickly realized I did not need to worry about smoking the bees.  Smoke has long been known to "calm" bees.  Basically, a little smoke does two things:  some of the bees will prepare to abandon the hive by drinking honey, as though there is a forest fire;  the smoke will make it difficult to smell any alarm pheromones being sent out by guard bees.  Since my colony is so new, they are pretty much focused on building up their resources and not defending the hive.

The queen is somewhere under the other bees in this photo.

I quickly checked two of the combs.  It did not take long to find the queen laying eggs.  There was even honey and pollen in some of the cells.  All signs show the colony is off to a good start.

Finishing Touches

Before I painted the hive, I measured out some handy legs to attach.  For some odd reason, I didn't take any photos of the legs as I worked on them.  They are pretty simple and cut so that they support the hive by the bottom while attaching to the front and back with 2.5" galvanized bolts.

It has legs!  I made them short so I can put the hive on cinder blocks and keep all the wood off the ground.

The top bars in the hive.

 Here you can see the top bars on top of the hive here without the lid.  I do not have the woodworking expertise to make these beautiful triangle top bars that are a single piece of wood.  There are a lot of ways to make top bars, but ones like this can support a lot of honeycomb and give a large surface for the bees to build on.  My uncle Tommy, an excellent woodworker, made them out of a walnut tree from where I grew up.

Top bar

1/2" hardware cloth on the entrance holes and 1/8" on the floor

Once the legs were attached, the only thing left to do was put some hardware cloth on the bottom and on the entrance and vent holes.  The hardware cloth on the bottom is small so the bees cannot get through and is to allow ventilation.  On the entrance holes, it is 1/2" so the bees can go in and out, but mice cannot raid the hive or nest in it.












Finally, I was able to move the hive up to its final resting place!