Starting a new hive

I am starting up two new hives. Once we open up the three pound package, place the queen cage in the hive between a couple frames, then you just dump the bee in.

Since the bees do not have a home to defend, they will not sting. So you do not need the bee suite. Last year one went up the pants leg looking for a home and stung me. Thus the bee suite.

It really is fun just dumping the bees in.

Pallet of bees. The new packages of bees are raised in CA and shipped to a Beekeeping supply shop in WI. Each box has 3 pounds of bees, or about 6,000 and a queen.

We went up there to get 3 boxes and brought them home this weekend.

Bees at School

Today Aleena taught her 4th grade class about bees. She had shown a slide presentation explaining many of the finer aspects of bees. With her she displayed a frame with a queen cell and a full frame of capped honey. She also had the observation hive with 3 frames of bees.

Her class asked a lot of great questions. They enjoyed seeing all the bees and got a taste of fresh honey.

Spring Queen Cells

In the spring it is natural for hives to colinize. They do this by creating new queens, thus creating the queen cells.

I will need to go through my hives every 7 - 10 days are remove these to keep my hive strong for the season.