Sunday, May 17, 2015

Our first Honey beecut out.


They were behind two sheets of plywood in an old unused horse stall with a John Deere backhoe in the way.
As cutouts go, I guess this was pretty easy. I'm not sure if I would want to do a hard one. It took a little over 5 hours total. 
Started late around 3pm, but it all worked out well.  Only a couple of bees flying when we left just before dark. We got most all of them.
Found the queen behind a comb in the upper section!! I left the upper piece of plywood on until the lower part was cleaned up.
You notice how few bees were on me. They were very tame.   I only smoked them a little at the start & vacuumed the guard bees first.

They are very small bees and there are a lot of them!
We got ten frames of brood banded, but they had very little honey put up but the blackberries will be blooming very soon. I'll give them something to get by on until then.

As usual, click on one for a larger slide show




Lots of drone brood












4 comments:

  1. OH ya. Any cut out where I am not standing on a ladder 20 feet up in the air and not worried about damage to a homeowners house is an easy cut out. That is a pretty nice sized hive too. Did ya rubber band the comb into open frames?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I filled & banded ten frames. Can't beat ground level. Got a call yesterday for a swarm in a chicken coop wall, but it's a 1 !1/2 hour drive.
      The lady who wanted me to get the bees out of her chimney can get someone else. A 2 story building B&B and all the fireplaces are sealed off.

      Delete
  2. That looked like a really big hive! How long do you estimate they have been in the wall?

    ReplyDelete