Day One - Nucleus Hive in Place

Yesterday, Liam and I went over to Robin's - our friendly bee "supplier" and chose between two nuclei.

One was a swarm from Warminster, the other reared from a Queen Cell from one of Robin's own hives. I was really tempted to go for the latter option, Robin seems to rear incredibly placid bees, but he recommended the swarm as they had already drawn out all their comb and were laying better. We went with his recommendation and went home leaving him to close them up later that evening.

This morning Robin arrived with a nucleus hive, and the hive we are buying off him second hand. He has made most of it himself, including my particular favourite - a crown board with glass in so you can observe what is happening underneath...

The whole operation only took 5 minutes - I put the nucleus down on our makeshift hive stand (8 concrete slabs facing our neighbouring field) and Robin put on the nucleus roof and pulled out the fabric "stopper" from the nucleus hive entrance. Seconds later, bees tumbled out and started flying around.

Needless to say my camera is dead so I am charging it as I type but I hope to take some photos later on. All I need to do (apparently) is check on them from afar to see if they are flying back to the nucleus hive, bringing in pollen and generally seem OK (!?) Robin will then come back on Thursday to help Liam and I transfer them to the hive proper and maybe (hopefully) clip and mark the Queen.

I seem to have become a beekeeper!