Wife and kids just got a starter hive from Dadant. A nuc of bees is scheduled for late April. Have to find a good place for the hive before the bees show up.
Managed to starve 3 hives this winter. Not enough attention last year. Lesson learned. 2 new packages installed on April 23. and colonies growing quickly. Added a second box to each yesterday. Strong brood and comb drawing on the frames. Hoping to build them up before the spring nectar flow. But we need some rain!!!
Caught a swarm last week. Pretty sure is from my only hive that is one year old. I have the swarm in a farm store hive. The farm store hive is poor quality and over twice the price as a hive from a bee supply store an hour away...but it was starting to rain and cool off for the next 4 days and the bees needed a home. Old hive has been inspected and 3 queen cells were left in it and one may have hatched. Should have a mates queen this week if everything goes well. I'm on the road for 3 more weeks so I'll either have a healthy hive or an empty hive.
Glad I found this thread. Our son works with a guy that has bees, he's also met another guy that has some too. Needless to say, he has jumped in with both feet...lol... He has built at least 3 hive traps and a couple big hives. He is building them horizontal style. I've helped him build frames. He uses the Commander scent, seems to work well. He caught 2 swarms at his house and moved them to hives. He brought 2 traps to our house, had a swarm move in 1 of them a few weeks ago. Yesterday morning about 9AM, I checked the box...several scouts were checking it out... We came in from a job, as I parked the truck and trailer, I saw an amazing sight...looked like a cloth was hanging on the box... Looks like a big swarm want to move in I checked on them after dark, seems like they all got moved in... He has started building a few with viewing windows...lot of bees in this box I'll get more pictures pf the other hives....
