The Spring Install ReCap

I ordered my NUC (nucleus colony) and beehive in February. I picked up my beehive from the Rodale Institute in mid April, brought it home and painted the outside for weather protection, and with some help got the legs secured in the ground and the whole thing attached and level (having a level hive is very important for a top-bar hive so that the comb gets drawn out straight).

Picking up my NUC colony was an absolutely amazing experience. The feeling resembled that of bringing home a newborn baby. In the back of my VW were somewhere near 20,000 bees that I would be caring for. I felt super responsible for their wellbeing and thought about them constantly and dreamed about them at night. It was exhilerating but terrifying at the same time.

Installing the NUC into my hive was a real trip. I had only experienced handling one frame of bees one time beforehand at an installation demo. Now I had nearly 12 frames of somewhat-aggitated-from-travel bees to move. The install took lots of pauses for calm on my part. Three quarters of the way into the install, when I picked up a large bar of brood comb, half of it fell off. That nearly did me in. Bees everywhere, brood everywhere and substantial anxiety that the queen was on that comb and might have been squished. I think it took me nearly two hours to figure out what I was going to do. I did the best I could, and in the end the experience made me have to get real comfortable with the bees real fast . I am glad for that now, because it is so tempting to just get the bees in the hive and let that be that.