Worldwide Beekeeping
Beekeeping => Beekeeping 101 => Topic started by: Jen on March 13, 2015, 12:54:36 am
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I've had several suggestions on how to tame my hot hive. Pulling a nuc is at the top of the list. I read back a few pages on this forum, but the process of nuc making and managing is more in puzzle pieces. I believe I will be making a med nuc, in a med hive body. This is what I want to learn this spring ~ let's leave out splits on this thread please :)
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~ let's leave out splits on this thread please :)
How do you make a nuc without a split?
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reducing the population somewhat can have the tendency to make a hive more humble. If you have one queen excluder the easiest process is to follow the doolittle process of nuc making.... remove one or two nucs from the 'queenless' part of the box and when you do this have mated queen ready to install. if you are keeping these nucs at the same location then bee tight equipment is essential and installing the new queens into their box and keeping them totally shut in in a 'cool and dark place' are good practices to follow.
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Jen
follow my simple instructions on how to make a simple nuc. Its so easy anybody can do it. I think you are a little afraid making a mistake. Take out 3 frames of mix brood from your strong hive. One frame of honey and one frame of pollen. Put in a cadge mated queen. Start feeding megabee, and protect the nuc with a robbing screen. :)
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I guess I will have to agree with Ray4852 here. It is simple...
The short version;
If you have a couple of strong hives, pull 4 frames of mixed brood, pollen and honey along the top edge, as well as the adhering bees,add a drawn frame and put them in the nuc box. Move them to another yard, or partially block the entrance, wait 12 to 20 hours, install queen cell or queen cage. Come back in a week and check for eggs.
http://www.outyard.net/nucleus-hives.html
The LONG version can be found there as well.
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All the above works well, but I am a firm believer in moving the queen and putting the new queen in the original hive, ESPECIALLY when trying to calm an aggressive hive as Jen is trying to do.
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Yeah, nuc for me as well. But for me, I'm not going to purchase a new queen. I want them to make their own. I really like the genetics of this queen that I have. So I was going to do it yesterday, but didn't have a flashlight and the sun wasn't really out so I couldn't see any eggs, But there was young larvae everywhere. I never could find the queen so I closed it up and will try again another time. I think I want to keep the existing queen in the original hive and just move eggs, larvae and food to the nuc. I know that there will need to be drones in my area for her to mate. We will just have to see what happens.
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Robo- "How do you make a nuc without a split?
Ummm, I dunno... :D I thought a split was litterally 'split in half', like 5 frames removed from the original hive. But then I read about light nucs? That's why I want to learn nucs.. THEN, I'll learn splits. Are they the same thing?
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I'd still consider it a split
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Okay. In my case I want to calm this hot hive...Now! I'm not going to be able to buy a mated queen until probably the end of May. So, if I remove the queen and put her in the nuc, I'll have to let the original hive make their own queen, that will be a month or more in waiting. However, that process isn't going to take any longer than waiting for May and a new mated queen.
So, if I can't find a queen to buy right now, I'll have to let the original hive make a new queen.
It's still pretty early I'll just have to adjust to the fact that they won't be able to make as much honey.
So Pete, you consider a nuc and a split the same thing?
Question: I've heard the term 'light nuc', is there such a thing?
Scenario: I have moved 3 frames of brood, one frame of honey, and one frame of pollen to my waiting medium, which is on a bottom board, and has a lid. I wait at least 23 days to see if new queen is mated and laying.
Now, what do I do with this nuc?
1. I can sell it
2. I can keep adding frames as needed to make an new hive for myself
3. When the new queen in the original hive is up and running, I can combine
Thoughts?
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Scenario: I have moved 3 frames of brood, one frame of honey, and one frame of pollen, "AND THE QUEEN" to my waiting medium,"plus 5 empty frames" which is on a bottom board, and has a lid. I wait at least 23 days to see if new queen is mated and laying.
1. I can sell it YES
2. I can keep adding BOXES as needed to make an new hive for myself YES
3. When the new queen in the original hive is up and running, I can combine YES
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YES! Thank you Mr. Wizard kisshugpatpatpat, I love it when I get it right... OR when I just plain Get It! LOL
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Running nucs is a good time plus u have lots of brood most times. I run all deeps and stack them as high as 4 boxs.
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I run them all year long . Spring /summer /fall/and winter.
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Summer is a great time to play with nuc's .
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Nucs are great brood builders and make comb fast . And making splits . i set my splits right on top the mother hive
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Jen i know alittle about managing nucs if oyu have any questions do ask. One big thing they build fast and swarm in a blink of a eye.
I sold 12 nucs this spring so there's always some thing you can do with nucs. Plus lots of queens.
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Just showing off my nucs. I have 16 coming out of winter 31 hives total only lost 1.
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Wow! That is quite the production there Glock :)
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I am with Glock.. I have more fun with the nucs than I do the regular hives.. You need to keep inspections to a minimum on production hives, but the Nucs you NEED to be in to manage them, keep their population low enough to prevent swarming etc. Swap in new frames for them to draw etc..
I am looking forward to having more nucs this year than last.
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Scott, if you go all mediums, how do you assemble a med nuc? I remember the board that you put up against your nucs...?
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What is a nuc? If I have a 10 frame deep hive and put it in two 5 frame boxes, does that change it to a nuc?
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What is a nuc? If I have a 10 frame deep hive and put it in two 5 frame boxes, does that change it to a nuc?
I think that makes it a duplex? :P
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ooooh tbone... I was gazing out the window contemplating What Is A Nuc... when that came on. :goodone:
Idee, been contemplating... I think the answer is Yes! It would make it two nucs ~
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I had a lot of fun with Nucs last year. A Nuc is a nucleus colony, kind of like a seed that will grow into a full hive quite quickly. Nucs can be as small as one frame of brood and a couple of frames of mixed stores, or as big as 5 frames of brood and a couple of frames of stores. The standard Nuc offered for sale around here has 2 frames of solid brood, a frame of solid honey, and a frame of solid pollen (or any combination of mixed honey/brood/pollen frames that equals that). A premium priced Nuc should be overflowing with bees at the time of sale and ready to move into a 10 frame box.
Here are some important things that I learned:
1: Full size hives raise better queens than Nucs because they have more resources and better temperature regulation. So it's better to give the Nuc the queen and let the parent hive raise a new one.
2: Strong Nucs build up fast, weak Nucs take a month or more to get going. If you want a new hive, start strong. If you want to bank a queen, start light.
3: Nucs don't stay small long. Don't plan on leaving them in a Nuc box for more than 3 weeks or they will likely swarm.
4: Nucs are easy to inspect. They tend to be quite docile and I usually just mist them with a bit of water instead of smoking them.
5: Nucs are susceptible to robbing, reduce the entrance to about 1/2"x1/2"
6: NUcs do better with feeding. They are generally speaking light on foragers and heavy on nurse bees because most of the foragers wander off to their old hive.
7: If you make a Nuc from a very strong hive, two weeks later you will have a Nuc and a strong hive. If you make a Nuc from a weak hive, you will have a Nuc and a hive that struggles for the rest of the year.
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Well put together and understandable Pete ~ Thanks! :) I'm going to have to get into hot hive and see how they are doing. I'll be prepared to pull a nuc if I think it's a strong hive.
The hive on the far left is the hot hive. As of two weeks ago the first medium was where the capped brood was. And, they were just starting to go down into the deep. There was some brood, nectar, and pollen in the second med. The top med was just put on a few days ago.
I'm thinking to date, that hot hive has about 2 meds worth of brood if you could combine all the brood frames together. Would that be considered a strong hive? I don't think so. It would be different if it were like 2 deeps of brood.
I dunno, what do you think?
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It's always quite subjective what a strong hive is, that looks like one to me. The beauty of bees is that things are adjustable. Provided that you are good at spotting queens, you can take a frame of brood out and give it to a weaker hive. Or you can take three frames of brood and start a Nuc. Later if the Nuc is struggling you just give them an extra frame of brood. As long as you don't accidentally transfer a queen into another queen's hive it's all good. Many bee keepers equalise hives this time of year, but I think that's a technique aimed at getting the maximum number of pollination units. I rather like knowing which queens are doing the best.
a big challenge for smaller spring time Nucs is keeping warm enough during the cold nights. I wrap mine in styrofoam to help them out.
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I really like the thought of having some nucs around, but I came up with a scenario that I need some help on. Let's say that you have ten full sized hives. Five at your home and five at another outyard that is 10 miles away. For a part timer with a full time, "regular" job, it is difficult to get out to the other yard to check on these bees more than once a week. If you have nucs at that yard, it doesn't seem very practical to have to go out often to manage nuc hives at that yard. What if you keep all your nucs at home, go out to the yard 10 miles away and discover a hive that needs help or a new queen. Do you always take a nuc with you when you go? I know 10 miles isn't really that far, but I know some of you have yards 20 or 30 miles or more from your place.
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I keep my Nucs right on my back deck, so that I can monitor them closely. Not much with bees is an emergency (except maybe a swarm) You can always wait a week to fix something.
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I have an opportunity to put a hive 40 miles from where we live, my father in laws house. It's very intriquing because the bees would be in thick alpine surroundings, would be nice to see the difference in honey. It would be a good test for me because I wouldn't be able to check on it as much as my three in my backyard. I'm often reminded that I may mother my hives way too much. Actually, I'm much much better than I was early last spring, and I don't regret for one minute the attention I gave to my bees last year, I learned a ton of stuff, and they did just fine with my extra intrutions.
So think of your bees that are 10 miles away as an experiment of letting the bees be bees, maybe check on them once a month. I'll bet we would both be surprised as to how fine they will do.
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3 of my yards are over 10 miles from my house. I try to get to them every 3 weeks. Seems to work out ok.
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I like that idea Camaro :)
What is the purpose of moving the newly made nuc away from my three hives? robbing?
Should I feed a new nuc?
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When you make up a Nuc the bees in there will be nurse bees and forager bees. The nurse bees will stay with the brood and the forager bees will return to the parent hive because that's what they're oriented to. If you move the Nuc more than 2 miles away from the original, the forager bees will re-orient and return to the Nuc. The way to overcome this return drift, if you don't have an outyard, is to shake the bees from a couple of brood frames into the Nuc. There will be way too many bees for the first day, but they will thin out as the foragers leave.
Yes, you should feed a new Nuc. For the above mentioned reasons, they will have a lack of forager age bees for the first week or two.
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Iddee- "I have moved 3 frames of brood, one frame of honey, and one frame of pollen, "AND THE QUEEN" to my waiting medium,"plus 5 empty frames" which is on a bottom board, and has a lid. I wait at least 23 days to see if new queen is mated and laying.
Iddee, if I pull my 5 frames to make a nuc, AND add 5 empty frames... to me it's not a nuc anymore, it's a hive.
My thinking is that I pull a nuc, hold it for a month while the original hive is making a new queen, when new queen is laying, kill the old queen in the nuc, and recombine the bees back into the original hive...
If I put the nuc bees back into the original hive with the new queen, keeping the army of foragers together, won't that make a better chance of more honey for me?
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That will work fine if you have a 5 frame box. NEVER, NEVER, NEVER put bees and 5 frames in a 10 frame box.
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Yes I learned that the hard way with 5 in a 10 box, wonky comb all over the place.
If I have hubby throw together a med swarm box, and I put in 3 frames of brood, one honey, and one pollen... what's to prevent the queen from swarming? there is no where for her to do her thing for about 30 days.
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So pull one frame open brood, one frame capped brood, one frame honey, one frame pollen and one frame empty, OR build a 5 frame deep and put medium frames in it. They will draw drone comb under the frames, straight, and it can be cut off when combined, or they can be used as is in a deep. I have a few medium frames in deep boxes. They draw straight comb down, but do not attach it to bottom or sides. They work just fine.
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This is a Great thread! :nice: It's just what I had in mind for newbees.
I like this last bit of advice Iddee, what I see is the succession of eggs to larvae to capped brood... which will keep the bees busy for those 23ish days that I'm harbouring them. Then, the empty frame will help keep queen content as well.
BRILLIANT!!! :eusa_clap:
I don't have a nuc box of either size, hubs said he could throw one together for me, think I'll go a med :)
Just went over to DIY and got some 5 frames nuc plans from Robo, and also went to LzyBkpr's website. FYI
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You don't need anything as fancy as a Nuc box. Cut a piece of rigid foam insulation or a piece of plywood that fits snugly into a medium box. You now have a follower board that allows you to have from one to 9 frames in the box and you can use a standard bottom board and top cover. Also allows for gradual expansion of the Nuc. The bees might wander into the empty 1/2 of the box, but with the follower board in place they will not build comb over there.
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Hey ya know what? we built a couple of those last year, winged it. I really like this idea of the follower board. I do know that LzyBkpr has how to make them on his website.
Just talked to hubby, he says he has a plan in mind. And I wouldn't mind having a couple of follower board on hand any how. If I'm just going to hold the bees for 30 days only, seems so easy.
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Don't be scared of selling Nucs Jen. With 3 healthy hives, you should be able to pull 2 nice Nucs and hang on to them for 3 weeks till you know your new queens came back from mating flights. Then sell them for $150 each. It's a really easy way to make the hobby pay for itself even if it's a poor honey year. Last year I had 3 strong hives coming out of winter. I made 6 Nucs and still averaged about 80 pounds of honey from each hive. Mind you our major honey flows are July and August, so they had time to recover and bring in a harvest.
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Toying with this idea. I think I'm being over cautious. Took 4 years to get one decent hive let alone three. All's I want to do is Not take any bees out of the hives. I know I could get another nuc out of my mother hive, but I want that hive to be a honey producer.
By the way, can I leave this nuc from the hot hive in my yard of I keep a robbing screen on?
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Yes. I set a nuc a few feet away from the mother hive. The foragers go back to gather honey. The house bees stay with the brood and queen.
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Great! :) That can be managed easily managed in my yard.
Now, about selling a nuc... shouldn't a standard nuc be deep frames? my nuc is going to be med frames...
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Lots of people want medium nucs. They seem to get a premium for them up here.
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Camero, what does a medium nuc sell for in your neck of the woods?
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110 gen fair price.
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Seems like $150 is the average price for a nuc. Mediums are bringing an extra $10
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Last year here was 100 to 120. This year, from 130 to 150, but that's NC. Other areas vary, but I think all areas are higher this year.
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What does it mean to 'winter a nuc'? or many nucs
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Getting the nuc thing down. Would now like the Who What When Where and Why of Splits/Divides
My first question is Why? :)
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Have a nuc go through the winter in the nuc (five frame) configuration. A challenge for northern beeks, for sure.
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More bees!
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Because I have't ever managed a nuc before, what are the winter challenges of wintering a nuc?
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A nuc ,split or a divide is basically the same thing just a different name given. A nuc should be a specified size and strength for the purpose of selling and buying.
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Swarm prevention.
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From what I understand, the amount of resources are less so an extended winter could mean starvation. But, the cluster is smaller as well, so they would not need as much. It may be the same. I just thought taking a nuc through the winter was more of a challenge.
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Here in the north nucs need special handling to survive the winter. Check out Michael Palmer's videos on youtube - he is the guru. I modeled my program after him and I've been pretty successful.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFanJbaigM4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nznzpiWEI8A
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Hi tbone :) since this thread started I've learned that beeks have more fun with nucs cause they have to get into them and 'do something' that I don't know about yet. Thinking that a nuc may have to be insulated other than a standard hive because of what you said about the colony being smaller.
Do you need a strong hive to make a split?
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Depends on time of year, whether you want to get honey or increase hive numbers. Or take the monument to provide swarm control with out effecting the colonies honey production.
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Do you need a strong hive to make a split?
You can always take a frame of brood from a couple of hives, doesn't set them back so much. I make all my nucs with 2 frames of brood. I do prefer sealed brood, I get almost 100% queen acceptance with them.