A few months back Travis built a top bar bee hive in the hopes that we would one day get honeybees. We were thinking spring 2013 but a few weeks ago an acquaintance messaged me to say she had caught a swarm and wanted to know if we wanted them. We hashed it over and decided to go for it and drove out to her place the next day to pick them up.
The bees were in a Nuc Box so it was really easy to bring them home. We gave them some time in the basement to settle down before transferring them and later that evening Trav got to work.
The only "equipment" Travis used was a mosquito hat he picked up at Canadian Tire last minute. I admit I pulled out my big lens and sort of hid behind our van while he transferred them. Surprisingly Trav didn't get a single sting and it wasn't until he was getting the last few bees out of the box that he grabbed a pair of gloves as they seemed to be getting a bit agitated.
Replacing the top bars. Each of those bars has a string across mounted with beeswax to give the bees something to start the comb on.
The entrance to the hive.
After a few weeks of having the bees I'm totally smitten. I thought this would be one of Trav's projects but I've done nothing but read beekeeping books and watch them work busily lately. I'm guessing we won't be harvesting any honey until next year sometime, but right now I'm content to just enjoy watching them.
