From: ddhess@bellsouth.net
Date: Mon, 09 Apr 2001 20:35:30 -0000
To: BiologicalBeekeeping@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Package installation results

Well, that was an adventure. Got my top-bars dipped yesterday and
was ready to install that evening. I continued to spray with sugar
water during the day while working on the bars and noticed what I
assume were wax scales beginning to pile up just outside the screen.
When everything was ready I piled everything into our 2 cars (those
top bar hives I made are _big_) and headed out to a farm one of my
attendings has (has one field that will be devoted to some sort of
blooming plant and will have scattered sunflower patches too).

It still took me a while once I got there to set everything up. I'd
read several places about how gentle bees are esp when in swarming
mode, and other places about how gloves can make you more likely to
be stung by making you less gentle with the bees, so I decided to
give it a try with minimal bee gear - just the veil. About half-way
through installing the first package, fighting to get the blasted
cork out of the queen cage with bees crawling all over my hands and
ankles (and having seen beginnings of comb in the package cage thus
invalidating the 'no-hive-to-defend' premise), I was beginning to
wonder if that was such a good idea. It was a bit unsettling at
first but once I realized the tight grip they had on me was for
nasanov-ing rather than preparing for a potential sting, I was able
to ignore them better (didn't make the corks come out any better
though). First package went into the Langstroth hive, second went
into my TBH with the window, the weak one went into the plain TBH.
In the first TBH, the supporting tin came off of the queen cage so it
went for a swim in the sticky viscous mass of bees - even after
dumping them in the hive I couldn't find it and tried swishing them
around with my fingers and them my leatherman when that creeped me
out. I had intended to set the cages completely the TBH's, but after
covering the floor with the initial dumping, I didn't want to risk
squishing them so just propped the cage at the front door. By the
time I got to the weaker package, I had my system pretty well down
and left the cage propped inside the hive. The top bar hives got
feeder baggies and the Lang got an entry feeder and makeshift
entrance reducer.

Probably the funniest part of all this was my daughter, 3 yrs old.
Some of her quotes: "Lots of bees get out... BUNCHES of bees get
out." "Bees my friend, I pet them" "Look, I a BEE!!" - as she
bounces up and down 3 feet away from a package covered with leaking
bees. She thinks bees are a complete blast... she sat next to the
packages while I was doing all of my setting up playing with the
bees. We told her not to pet the bees (repeatedly) with only brief
results for the most part, and she would occasionally grab a bee and
put in on one of the flowers she was holding and giggle as the bees
crawled on her and got in her hair. Wonder what she'll think of them
if/when she manages to get stung.

Final score of the day: Don - 3 packages; Bees - 1 sting (I had
walked away from the hives to grab something and I think it just got
caught by my shorts since the sting was at my shorts line). Planning
on going back this evening to see if they need their feeding re-
boosted.

Having fun so far. :)

-Don