Giant Wooden Bee Skep

[Gene Weitzel]

Here are some photos of a cutout I did on Sunday from a 1/2 wooden wine barrel:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb226/geneweitzel/Bees%20in%20wooden%20barrel/IMG_0024.jpg?t=1208792412

Brood nest started on the second comb in:
http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb226/geneweitzel/Bees%20in%20wooden%20barrel/IMG_0029.jpg?t=1208792766

Brood nest continued across to the next to the last comb:
http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb226/geneweitzel/Bees%20in%20wooden%20barrel/IMG_0111.jpg?t=1208792839

The last comb attached to the side was nectar and pollen (here completely covered in bees):
http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb226/geneweitzel/Bees%20in%20wooden%20barrel/IMG_0113.jpg?t=1208792887

Here is a link to the entire photo bucket album if you are interested in seeing more of the process:

http://s210.photobucket.com/albums/bb226/geneweitzel/Bees%20in%20wooden%20barrel/?action=view&current=IMG_0024.jpg

By the time we finished, I had shaken enough bees to populate 10 mini nucs with about 2 cups of bees each, started 2 five frame nucs with about 3 lbs of bees each and 3-1/2 frames of brood each and still left 10 nearly full deep frames of brood in a single deep with their old queen and enough bees to completely cover all ten frames. All this was before the foragers returned, so the single deep hive I left in place of the barrel was nearly overflowing with bees by sundown and will probably be ready to add a second deep in about a week, if not sooner.

[peggjam]

Nice..Never had one around here like that(wine barrel).:)

[Gene Weitzel]

Nice..Never had one around here like that(wine barrel).:)

I picked this one up last August and just strapped it to a piece of plywood and brought it back to the hive yard and set it on the stand. I figured I would cut it out this spring. When I peeked under the barrel before I set it on the plywood, they had a nest about the size of a large watermelon starting in the upper left edge of the barrel. If you look closely at the first shot, you can see a scorch mark on the front where the guy's gardener had tried to burn them out. All it got him was about 20 stings! I was pretty surprised at how much they had built up since last August. Most the comb we removed was very new and soft so it was probably a combination of stuff drawn during the fall flow last year and this spring. The fire ants had infested the rotted wood on top where the comb was attached, I got to cutting them out just in time. If they had loaded their comb up with much more honey, the whole top would have collapsed.

[peggjam]

Did you take any cell measurements? It almost looks like sc:).

[Gene Weitzel]

Did you take any cell measurements? It almost looks like sc:).

I did not take any precise measurements other than to compare it to some sc I had on hand, but it was a pretty typical natural broodnest. Lots of sc in the center, drone on the edges and other various sizes in between. The only sting they gave us was from one that had crawled up my son's pantleg. You can see a small portion of my other son in the first shot with no protection whatsoever. He hung around and took most the photos without ever suiting up. At the very last, when the bees were pretty fed up with all the intrusion they chased him off and he went in the house.