Packaged bees vs Nuc for newby

[TXbeekeeper]

Hello. I'm in North Texas and new to the forum. I used to keep several hives of bees back in the 70s in the Houston area, but gave it up for several reasons. Back then, you could get almost all of your beekeeping supplies from Sears. A lot has changed since then and especially the health issues a colony faces these days. But, I guess that is a topic for another conversation. I'm re-introducing myself strictly as a small time hobbiest. I used to pickup swarms as a means of increasing my hive count. However, with the current mite problem, I was planning on purchasing my bees for two hives. Can anyone offer suggestions on the preferred method of establishing a new colony; a 5 frame Nuk or packaged bees? I have no experience with either. My initial thought would be the Nuk because you are starting with an established queen, workers, brood, and possibly some amount of honey stores, but I just wasn't certain. Also, does a Nuk contain a similar number of bees as does a 3# package? I will be purchasing Italians with the intent of introducing a VSH strain of queen; Russian maybe, in the not to distant future. Any input would be appreciated.

[justgojumpit]

Nucs will build up faster than packages because they already have brood of all stages. It will take three weeks for a package just to get to this stage.

justgojumpit

[justgojumpit]

Nucs will build up faster than packages because they already have brood of all stages. It will take three weeks for a package just to get to this stage.

justgojumpit

[tecumseh]

with nucs you have an established queen with enough brood so that fairly quickly the hive will quickly establish something that is approaching a normal distribution in regards to age demographics. with a package you are kind of starting out from zero with some possible problems to overcome... for example acceptance of a new queen and (most typically) foundation that must be pulled before the queen can begin laying. if you get good young worker bees in the 3# package... these will be steadly dying off until the newest brood begins hatching, but the unit should (with a bit of feed added) overcome the hurdle. if you get older bees in the shake there is a good possibilities that the unit will not survive the bioliogical time lag.

installing a package on new foundation and nurturing this into a full fledged hive is however something I think every new beekeeper should experience at least once. I sell nucs, but I still can recall the joy of establishing my first packages (a long long time ago and most definitely in a galaxy far away).

at the front side I would guess (don't absolutely know) there are more workers in a 3# package (about 10,000 bees more or less) than in a 'typical' 5 frame nuc.

hope that helps.

[TXbeekeeper]

Thanks justgojumpit and tecumseh very helpful info. Any thoughts on the Russian strain?

[tecumseh]

you would buy a commie bee? ha!

I don't (have not) used russian. they are reported to overwinter in very small cluster. some say they build up fairly quick (whether quick enough for your location is another question). some say they are a bit more defensive than your average bee (the average being unmeasurable here). superscedure or replacement or swarming (when it occurs) I would suspect equates to the bees in the box being somewhat more defensive than the earlier half sisters.

I would suspect the russians would make an excellent bee anywhere along the northern edge of the country (+ say canada) where small winter cluster size has benefits. this benefit likely would need to have a long continuous honey flow to make you a honey crop.

[TXbeekeeper]

Thanks tecumseh. You've given me some stuff to think about. I saw another post of a person who said he was going to keep an open mind about his Russians. I think I'll think about it. I was particularly interested in them because they are VSH variety, Maybe I shouldn't be so concerned about that trait.

[tecumseh]

TXbeekeeper writes:
I was particularly interested in them because they are VSH variety

tecumseh:
you might wish to look at the glenn apairy web site (they produce ai or ii queens for queen producers). At least the last time I looked the vsh trait could be place in any number of 'kinds' of bees and not just the russians. The vsh trait it appears (from what I see and hear) was something that sounded good on paper but didn't work out so well in the real world. I suspect (don't absolutely know) genetically reproducing the benefit of vsh may have been difficult and the downside (early high maintance requirement) was likely unstated. The latter being especially difficult for anyone with numbers of hives.

[TXbeekeeper]

Thank you tecumseh. a lot of good advice. i'll take a look at the website. i really appreciate all of your advice.

[swamprat]

nuc vs package the choice is yours.but living in texas you should not try catching swarms in your area with the chance of AHB.

[TXbeekeeper]

Thanks for the info and particularly the swarm advice. I guess I didn't stop to consider AHB.

[BeeAware]

If you buy Russians, get them from a member of the Russian Breeders Association. I have some and like them. They are not aggressive but they do keep queen cells going most of the time. The Russian x Italians that some sell are not so good.

[tecumseh]

swamprat writes:
nuc vs package the choice is yours.but living in texas you should not try catching swarms in your area with the chance of AHB.

tecumseh:
I don't spend much time chasing swarms any more. but when I did I would 1)send a small sample in a plastic bag to the state bee lab to determine origin (africanized or european) and 2) I would buy queens from established queen breeder and immediately replace the queen in the swarm.

anyone who does catch swarms or does cut outs here need to very quickly discover the state bee lab. a sample is: you kill about 100 bees in a plastic baggie or jar with denatural alcohol... you county extension office should be able to assist you in sending this to the state lab. testing is free. typically it takes from 7 to 10 days to get some results.

[Hambone]

anyone who does catch swarms or does cut outs here need to very quickly discover the state bee lab. a sample is: you kill about 100 bees in a plastic baggie or jar with denatural alcohol... you county extension office should be able to assist you in sending this to the state lab. testing is free. typically it takes from 7 to 10 days to get some results.

Here is the links to the Texas lab. I am going to be a swarm chaser this year, and have a few of these forms printed out ready to go.

http://honeybee.tamu.edu/bee_id/thb_id_lab.html

http://honeybee.tamu.edu/bee_id/pdf/bee_id_howto.pdf

[TXbeekeeper]

I'm sure there is a very specific reason to have them identified at TAMU. But just so I understand, I know that a swarm is typically much more docile than a normal hive, but wouldn't you know right away if they were AHB when you tried to hive them? I'm missing something.... Maybe there is AHB in back generations that could affect the behavior down the road?

[tecumseh]

Certain indicator of where swarms choose to nest MAY give you the first clue. Swarms that set down in water meter boxes (or anywhere near the ground) should always be suspect. Visually looking at the bees... I cannot distinquish one from the other. Naturally drawn comb cell size is another big clue.