[Oldbee]

The second paragraph was a bit confusing [to me]. Of course, you know now that any box that you want to remove for honey must not have any brood or capped brood in it [or very few cells at most] before putting any bee escape under it. You can check this by looking underneath when the box is tilted up at an angle [if not too crowded with bees], but looking at most of the frames individually is better.

"I hate the way I crunch bees when I put boxes on, and drop frames, and bang things, and drip honey everywhere."

You have to smoke the bees away from the top edges of the boxes; a few puffs should do it and it works for 5-10-15 seconds. Not much you can do about the bees underneath the box. I find brushing only irritates them and doesn't work fast enough or last long. As far as banging and dropping , just try and relax more, work smoothly, and those things should become less frequent over time.

"What are they doing?"

I don't know. At times, probably asking the beekeeper the same thing.

"All that said, I love my bees and I'm enjoying this adventure!"

Well, that's good .

 

[beekeeper1756]

I completely agree with you...I cringe everytime I hear that crunching sound and the box has a "soft" feel to it rather than the harder wood on wood feel when you set the box down.

I found the turning the box sideways a little bit and then simply sliding the box to realign with the box underneath that I crush far fewer bees. It takes patience but it works better.

I agree with the idea of smoking the bees away from the edges as well. Brushing doesn't work so well.

I have personally found that you can move bees around by breathing on them and blowing air on them. I will tell you that they hate carbon dioxide and while it will move them, it will also simultaneously set them off and they will fly into your veil instantly. It's a defense mechanism. I'd stick with smoke and off-setting the boxes and then realigning. You can get them to move by blowing on them but at a high cost.