Would you do this cutout?

I woudl not do a cut for a customer I thought was lying got me. I would also stop a cut out if in the process I found out they where lying to me. This is due to my experiences with home renovation and remodeling. there is a certain customer you do not want to be involved with when it comes to working on their home. And these behaviors are clearly indicators of that sort of customer. More commonly it is the customer that generally looks at you with suspicion. But the same sort of situation can and does manifest itself in other ways. Lying is one of them. I have no problem if someone made a mistake. certainly not one as common as spraying insects. But I require that others pay for their mistakes. I do have a problem with them lying to me and causing me financial harm. I charge more to remove sprayed bees. lying to me and getting me to do it for less is equal to stealing from me. I make it clear that I charge more to remove poisoned bees before I even start. if during the cut out I find the bees have been poisoned that increased charge applies and I then require being paid in advance. The cut out will not continue until I have been paid in full. They have now established that they cannot be trusted. so they will no longer have my trust. They can now work with having to trust me.

challenger said:

If someone wants to work for free or for the "value" that they see in the bees then so be it. It won't make sense long term and a job done for free isn't going to be done as well as one that is paid to do. JMOHO

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The Value that a colony holds is variable for mine beekeeper to the next. for example so far this year on average any colony I had last fall has been worth over $250 so far this spring. I also take on about $130 in costs to get it. That estimate includes $75 for the basic hive equipment another 30 to 35 dollars for a second box and the cost of feeding and managing until the following spring. I make my choices for far more sound reasons than whether I want something or not. Do I want that profit? sure. Can I afford to get another colony? I can get colonies for far less cost than a cut out. So if what I need is another colony I will make it in the most cost effective manner possible. A cut out is a situation that a customer has a problem with their home. and that is how I treat it. I am capable of fixing their problem. I am not doing it to get bees. if I do get a colony in the process so be it. But I am their to solve their problem.

As for how well a job is done. that would be determined by work ethic and not the money involved. those that do work well will do it well. those that do not, will not. I never forget I am not just working for this one customer. I am working for every person they ever tell about my work. Maybe that is why I have not advertised my services for over 10 years and still have people that hunt me down to do work for them. I finished a kitchen remodel. In the process all of my customers neighbors not to mention the friends that dropped by to see the work learned all about how I do bees as well. "Oh I know of so and so that had bees in their tree last year". And they will remember me the next time they know of someone with bees somewhere.

When you live actually doing something it shows. and people remember.

Update -

I cancelled the cutout and didn't feel the least bit guilty about it. After much consideration, I was trapped. There was no amount of discussion that would convince me that they had not sprayed the bees. It was the discussion that we already had that lead me to my decision, and there was no changing that.

Some folks mentioned changing out comb, etc., but the bottom line is that the pesticide is already in there and the bees are walking across it and will spread it to any box you add. I know that stuff doesn't last forever, but it's a mental thing (probably from utilizing sterile technique in the medical field), and I just don't want bees that bad to overlook it. Given the abysmal success rates for cutouts, I'd rather make splits for free or buy packages or nucs than sweat my tail off for sick bees.

And yes, I would stop in the middle of a cutout and bail. I have an ad that says don't call me if you've sprayed the bees. The agreement we have is that I will remove a clean colony of bees for free. If they've been sprayed, I'm not at all interested. If you post an ad for a free refrigerator that runs and I get there and it's broken, then sorry, I don't want it. You lied and it's your problem.

If you're paying me for a service, that's a different story. If I'm doing you a favor, then beggars can't be choosers.

Even getting paid, I think there are some ethical issues. Some of us use foundationless to avoid acaracide contamination. Along the same lines, the culling of some comb every year is a pretty common practice regardless of your beekeeping style. The rationale is that contaminants can theoretically accumulate in the hive from bees inadvertent contact with pesticides. Given those theories and practices, and the premiums the public puts on the all natural, unadulterated products we sell, I can't in good conscience sell bees, comb, or honey from bees raised in comb that may have been saturated with pesticide.

In theory, I'd be willing to do a removal on a hive that had been sprayed, but I would charge an arm and a leg and toss the bees and the comb. In that scenario, you might as well call the exterminator.

I had a condo HOA president call me about a cut out. He said that he sprayed them three times before someone told him that this wouldn't kill the hive. Perhaps spraying enough would indeed kill the hive but what gets left behind for a subsequent and more serious mess should be a big concern. I explained this to him over the phone and he continued to mention that there were a lot of bees "that were worth a lot of $ to a beekeeper". I told him I charge for doing a removal and that I don't factor potential value of what I remove into the estimate because that really isn't what the job is about. It is about removing a hive inside a structure in a safe and proper way and returning the area back to the condition it was found. There is another guy in town that does removals and he is a shyster. I get paid a lot of money to remove hives and the last job he bid on was six times what I charged and he subs everything other than the actual removal of the bees out. He wouldn't know what end of a hammer to catch if you threw one at him. I do the whole job as I imagine most do. Anyway I went to look at this condo job. It would take maybe 3 hours with travel and I told him $400.00. Six foot ladder, remove a piece of plywood ceiling in a screened in porch, remove the bees etc etc. Replace everything, a little calk and done.
Last week we did one at the top of a gable 35' up in the air. We rented a man lift for $400.00. Spent a full day taking out a huge hive from inside the boxing/trim of the gable. Got soaked with sweat and honey and we were a complete mess and tired as we could be but we cleared almost $600.00 for two of us which was a fair price. When I got done you couldn't tell we were ever there. The guy that did the exterior trim on the house was a fool. He left a full 1" gap at the peak where the two pieces of soffit meet and filled it with calk. I find that poor workmanship is one of the leading cause for bees finding a way into a house.

I never thought a discussion of cut outs could get so rough. When we were learning we did several removals for free to get experience. We loved the rush so we started doing more but charging for it . Our average charge is around $200 for a couple of hours work. If we are there a little longer $250. If the job is high or looks like it will be longer than 2-21/2 hours we charge more yet. The bees that we collect we sell after they have settled in and we have a good laying pattern. Here in Florida we don't have the wintering problems that the northern states do so usually any nuc that has three or more frames built out will do fine. We rarely save more than a single frame of brood more than that and the amount of damaged brood and dripping honey becomes a problem for the bees that they have to take care of .Our survival rate on cut outs keeps improving as we learn and experience more. For example we learned that putting wadded up paper towel in the bee vac improved survival rates tremendously. My theory is that it provides cushioning when the bees enter the vac and it absorbs moisture from the mass of bees . We learned that when we put the bees in a hive we need to keep the hive entrance closed for 24 hours so the bees have time to repair the comb and clean up any spilled honey so that we don't have robbing.
Also some of you cited the cost of equipment. Bee vacs, trucks and bee suits would be considered capital investments with a life span so you can't realistically expect to cover that expense with one job. We figure our time is worth about $25.00/hour and we want to make profit to cover our other expenses so we figure about $50.00 per hour per person.So a 2 hour job with two people equals $200.00. My wife like to do the vacuuming and cutting out the comb, I like cutting holes in things, putting the comb in frames and talking to all the observers. We do one or two jobs a weekend and I will sometimes do a couple after work during the week.We have fun doing it, we make money and we get to play with bees. I can not think of anything more satisfying.

I would certainly agree that poor workmanship is a major cause of bees getting into structures. Here in Florida traditional plywood soffits have been replaced with perforated aluminum sheeting that slide in on tracks. It is easy to put up (and take down) but it does not provide a secure seal to keep bees out. I would rate that as number one, poor workman ship as number two and poor maintenance (allowing rotten wood to remain) as number three. We went to quote one job in a very expensive neighborhood (1/2 million dollar and up) where they had built a garage with a flat roof and then put walls above the roof about three feet all around to make it look Spanish. The first time it rained the garage roof began to sag. It turns out they did not put any drains off the roof. So the contractor sent out a couple of his goons and they cut several drains in this fancy wall and put red clay pipe thru the holes for drains. Turns out they did not seal the pipes in the holes and bees got in to this wall. Now the guys lawyers and the contractor are fighting over this construction and probably will be for years. No one wants to pay us for the job so the bees are still filling up the wall.

Poor workmanship or poor quality of materials. Do you realize that even teh plywood you refer to is a compromised quality of material due to the lack of genuine quality materials.

A soffit is also an indication of low quality craftsmanship low quality materials or both. In genuine quality construction you want the work to show. think of a log cabin where the logs are left to show. or cathedrals where you see the beams supporting the roof etc. Soffits and other such changes in construction are there to hide unsightly low quality material.

I own a home that was built in the 40's the beams in the ceiling are exposed and the wood used to make the ceiling is left showing. There are no soffits on my house. The same lumber that makes my ceiling just runs over the outside walls and continues to the edge of the roof. Over my front porch it cantilevers nearly 8 feet out form the house. with no support posts or beams. In short this house is built like a tank and the craftsmanship matched it.

It requires both material quality and skill to build sound structures. New ideas are developed to reduce both. Cheaper materials that are faster to install. You are eating away at the measuring rod from both ends.