The Nuc Seller & The New Beekeeper

Brian arrived to pick up his nucs, a wannabe beekeeper … he left a keeper of bees … he arrived home … with his own beekeeping stories to tell!  More on this later.

Selling Honey Bee Nuclei – Best Practice

Within 10 minutes of announcing I had two nucs for sale on this site, they were sold. This internet malarkey is really going to take off some day.

I quickly felt the responsibility of needing to be a responsible beekeeper. I was handing over the chalice to another, in this case a novice beekeeper who was so keen he was driving 80 miles and getting up at 6am to pick up my colonies.

So I had to prepare. I had to prepare properly. I created a checklist:

• I had already ensured the honeybee nucs contained laying queens
• They had a good brood pattern
• They had plenty of stores
• They were disease free
• There was low varroa
• I had hive records
• And I even added a page to the site giving advice to novice beekeepers to help ‘Brian’ in his first few weeks of handling the hives

I closed the nucs up the night before Brian arrived.

Job done right? I’d covered everything I need hadn’t I?

Well clearly not…

The Nuc-Selling Lesson

Whilst I had ensured my nucs were top notch, I had however forgot to think about the packaging. Yes when Brian and his young son (and trainee beekeeper) John came to pick up the nucs I realised that one of them had a nice tight-fitting entrance closer, the other entrance cover was not a tight fit. Not at all.

After trying pins and sticky tape our solution was to wrap cling film around the nuc including the entrance.  The nuc box had a mesh floor so oxygen could get in.  We checked our work and were satisfied, however, we clearly didn’t manage to totally seal the bees in as Brian and son discovered later.

As they left I remembered the car journeys at the beginning of my beekeeping journey with nucs and the hum of the bees providing excitement, thrill and joy. And then of course there was the nervousness….

Brian’s Story

“I left yours driving very carefully and taking your advice to head the shortest route to the motorway.

All was well, until we joined the motorway, when John counted five bees on the rear window. Deciding it was better to keep going, by the end of the motorway about 50 mins later, we had more than a hundred in the cabin with us. Mostly in the boot area but some on the back seat and door windows too.

I then had an idea – cool the car interior! So I used the A/C to chill the car. They duly stopped flying and sat quiet for the remaining 20 miles home.

Once home I suited up and took the polynucs to the hive frame, then returned to the car to try sweep at least a hundred bees from the rear of the car, with some success. Although I did get a couple of stings on the fingers – nothing too bad.

The sun is shining and they’re flying now. I’m at work with about 30 bees still in the car.”

I felt bad about the escaped bees and stings – but Brian is thrilled.  We have exchanged a few emails. His car is clear of bees and the bees are settling in!  I will source poly nucs with better entrance guards.

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• Nucs & Beekeeping Equipment For Sale