Honeybee Nuc

Description

Dear Beekeepers, you can email us at [email protected]. Keep in mind we spend more time in the bee yard than at the computer and I will reply as quickly as possible. If you want more than 5 honey bee nucs there’s a discount you can email me about. Discount not available here. 

We generally add inventory to the website to pre-order nucs at the beginning of the year. You can email if you’d like us to pencil in an order for you, [email protected]. 

Nuc is short for nucleus, the heart of a honey bee hive.  5 frame nucs come in a super convenient EZ Jester box (or similar). Each nuc includes about 3 frames of brood in different stages of larvae, 2 frames of honey/pollen to feed the newly hatched bees, a new queen with a proven good laying pattern, and a bunch of bees. Pickup in May, weather depending, Claremore, Oklahoma. No shipping. $50 nonrefundable cancellation fee.

We will offer a pickup in Crockett Texas as well. Please make a note if you want to pickup in Crockett for us when ordering. 

Please READ THIS BEFORE ORDERING … When you order a nuc of honey bees from us we are working to build these nucs for you. This requires splitting our own bees, queen rearing, having jester boxes prepared etc. So if you change your mind about honey bees and want a refund before pickup there is going to be a $50 fee we retain for our labor. If you change your mind at the last minute, on or after April 15th of this year we will only give a refund providing there’s someone else who will buy it. Generally we have a waiting list and that’s not a problem, but it’s not a guarantee. 
You must take the honey bee nuc home carefully so it won’t shift and jar while traveling and stress or even kill the bees. There needs to be some airflow while they travel. So for example, if you leave them in the trunk of your car overnight you might kill them. The entrance must be opened before the next morning so foragers can fly away to forage or they could get overheated in the nuc and die. These nucs are full.  When you move the frames out from the nuc box into your own hive body each frame must be moved carefully straight up so that the frame doesn’t roll into the side of the neighboring frames and roll bees. A person could roll their queen and kill her. Do not go looking for the queen while transferring the frames to your hive body and further stress the bees. They may swarm. Once you take the hive, we cannot be responsible for these kinds of beekeeper errors. 
We do our best to keep the hive beetles out of the hives but these guys are a real pest these days. Your hive won’t be overrun with hive beetles but there’s a chance there will be a handful. 
Honey bees are excellent at keeping a clean hive. In the natural cycle of honey bee life, there are some who have worked and worked and worked and their life is over. The bees carry these out but there are still often a handful of dead bees at the bottom of the nuc box. There shouldn’t be a ton, but there are usually a few. Please understand this is normal. 
We have our hives inspected by the state bee inspector each year for mites, etc. We keep on top of mites especially with oxylic acid (a natural treatment). Your honey bee hives should be clean of mites or extremely low. Still, do learn how to treat and keep an eye on them especially during brood seasons. 
No honey bees will be shipped. All nucs must be picked up in person. We’ll be in touch with you as to pickup as the time draws near. This is generally first week of May but it can vary up to two weeks sooner or later. All pickups are in the evening around dusk. We want to be sure the honey bees who are out foraging have time to make it back home. If someone were to take a hive during daytime they could leave behind a third of their honey bees. Typically, we’ll gather just before dusk, discuss how the jester box works, how to move frames to your hive body, answer beekeeping questions and then when the bees are all home, it’s safe to load them up and you to transport them to their new home. WEAR YOUR BEESUIT. There tend to be a ton of honey bees flying. They’ve just been moved and they are a bit cranky about the same as I am after an early flight traveling.  
We won’t load a nuc into a minivan with children, or any vehicle right next to children. A pickup truck is best with something to wedge beside the jester box so it stays put. These nucs do seal very nice and tight and we can add a strip of duct tape to seal the top, but there are little concave areas around the hive entrance where a bee may not have gone inside the hive and it’s hard to see up into those tiny corners. Bees can even be on the bottom of the box. We will do our best to get the bees into their jester box before closing the entrance but it’s not a guarantee each and every one are inside the box. If you don’t have a pickup truck, yes the nuc can ride in the trunk or in the floorboard of the car. There’s a chance you’ll have a bee flying in your car. Turn on the air conditioner full blast, keep a tiny opening in the window and any stray honey bee will generally sit still. 
If you’re allergic to honey bees please don’t come to the bee yard and please don’t travel with them in your auto!  
Now if you still want to be a beekeeper, it’s rewarding and the honey bees are awesome! Eating your own honey is awesome! We don’t presently offer any classes but will answer questions as best as possible at pickup. 

You can get bulk discount per nuc when purchasing 6 or more. Please email. Discount not available online. 

(The paypal option here is not functioning, pp has changed their system to no longer be used for pre-orders that won’t ship immediately and they don’t seem to work for pick up items either).