African American Beekeeper

Old Location: I decided to move this hive to a more sunny location in hopes to keep the small hive beetles to a minimum this year.

I did my research and learned that when moving the hive:

1) Wait until dusk or night time to ensure all bees have returned to the hive.

2) Move hive to desired location.  I used screened wire to cover the front entrance. Once I got it in place, I removed it.

3) Once at new location, make sure to obstruct the hive’s entrance using a few twigs and mulch so that the bees will have to reorient themselves to the new hive location.

Here I have placed an entire branch across the front of the hive telling the bees that something has changed.

On the next day, I noticed that a few dozen bees were still going to the old location.  I decided to place a honey super and frames as a safe haven for the bees. It was getting late and it looked like it was going to rain. However, the following morning to my surprise only 5 bees remained in the make shift hive.

Placed in old location for those bees that didn't get the memo!

Finally! I removed the branch and all bees had been reoriented to the new location. But I didn’t stop there. Since it’s early in the season and I had already interrupted the bees, I went ahead and  painted my hive and jazzed everything up a bit.