I'm having fun now...

[wd8das]

After some weeks of fruitless swarm-baiting, a beekeeper here in town sold me a small colony of bees.  I let them settle into their new location for a couple days and then transferred their frames intact into a new Langstroth hive this evening.  Given the concerns about their strength for the winter I decided not to stress them by cutting the comb to fit into my top-bar hive.

The bees seemed OK with the whole business - no stings, no attitude.  A couple bees got under my coveralls but they just buzzed a moment on my skin and I let them back out.  Tonight I'm sewing up that hole.  -grin-

I added some photos of the new hive and the bees feeding after their house makeover.

Steve

[AliciaH]

Congratulations!  Is this your first hive?  Where are you located?  How many frames do the bees take up?

[wd8das]

The hive bodies are two shallow supers with 10 frames each.  The bees have filled all but one of the 20 frames with comb, and are working on about 16 of the frames.  They seem to lack food stores so I'm feeding them sugar-water with a couple drops of lemongrass oil.  I noticed that some wasps have discovered the feed bowls, but so far I'm not seeing any wasps trying to get into the hive.  If they start that nonsense then I suppose I should restrict the entrance to support the bee defenses.   

As a new member I cannot post the link to my photos but if you search Flickr for "whaengineering bee hives" that should turn up the pictures.

Steve

[wd8das]

Yes, this is my first hive, and I'm located in south-central Wisconsin.

Steve

[AliciaH]

Nice pictures, Steve!  I see the feed bowl there, pretty centrally located.  I can see how wasps could be attracted to that, too.  This is your first and only hive, right?  The other thing I would keep an eye on is bickering at the bowl.  Being out like that, someone else's bees may find it.  If not and you like your system, great!  If it does happen, you might need to change to a feeder of some sort.

Happy Beekeeping!
Alicia

[CountryBee]

Great job!

[AllenF]

I really don't believe I have ever seen frames put together with drywall screws before.  You should never have to worry about tearing the top off one.   And I like that TBH.  You get a gold star on that one.  I like the legs on it. 

[AllenF]

Oh ya, what's your location?   2 shallow boxes may not be enough food for where you live to get the bees through the winter.  But it is so late in the season, you may have to feed all winter.