Bees 1, Beekeeper 0

Spent today just waiting for the workday to end so that I could get home and install the bees. The late afternoon was calm and not too warm. The girls were clustered nicely in the cool of the garage and were given a bit of sugar water to fill their bellies and keep them satisfied during the transfer to their new home. Not one to worry about getting stung, I didn't think twice that my shirt wasn't all that loose. At least it was bee-friendly white. The fit of the shirt, however, would come back to haunt me...

Extracting the queen cage was simple enough. There were a number of attendants with her and the sugar plug was still going strong. I easily set her up attached to a frame. But removing the can of sugar water was a bit difficult as sat down in the box a bit. While slowly lifting it clear of the opening, I got my first taste of how quickly those little bees can wiggle through the smallest of spaces! But so far, so good. All was proceeding exactly as expected until what came next...

I have not read anything about this nor was it ever mentioned in the Short Course what happens when you gently tap the box in order to get the bees down in the bottom and ready to dump into the hive. The sound of the collective buzz put me on alert that this seems like one angry box of bees and I'm supposed to open it up and then dump them loose? Well, okay...

The second I removed the covering I found myself standing in a swirl of pissed off bees. That didn't bother me so much until I realized that my shirt was not as loose as I had hoped and I got stung on the arm. Now, a bee sting really does not hurt all that much. Frankly, I'm troubled more from the discomfort of a tick bite than I am the bee sting, and I'm suffering from both at the moment.

While I paused that millisecond, wondering how many more stings I was about to get through my shirt, my husband took off shouting something about the black hat he was wearing. I was so focused on getting the bees installed that I didn't give a thought as to what he may be wearing - he was only the photographer, after all.

I really wasn't as disturbed by the swirling mass of angry bees as I was interested in how many more bees were still in the box and how easy it was to dump them onto the queen cage and into the hive. I installed the rest of the frames, filled the top feeder, put the lid on and placed the entrance reducer in the opening. Bees installed: Done!