a ball of bee keeping emotions

Hi everyone.  Boy have I been on a roller coaster of emotions since Wednesday (holy cow, that was only the day before yesterday).

Wednesday, I got my bees.

Well, let me go back one day.  I was at work Tuesday, and got a call from the post office at 6:05 that the bees were there!  But, the post office closed at 6:30, and I had to work until 10pm.  I tried to arrange for someone else to pick them up, but it didn't work, so...I resigned myself to the fact that I had to wait until Wednesday morning to pick them up.  I was okay with that, but I must admit that I didn't sleep well Tuesday night.

I woke up Wednesday early and excited.  I got ready, and my dad and I headed to the post office to pick up my ladies.  I was told I had to come get them, because the carrier wouldn't deliver them...which I totally get, because I wouldn't want to deliver them either if I didn't know about them.  So dad and I waited in line, and I finally got up to the counter.  I told the man that I was there to pick up a crate of bees.  Obviously, I didn't have to give my name, because no one else in my little town was getting a package of bees in the mail that day...so we waited...and waited...and then they told me that the carrier DID take them.

GRRRRRRRRRRR.  So we got back in the car and drove home.  Luckily we caught the mail lady near our house and she drove there and dropped them off...YAY, I FINALLY HAD MY BEES!!!!!


I brought them in the basement, sprayed them with sugar water and let them sit for an hour or so.  Here is a picture of my lovely ladies.  It's not the best quality, but it's the only one I have so far.

In the middle of that wad of bees in a can of sugar water and a queen cage.  The bees on the bottom didn't make it, but that happens.

So finally the rain and wind stopped, and it was the perfect time to put the bees in their new home.

Everything went really smoothly.  The queen (Brittany) was alive and moving and she had several attendants in her cage with her.  I installed her and poured the bees in around her.  It was magical.  It was so great listening to the humming inside the hive.

However, my elation quickly turned to fretting and worry, as yesterday the weather was awful.  I don't think it got above 35 degrees, and it was windy and rainy ALL day.  The wind was so strong it blew the antenna off our roof (it was still up there from when you had to have one for TV).  I worried about my girls all day.  I went out to the hive to talk to them a couple times.  I felt so bad that they had to be in the cold.

I had my mom help me put a solid piece of plywood under the base, because it was screened and I was afraid it was too cold.

Today my dad and I rigged up a feeder to try to feed the girls closer to the cluster and the queen.  I'm really hoping that they will be okay.  I think about them all day, every day.  I am a nervous bee mama.

If any of you have had experience with this, I'd really love to hear about it, good or bad outcomes...

Tomorrow is supposed to be cold and rainy, and Sunday is supposed to rain, but be in the fifties, so I'm hoping to go in then to make sure the queen was let out of her cage.  Other than that, I'm leaving it up to God and mother nature.  I know they know best, but I just really want my girls to be okay.

Until next time...

Jamie...newbee nervous mama.