Hi, tomorrow i am putting my bees in the hive for the first time! And i was wondering if anyone had any tips and tricks. Any advice would be much appreciated. Also what time in the morning do you think is best to put my bees in the hive? Thank you so much!
Laura
I’m a beginner myself, so don’t trust anything I say ;-), But I wouldn’t worry about it too much. How are you getting your bees? As a package?
There are a few videos of people installing hives from a package on the internet. I’d just watch a few and pick up how they are doing it and maybe catch some tricks while doing so. Perhaps make a small checklist and get a helper so you don’t forget a step.
Most important thing is probably to not release the queen directly, but have the workers chew through the sugar plug over a few days. But make sure they can access the cage to feed her majesty.
I was able to collect mine from a local beekeeper in the evenings, so it was a completely different method. In that case the time is important because most of the bees were back home by then. We just moved over the frames from his box to mine, waited a short time to give bees that were still flying around time to settle down and closed everything up. I then drove my box to the new location and directly opened the front back up. Last year the colony was a little smaller, so I used the entrance reducer to make it easier to defend themselves. This year’s colony was a lot stronger, so I just opened the full entrance.
One thing I learned over the last year is, that while you still learn a lot about how they behave, bees will always surprise you and so something different. 
Here is a great video: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DMZknUirqbQk&ved=2ahUKEwj8qff3pOaFAxWDD0QIHXnJAJwQtwJ6BAgJEAI&usg=AOvVaw336Zyb1AqmeWKWpU5IcnV8
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How did it work out for you?
It when very well! It was so much fun! Thank you so much for your advice.
Laura
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