I am collecting my first ever Nuc this evening and forecast weather for tomorrow is thunderstorms.
I will place the Nuc in the location where the hive will be permanently and wondered at what point should I open the Nuc entrance… this evening in the dark when I arrive home or first thing tomorrow morning.? Also if the weather isn’t on my side, can they stay in the Nuc with entrance open for a day or two? It is a wooden Nuc. Thanks
Hi Marnie, and welcome to the forum. I would open the entrance straight away, as soon as you put the nuc into position. Bees love almost nothing better than to be able to circulate fresh air throughout their hive, via the entrance. It will also give them a chance to remove any dead or injured bees, which they do with a degree of urgency. Plus as @Dawn_SD will suggest, they love going to the bathroom (not for a bath).
Yes they can stay in the nuc for a day or more with the entrance open. They will orientate to the entrance, which will help if you place the new entrance roughly in the same position.
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Oh @JeffH, you are so funny! I would usually say that they need to go to the loo, but for an international forum, it is very hard to know how to describe it…
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Hi Dawn, for some reason I seem to recall you saying the bees need to go to the bathroom. I probably got that mixed up in my head. Maybe you said a toilet break or something like that.
I’m glad that Marnie’s bees are in a wooden nuc. I’m not a fan of coreflute nuc boxes.
I haven’t got my truck back yet. It’s really only a ute, an '83 FJ45 Land Cruiser tray back ute. I’m not overly worried because I developed water on a knee. It’s better than what it was yesterday. It didn’t stop me from planting some sweet corn, as well as sweet potatoes today. I thought I was going to hospital today, on account of how hot it felt last night.
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