Since the new equipment has arrived I've quickly made up one new nucleus. I'm meeting the beekeeper I borrowed the spare nuc from on Thursday and I'd like to be able to return his nuc to him.
This is all untreated wood so it's suitable for moving the bees into straight away - I don't use any glue either, just nails (though the instructions say to use PVA glue), simply because it would make any necessary repairs over the years almost impossible if the wood is glued as well as nailed.
This is the nuc to be replaced - it is actually larger than my own models, holding 7 frames instead of 5. This works out well because I can select the two frames with the oldest sealed brood on for removal - hopefully this should eradicate any trace of varroa which could be here.
The nuc needs to be raised up higher too as the weeds are starting to grow up fast now. I'm not using very strong boxes as this will be a very temporary site and won't have to support much weight.
With the existing nuc moved to one side (stood on top of the new lid, upturned), the new nuc is placed on the original site - but is now a few inches higher up, of course.
I transferred the frames over, keeping the same order, and checking for frames of sealed brood.
With the new nuc now full of frames there were still quite a number of bees still in the original nuc. They didn't shake out very easily and the queen could have been amongst them so I just upturned the whole box and stood it on top of the new nuc. It was just starting to rain, but with the roof placed on top, the colony is well-sheltered now.
With this upturned box placed over the crownboard, all the bees in it will quickly move down into the brood nest. As the old nuc is larger, there is quite a gap along one side.
I didn't want to leave a gap there for long as it could encourage robbing by other bees so I stuffed it with a few handfuls of weeds.
With the entrance fully-open, many bees sat there fanning a beacon pheromone out - they often do this after any disturbance, as it helps any lost bees find their way home again. You can see some bees automatically flying back to the spot where the original entrance was, a few inches below the nuc, but they quickly found the new entrance.
The rain started to pour down at this point - it's fine to leave the nuc like this for a while now, I just need to remove those last parts before long so that I have time to clean them up ready to return them on Thursday.
