Local Nucs!

[T Beek]

I purchased 2 NUCs from Bee-Nuts (a frequent contributor in these pages) this year hiving them on May 13th.  They came in a cool homemade/well made SIX Deep Frame box that he also sells for just $20.00! (a pretty good deal if seeking DEEP Frame NUC boxes).

Since I only use mediums I built a 'dummy' box to place directly below the deep frames, thus preventing bees from building comb below.  It has worked out well and they have built up so quick that I may need to add another super soon, they're in three mediums now, having added the third about two weeks ago.

To put it simply, the queens (from Ray Olivarez) and local survivor bees have provided some of the nicest/tightest broodcomb ever witnessed in this beeyard or this beek.  These colonies are booming despite some less than desirable weather patterns and will likely provide me with many bees and even some honey this year.

I am more convinced then ever by this experience that LOCAL BEES RULE and believe fully that we all should be striving toward that goal of supporting local suppliers or starting such an endeavor ourselves, if for no other reason than to produce bees already acclimated to the region where they will spend their entire lives.

Despite great success purchasing (treatment free) packages from Texas for many years I'm switching to LOCAL NUCS (as long as they're available) from now on.

Bee-Nuts is definitely doing something right.  Cheers to his efforts.  His bees are amazing.

t

[BlueBee]

Glad to hear your bees are doing so well T.

I seem to recall Bee Nuts was experimenting with Sunkist queens from Russel's too.  How are they making out in WI?

[Joe D]

Good going there T. sounds like they are doing great.  So far I have 6 hives they were all raised with in 40 miles of my yard.  When they are local bees you can also see how the hives where you are purchasing from are,temperment, activite, disease and etc.  Good luck with your bees.



Joe

[T Beek]

Glad to hear your bees are doing so well T.

I seem to recall Bee Nuts was experimenting with Sunkist queens from Russel's too.  How are they making out in WI?

Not exactly sure since my queens came from Ray Olivarez.  Russel who?  Perhaps I'm confused    Wouldn't be the first time 

t