Norfolk Honey - Honey Bees for sale
A nuc of bees
I offer nucs for sale in April, May and June and July
BEFORE YOU BUY - READ FERA's GUIDANCE
TO THE SALE OF HONEY BEE NUCLEI
I offer five frame nucs in April and four frame
nucs in May, June and July
What is a nuc?
You can buy bees as complete brood box - see
second hand hives -
or part of a brood box that we call a nuc. A nuc is essentially the heart of
the colony. It's comprised of several frames of brood and the all
important queen.
In early spring a nuc
should also contain some frames of stores.
A five frame nuc should have three frames of brood and two of storers.
The price of a nuc varies depending on who you buy it from.
I think it' is fair to say that if you join a bee keeping association and buy
your nuc from another member of the association it's likely to be priced
at the lower end of the price scale. However, you may be put on a list and
you may need to wait for some time before your name gets to the top of the
list.
Nucs are generally transported in a nuc box (or traveling box) that will
take four, five, or six standard brood frames. Then when you get back
to your apiary
you
take
the frames with bees on
out of your nuc box and put them into your brood box. We offer a choice of travelling boxes - click here for traveling boxes
I also supply nucs already in
a brood box -- please see -- http://www.norfolkhoney.co.uk/equipment/complete_kit.php
Nucs with a previous year's queen
Buying a nuc of bees in the early
spring gives you an advantage in that you know that the bees have been strong
enough
to
survive
a winter
and
you
are
therefore very likely to get a good crop of honey from your new bees before
the season is done.
If you buy a strong nuc of bees in April and feed it up
you may be able to 'split' (please
explain 'split') your
hive into two in May and take honey from both hives by the end of the season and have
two colonies to take through the winter.
Once April arrives please email
me for current prices of nucs. Or email me now to be added to my list. To be certain of getting a nuc you can send a deposit of £50 to added to the top of the list. Traditionally nucs are sold with new queens in June and July. Possibly because colonies started with nucs headed
by a new queen are less likely to swarm in their first year.
However, some beekeepers feel that buying a strong nuc at the beginning
of the season (April) gives the bees more time to settle down and establish themselves
in their new location. Once settled (and weather willing!) they could well make a good crop of honey for you by the
end of July. Buyers just need to be aware that as the queens sold in April are the previous year's queens
that they
may need to read up on swarm control.
Of course you could also sign up for my online
queen breeding course I and will take you through splitting your hive and breeding a new queen(s). I start my course with an in depth telephone conversation with you (in order that I can understand exactly your circumstances) I will then tailor make a queen breeding course just for you. My course explains several different methods of swarm control and different methods of queen breeding. The aim of the initial telephone conversation is to find a method of increasing your colonies that is right for your circumstances. Then I continue to advise you throughout the season with telephone calls and email exchanges. Together we can cover not only queen breeding but all general beekeeping practice through the main spring and early summer period.
You can take my queen breeding course without buying bees if you already have established colonies. If you don't yet have bees but want to breed the maximum number of queens from one hive in your first year you can make an early start in March by buying a complete colony in a second hand hive and feeding it up untill the beginning of May by which time the colony will be ready to split and breed several queens from.