Moving Bees - What Not to Do

As you may have read in my earlier post it is very hard to take your bees with you when you move.  If I had known how difficult it really was I wouldn't have done what I have just done.

I needed to relocate or give away all of my bees. Having seven hives I manages to give away two and I then proceeded to rent a U-Haul trailer to move the five I planned to keep.  I looked up the requirements to move bees like I was planning and I needed a certificate of health from the state I was leaving filed with the state I was moving to.  For a modest fee I was able to get a bee inspector out to my hives and before long all of my paperwork was in order.  To prepare for the move I harvested Honey from the hives in mid-Summer to try and get the weight down but the bees just filled them back up with honey from the plentiful flowers in the neighborhood.

I knew from talking to others and doing some internet research that bees generate a lot of heat when being moved.  The professionals throw nets over hives and move them in open containers like flat bed semi trailers.  I only had about three hours on the road so I decided to risk using a closed container.  I decided to risk further disaster by closing up the hives to prevent them from flying inside of the trailer!  Knowing the bees were about to get quite hot I stopped by my local Wal-mart and filled a shopping cart full of ice, about 250 lbs of it.  I got some strange looks as I checked out but it was nothing compared to the looks I got when I suited up in my full body beekeeping suit, opened the back of the U-Haul trailer, and started throwing bags of ice into it!

When I arrived at my destination I opened the back to see what the status was and was greeted with a cloud of angry bees.  For better or worse the hives hadn't stayed sealed and there were many angry bees waiting to express their feelings.  I warned the nearby homeowners that there would be some angry bees in the air shortly and proceeded to suit up and get to work.

I had five hives to move and not the best set up to do it.  I had an appliance dolly for moving the hives, the heaviest of which was about 350 lbs!  I also had some planks of wood to work as a ramp which worked, but just barely.  I nearly lost a hive over the side as the wood shifted at the wrong time.

A neighbor got stung early in the ordeal and a few houses down some children were enjoying tormenting their mother by sneaking out into the yard and pretending to be attacked by bees.  I did my best to ignore this and get the bees off of the trailer as quickly as possible.  I was happy to find that only one hive showed any signs of overheating.  I was not happy that there was a police car circling the block as I was working.  The homeowner from the property I was putting the bees on walked over to talk with the officer and not long after I finished unloading the trailer.  I still had to move the hives to their resting location and open the hives but I was eager to move the truck to put an end to the scene.  I closed the trailer, got in the truck, and started to drive off.  The police car followed me (of course) so I pulled myself over once we were out of sight of the bees.  The officer was smiling and in a good mood but said he wasn't sure keeping bees was allowed.  I had checked ordinances and I knew it was allowed but I thanked him for his assistance and we parted ways.

I returned to the bees and finished moving them, ending the journey mentally and physically exhausted.  In hindsight I should have gotten rid of the bees, moved the empty boxes, and started with new packages in the Spring.

The best thing I can say about the ordeal is that I'm glad I did it so I can recommend from experience that others do not do this.