Comments for Moving a Beehive

Jane, 29 October 2021

I'm moving, and I want to bring my honey bees with me. It's good to know that it's best to move them at dusk when they're in the colony. I think it'll be best for me to hire a professional honey bee relocator to keep the bees safe. https://nelsonsbeeremoval.com/honey-bee-relocation

Kathryn, 5 May 2020

My neighbor has a bee hive in his backyard. He has had it for 3 years now anyway, I came home from work and noticed a small swarm of bees going in and out of a flower pot on my back porch.I have watched them for about 4 weeks. I moved them to a garden along my back fence about a two days after I found them. They are still going in and out of the flower pot at the bottom through the drain hole in the sides of the pot. We bought a beehive from Nubee . We set it up today. How do we get the bees to go into the hive? Thank you, Kathy

Haven, 22 April 2020

We have a bee hive in our garage that we would like to move to a man-made hive in our backyard. Is this possible?

Michael, 2 April 2020

I caught a swarm and originally had a hive box cover that allowed them to sneak through (I didn't have a proper cover right away). After a few days I received the cover in the mail that seals the top. Will the bees have trouble figuring out they can no longer exit through the top but instead have to go to the bottom of the hive? I'm not seeing much activity at the new entrance but not sure if that's because the small swarm is busy inside creating comb or if they're confused.

Brian, 29 January 2020

I have a hive of Italian honey bees in the floor of my work shop. I would like to move them to a hive close by. What would you suggest. It's January in Missouri and I would like to move them before spring

Graeme, 24 October 2019

Recently I inspected by hive, during this the bees started attacking, and have continued to do so days later whenever I come near. Why would this be?

Steve, 2 August 2019

This is an old wive's tale and is no longer considered to be accurate by bee keepers. You CAN move them 3 miles, but you can also move them any distance necessary, with success, by ensuring you trigger the reorientation response in your bees. This can be done by keeping the bees confined within the hive for 72 hours, but this causes unnecessary stress, especially during hotter months. The preferred method among modern bee keepers is to place brush or branches directly in front of the hive entrance so departing foragers will realize something has changed and will go through an orientation flight the first time they depart the hive in the new location.

Sharon, 21 March 2019

There is a hive of wild honey bees in a nook in the eaves of a 9 storey listed mill where I work. They don't bother anyone. My concern is the death rate of these insects that come out about now and later in the year only to get stuck on the ground unable to get airborne again due to the cold + damp and are blindly crushed in their tens if not hundreds by people or vehicles within the mill complex. It would be a major bureaucratic undertaking to try and move them a minimum of 3 miles away. Short of placing placards around the area asking people not to tread on them (open their eyes and look very carefully where they are going), have you any other ideas as to what if anything can be done to stop the carnage?

Preston, 7 July 2016

I keep my bees in the old fenced in garden area near my pond. However I have to go through 3 cattle fences to get to them (which is pain when you have to carry frames to the extractor). So I would like to move them a little closer to my house, however there's a 45' crossing for the cows between the garden and my fenced yard. I don't want to move and leave them in the middle of the cattle crossing for obvious reasons. How should I tackle this?

Mullymore, 7 October 2014

Today I moved a nuc from a rather exposed spot (to which I had moved them in August to stop them being overwhelmed by wasps) to my apiary at home about 2 miles as the crow flies. I sealed anjd strapped the nuc just as dawn was breaking and moved them to their new location. I left them sealed up for about three hours. Then (with the sun shinning brightly) I opened the entrance. Checkng them later around lunch time there were lots of bees out flying very extravagant reorientation flights. I retreated as one took an unwelcomed interest in me. Towards evening it was all settled. Late afternoon for curiosity I checked to original site to find no evidence whatssoever of bees returning to their recent home location.