Alrighty, time to pay my dues and fully document my day for future daredevils. And also ask some more questions along the way. Make a cup of tea and sit down.
Our kind local beekeeper (thank you Lucy) was happy to donate five frames to the cause, one with brood. She was also due to go on holiday at noon, so I had the frames and the brood but no box, no timber, and no real idea of how it was all going to come together.
The nuc box arrived nice and early, so I got a chance to wrap my head around the design. One hole on one side, one hole on the other. Easy.
We went and collected the frames. Lucy said given that we didn't know how long it was going to take to become operational, she would leave the nurse bees in situ. This sounded cool. Real bees in my new box - sold!
We dropped the frames and the new bees in a loaned box at the house and did a quick turnaround to B&Q. To save a few quid, we built the frame on the garden table. A few pieces of internal CLS timber, some free bits of ply from the offcut bin and the frame was sorted - £13 all in.
Then we went and stared at the plumbing aisle for an hour. How do you create an international space station like seal between a very uneven piece of grade listed stone and a pipe without pissing off the bees? The best I could come up with was a toilet plunger. I used a stanley knife to cut the handle out and then used a standard washing machine pipe, screwing it into the plunger, with the piece that you'd usually use to grip the 40mm pipe on one side and electrical tape on the other (to create a bulge). I then sealed the whole thing with basic sealant.
To attach it to the wall I used
galvanised band. I poked two holes through the rubber and used washers, and machine nuts and bolts with a gob full of sealant.
On the nuc box end, I used an arts and crafts glue gun, sealant, and screw to sit the one-way valve on the inside of the entrance (this was a real pain in the a** - especially as it came off when everything was connected to I had to do a live fix with bees all over the place).
The washing machine pipe is tiered by design going from thin to thick. It wasn't thin enough to pass straight through but this was actually good. I used a Stanley knife to slice about halfway through the nuc and create a hole just smaller than the pipe. I then wedged it in so it both stopped halfway through and created a near-perfect seal.
I transferred the frames from my donor's box to mine. When I first opened it, I shat myself a bit by the bees that flew out, but after a few seconds, realised they really were as peaceful as I hoped them to be. I used a cheap head protector and a couple of layers of clothes but by the end of the day, I was picking bees up off the floor and putting them near the box without protection - even the wall bees were pretty placid through the whole ordeal.
At this point it felt like everything was ready. I soaked the hole with a smoker from Amazon and an egg box. Drilled two holes into the mortar. Quickly hammered in wall plugs and screwed in the rubber flange without damaging the stones. I didn't start the installatio with the box. Just the plunger, the attached waste pipe and a rag shoved down it to avoid a swarm in the face. I then quickly worked my way around the edge of a plunger with sealant. Not ideal, but given how uneven the surface was, I felt it was my only option. I'd already seen how they reacted to it (see original posts)... not daft enough to step in it and no fear of it and seemingly no toxicity.
Once I had a tight seal, I placed the box on top of the frame and pushed the waste pipe into position. I quickly sealed every possible other hole using sealant, too. I opened it up to the outside world, and the job was done.
(Actually, it wasn't because the valve fell off, and I had to pull three frames out to rescue it. Make sure it's 100% if you ever attempt this before you introduce bees.)
And that, is that. We wait and watch.
My big end-of-day questions are: Is there any risk of having too many nurse bees present in the new nuc box? I've done a bit of reading, and it seems it will generally be okay (and their warmth probably made this long day all possible), but I still am a bit concerned, given how small my feral hive is.
Should I still be thinking about introducing a queen? If so, when?
Is there a chance my pipe is too long and they will look at it, think 'no ta' and push further into the house? Will the ones that do make the voyage communicate that there is a plush green and pleasant land just beyond the tube?
Will the cap on the inside of the plunger present a challenge for the to get over? Will the 90 degree bend in the pipe be too much (I can potentially reposition so it's a straight stretch.
Is there anything I could have done differently? And is there anything I've done wrong that it's not too late to undo?
Is there anything at all I need to do over the next few weeks other than observe?
Hope this post helps others in the future.
If so, perhaps I just picked up a random bee?
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