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First Hive- A Gift for My Sister

So, I rang Warren and he sat me down. Calmly and wisely he counseled against upsetting bees under these extreme weather conditions. Lesson: A good beek will try to look at the world through bee's eyes. There was also a lesson here about me needing more patience , but that was more personal.
My Christmas deadline passed, I wouldn't be able to have a box of bees to give my sister within the week, possibly not even before New Year.
As a horrid and torrid New Year period of heatwaves amd drpught passed, stories came out about breaks losing commercial quantities of hives in National Parks. The losses experienced buy amateur beeks was less well known, and in areas not directly fire-effected, bees were under stress. Looking at the world through bee's eyes was very painful.
But as January came to a close and conditions began to ease Warren gave me the nod. Very cautiously her agreed to consider transferring his bees from a 5 frame nuc, and which "seemed to be going well", to my 8 frame box. I left my empty box as Warren's house and waited.
Some days later Warren told me that he'd transferred his bees to my box, they seemed ok, but needed another week or so to settle.
In the meantime, I was learning about Warren, and the beek life. Warren was a retired builder with the whole catastrophe: wife and family, grandkids and a house, he also played bowls ... but Thursdays were his "day for the bees" .Warren had "about 30 hives", he described having various other responsibilities and interests, but he religiously devoted a day a week to his bees. Lesson: Bees mist take priority in your life.

Warren was a swarm catcher, active in the Association Hunter Valley Beekeepers Association*), sold hives, made all his own be gear and tried to keep ahead ahead of Friggin Hive Beetle and Bloody Wax Moth. He reported that his wife often admonished him for "spending all [his] time with bees". I hope that if anyone reads this and wants to keep bees, that they take note.
* Around this time I got Registered as a Beekeeper and joined HVBA. Not cheap, but necessary and a great source of knowledge and information.
There's a catch cry among Beeks, that each beek you talk with will give you a different answer to other be errks, but there will be a kernel of truth in each one. So, the best way too learn is to listen to many, read broadly and try things out. As Fox Mulder says: "the truth is out there"; there is much about bees that we don't know.

Next: I get my first proper hive.

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