They didn’t get grumpy until we were taking the second comb out. They were surprisingly patient as we got started. And by the end, we were too busy to pay attention to their temper tantrums. We even let the smoker go out and forgot all about it. Never saw a queen, but Randy has at least 3 queen cells in the frames.

I only got stung 2.5 times. The half was through my jeans and I didn’t feel it as much as the 2 through my gloves.

This is what it looked like before we started on it

And there were a LOT of bees using that opening.

This is the “undamaged” wall.

Chris trying to see where the bottom is while Randy watches.

Randy starting up the smoker

And taking a Before picture

Starting to get in it.

 

We think this is all of it

 

Randy starting to cut

out the first board.

And take it off

 

Removing the first comb

 

He has ingenious frames that hold the feral comb.

 

 

 

The bees cleaned all the honey he got on his camera off for him before we left.

 

And there was a LOT of honey.  Besides this for Randy, some went to the woman who wanted the colony removed, some went to the helper (ME!!!) and some went to the neighbor who showed up with a pot to carry it in.

This is the hole after we took out as much comb and bees as we could.

Randy took 2 boxes of comb with brood, pollen, honey and at least 3 queen cells back to his bee yard.  Plus a couple of packages of bees in the vacuum box.

Feral comb honey for my mother.

Plus our high tech honey extraction system.

And here is Randy’s take on the whole thing  🙂  There is a link to his blog in our sidebar. Randy and Meg’s Garden Paradise.