Looking to buy bees for the spring? Here's a simple breakdown of your options (nuc versus a package), what they mean and some extra tips on what to look for and what NOT to do.
Ways to Buy Honey Bees
There are three different ways you can get honey bees for your hive. You can buy a package of bees, a nuc, or an established colony in a full size beehive. First, let's examine what each of these mean.
Package of Honey Bees
A package of honey bees is a screened-in box that contains roughly 12,000 young, worker bees (about 3 pounds), one young, mated queen and a can of sugar syrup (so they don't starve during transport).
A Nucleus Hive
Also called a nuc, a nucleus hive is a small box of bees. It usually contains 3 frames of drawn out honeycomb full of brood and covered in young, adult worker bees. There will also be one, young, mated queen walking around inside and 2 frames of food. Sometimes people sell 3 frame nucs. I've never tried to get started with this size nuc and recommend purchasing a 5 frame one.
A Fully Established Beehive
Sometimes people are looking to sell their beehives. This is usually a hobby beekeeper that doesn't want to keep bees anymore. It can be tricky figuring out what the cost of one of these hives is because it comes with already assembled equipment and the queen may be older. Sometimes it's a great deal and sometimes it's not. Do your due diligence and talk with the beekeeper before buying bees from them to make sure the queen is young and the bees are healthy.
Watch my video all about buying Bees
Buying a Package of Bees
Pros of Buying a Package of Bees
The pros to buying a package of bees are:
- cheapest way to buy bees;
- easy to transport, especially in a car;
- can be shipped;
- can be transferred to a top bar or other style hive that does not have moveable frames;
- ready earlier (usually mid spring).
Cons to Buying a Package of Bees
The cons to buying a package of bees are:
- Usually from southern states and driven to northern states for distribution. This not only stresses out the bees, but they are not from your climate;
- have to release the queen from her cage;
- cannot leave bees in package for more than 1-2 days;
- bees take longer to grow in population and honeycomb.
Buying a Nuc
Pros to Buying a Nuc
The benefits to buying a nuc are:
- Easier to install to your beehive - queen is free to walk around and is laying;
- comes with honeycomb, honey and pollen;
- does not have to be transferred to your beehive equipment immediately;
- usually local bees that overwintered in your area.
Cons to Buying a Nuc
- The downside to buying a nuc is that they usually come on deep frames for a Langstroth style beehive. You cannot transfer them to a top bar hive, a hive with medium or shallow frames or any other style beehive that cannot fit moveable frames. However, sometimes people sell nucs just for medium boxes so check your local bee club.
- More expensive;
- not available until later in the spring;
- harder to transport in a car.
Confused about the parts of a beehive? Check out this article about how a hive works and is put together together.
Other Things to Consider
Usually, you will be asked if you want a marked queen. This means that your queen will have a paint dot on her back. The color of the dot changes each year and will help you keep track of how old your queen is and find her in the hive.
The other question apiaries will ask is if you want a queen with clipped wings. When a queen's wings are clipped they won't be able to fly. People often do this to prevent swarming. This doesn't always work to prevent swarming and is not necessary with a nuc or installing a package into a langstroth hive. However, for reasons unknown to me, bees are more likely to abscond (and take off completely) when you put them in an empty top bar or warre hive. This happened to me my first year as a beekeeper when I had a top bar hive and it's really awful when you wait all those months for your bees only for them to fly away a week later.
Photo: me looking at a top bar frame
Tip!
Instead of getting your queen's wings clipped, get a piece of beeswax or honeycomb from a beekeeper and put it into the hive so it smells like bees, or you can buy a piece of honeycomb (feel free to eat the honey from it first and give the bees the chewed up wax).
Shipping Bees
Warning! Do not have bees shipped to you if you can avoid it. If you cannot find a local apiary to buy from and it's your only option, try to find a place as close as possible and pick up the package from the post office. It is very common for bees to arrive dead when they are being delivered by your mail carrier. All it takes is for it to be a cold day for your bees to freeze to death. It is not the mail carrier's fault! They don't know how to handle live bees and should not be asked to do so.
Strains of Bees
There are different strains of honey bees and sometimes you will be asked what kind of bee you'd like – German, Italian, Caucasian, Carniolan, Buckfast, Russian. I prefer a locally bred colony that has successfully handled my local climate over a specially bred bee and they're usually cheaper too, but feel free to buy a specially bred queen if you like, there's nothing wrong with trying. Here's a link to the University of North Carolina's list of strains of bees and their traits. I usually request Russian bees because they tend to deal with varroa better and are good at overwintering. I also don't care as much if my bees are very gentle. It's up to you to decide what traits you prefer. After all, you have to also ENJOY beekeeping.
How Much Do Bees Cost
I've found that packages and nuc's don't vary in cost too much around the U.S. In Hawaii, a nuc was $200 and in PA it's $225. I could never find anyone selling packages of bees on the Big Island, but in PA I just purchased one for $140. 13 years ago, I purchased a package of bees in PA for $115.
Here's my live video about buying bees, assembling equipment, and check the comments for prices other people said they paid for bees.
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