Things are warming up earlier than usual and something like this normally would not happen for another month or so around here, but bees have been hauling pollen in quantity since the fourth week in Feb. Things are moving and barring a heavy freeze things are shaping up for a good first half flow.
Anyways, I did a log cut out. Went amazingly smooth and quick. Nabbed the queen and got them home. THe only thing that made this all possible was a property owner willing to not throw gas on 'em and a slow fall as the rotting oak tree sort of just pulled out of the ground after Hurricane Ike last year (we got hammered, even up here in South Western Ohio!). SO the colony survived the fall and simply started drawing comb and fixing the old comb.
A managed to place three deep frames worth of brood comb into catch frames I started making.
A little over a week later they have drawn out and repaired the brood frames and drawn out about half the two plastic pierco. They appear honey bound and I am going to give them space. The day after the cut-out it dropped down to 20F so I wanted to make sure they had a small chamber to heat and flourish. Now that its into the 70s again I gave them more room.
Here is a link to the site detailing the method I used and try ot break it down step by step. I am not the best teacher but I hope it serves as a solid piece of instruction to anyone wanting to do something similar. It was my first time doing a log. I've done 5 cut-outs total, 2 successful, so take that into consideration. I am fairly new to this.
Here is the link:
Tree Removal Blog EntrySome quick photos: