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2012 Package Bee Status:
We are now Sold Out of Package Bees for the season. We still have Queens available.
Full payment is due with your order. We do not mail packages, they must be picked up at Warm Colors Apiary in South Deerfield, Massachusetts.
Warm Colors Apiary has provided package bees, nucs and queens to New England beekeepers since 2000. We pickup and transport the bees from Georgia to ensure they arrive in the best possible condition. The bees spend less time in cages, reducing stress, and this results in healthier bees with fewer losses.
Our scheduled dates are arranged with the producers months before picking up the packages. We purchase from several different apiaries and most seasons they have been able to stay on our pre-arranged schedule. A few factors including the rate of colony buildup, and having suitable weather conditions for mating queens can cause delays. When this happens we set a new date and make every effort to notify you of the change. Plan to call 413-665-4513 several days before your scheduled pickup, and listen to the phone message to confirm we are on schedule. Plan to be flexible and understand there is no advantage pressuring producers (or us) to supply bees & queens unless they are ready.
Planning for your bees:
Have your equipment assembled, painted and setup at the hive location.
Have sugar syrup and pollen patties ready to feed your bees. We sell five gallon buckets of sugar syrup and Bee Pro patties (Mann Lake).
Pickup at the Warm Colors South Deerfield apiary is between 9AM and 1PM or make arrangements (with Dan) for a time you can collect your bees.
Demonstrations on "How to Install Packages and properly Introduce Queens" will take place at 1PM on Saturdays. Also read "The Introduction & Care of Your Package Bees" printable from this website at no charge.
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Queens |
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Mated queens are available from other queen producers in April and May. Warm Colors Queens are best described as a mix of races that winter well and have resistance to mites and disease. We also select for gentle behavior. We graft Queens from our best over wintered stock. Drone colonies are selected to improve genetic diversity and increase the successful free mating of Queens. All our Queens are tested in five frames nucs and are proven layers. We prefer Queens to be picked up at the South Deerfield apiary and introduced the same day. This results in a higher Queen acceptance, and fewer failed queens. |
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Bee Nutrition |
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Nucs |
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We will not be selling Nucs in 2012 as we have joined the Russian Queen Breeders Association and will be using all our colonies to support this program. Russian bees have been proven to have many superior qualities; mite resistance, wintering ability, and other attributes desirable in a commercial or backyard apiary. We have been assigned two lines of Russian stock to use for breeding, with the expectation that the genetic purety is maintained - production Queens must pass a series of tests before Warm Colors Apiary can be a certified member of the RQBA. This is an exciting opportunity and will require considerable effort as we setup mating areas, and make the transition to head all our colonies with Russian Queens. This will take several years to put the infrastructure in place so please do not call to order Russian Queens. Our goal is to offer Russian Queens in 2014. |
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