A nucleus becomes a hive: the first six weeks
The colony arrived as a five-frame nucleus on a warm evening in late May, collected in the back of the car with the entrance blocked with foam and the box strapped shut, and placed on its stand behind the shed just before dark. I pulled the foam and went indoors. By the next morning bees were flying from the little box and I had become, by the only definition that counts, a beekeeper.
A week later, on a still afternoon at 21 °C, I transferred the five frames into the full brood box in the same order and orientation they had in the nucleus, with six new frames of foundation either side, three on each. The frames were heavy with bees and brood and I saw the queen, a plump marked one, on the third frame. The whole transfer took eleven minutes and my hands shook the entire time. The empty nucleus box, with a few hundred bees still in it, I left leaning against the entrance, and they walked in by evening.
Weeks two to four were about watching them draw comb. Fed with a litre of one-to-one syrup at a time in a contact feeder on top of the crown board, they drew the first new frame in five days and the next two in another week. The brood expanded to seven frames by the end of June. I inspected every seven days, which the books say is right for the swarm season, and found no queen cells, which was a relief every time and probably a small disappointment every time as well.
Week five brought the first lesson. I left the feeder on too long after they had drawn most of the frames, and they started storing syrup in the brood area, backfilling cells the queen needed. The brood pattern got patchy and I had a small panic. Taking the feeder off and giving them a super with foundation gave them somewhere to put it, and within a fortnight the brood frames were back to brood.
First week of July: ten frames of bees, eight of brood, a super going on, and a colony that is noticeably louder than it was a month ago. Mite drop over a week was two. I have written down the weights, the dates, and the weather, and started this record so that next year I will know what normal looks like. Whether I will ever again feel the particular pride of the first drawn frame, I doubt.