# Bee tree trapout



## Ross (Apr 30, 2003)

Nice job Gene, but it's way more work than I would do just for bees. Did you get paid?


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## AllFloridaBee (Sep 25, 2007)

Nice!!!

I've got some running right now, but I can't seem to make the cones so pretty like yours.. how do form them?


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## Gene Weitzel (Dec 6, 2005)

Ross,
I am definately getting paid. The site is only about 5 minutes from my office, so it's pretty convenient to check on it during lunch. It was not really that much work for me, my two sons did it all and I just "supervised" and took photos. The scaffold belongs to a generous friend, so I did not have to rent it.

AFBR,
I let my son form the cones, he does it by hand and I can't come even close to making them that nice either! He even gets them pointed upward so the bees don't ball up in the end causing a clog. No way I could have done it better myself! LOL


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## mudhoney (Mar 31, 2008)

Nice piece of work! Hope it pans out.


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## Gene Weitzel (Dec 6, 2005)

Just an update, Friday we checked the bait hive and had to pull out about 20 lbs of sealed honey, was afraid it was getting too heavy for my platform. It is packed full of bees and it looks like they made a queen. There were about 9 queen cells on the frame of brood I gave them, one had emerged and the others had been torn down, they were very calm and did not act queenless, lots of pollen in the next frame but no eggs yet, so all those bees had nothing to do but make honey. The bees in the tree chewed through to a small crack so I had to screen over their new entrance. They had only been using it for about a week, don't know how much that will set the trap out back, they still seem much weaker than the bait hive.


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## Chef Isaac (Jul 26, 2004)

you all let them raise a queen at the same spot of doing the trap out or take it back to your yards first?


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## odfrank (May 13, 2002)

Some guys just have way too much spare time on their hands.


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## Gene Weitzel (Dec 6, 2005)

Chef Isaac said:


> you all let them raise a queen at the same spot of doing the trap out or take it back to your yards first?


I let them raise a queen right there unless they get too populated, then I swap out the bait hive with another one and take the first one back to the yard. When that happens I get two colonies out of it cause the second bait hive raises a queen too.


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## Gene Weitzel (Dec 6, 2005)

odfrank said:


> Some guys just have way too much spare time on their hands.


I work a 55 hr/week full time job on top of all of this. Course it makes a difference when you have four sons aged 15, 20, 23 and 24 to help out. I just pretty much advise and they do all the work! (sometimes I have to kind of "crack the whip" a bit with the 15 year old though). LOL


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## Texas Bee (Mar 21, 2008)

Gene how about an up date on that trapout. Did you set another box in there? and how many sections of scaffel (sp) is that?


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## Gene Weitzel (Dec 6, 2005)

Texas Bee said:


> Gene how about an up date on that trapout. Did you set another box in there? and how many sections of scaffel (sp) is that?


Funny you should ask, we took down the hive last night. Used a 24' extension ladder, tied a rope around the hive, looped it over a an upper limb, pushed the hive off the platform and lowered it to the ground. It was packed with bees and weighed about 75 lbs! Will check it later to be sure they raised a queen and got some brood started. I'll submit photos then. The trap out only took about 4-5 weeks because as soon as the hive in the tree got weakened the hive beetles moved in and destroyed it. When we peeked into the hole all we saw was a few remnants of ragged comb, a lot of smelly mush in the bottom of the cavity and absolutely zero bees. I am pretty sure that they had been like that for about 1-1/2 weeks but weather had prevented me from getting the hive moved earlier. I have two more tree trap outs working and with no flow on, I suspect they will go even faster this time of year due to the SHB activity. Trap outs in SHB territory kind of suck since you don't get the the boost to the new colony by letting them rob out the stores of the old one. On the other hand, I suppose that the shortened time could be counted as a plus.

PS: That was two sections of scaffold.


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