# Shipping Nucs



## hpm08161947 (May 16, 2009)

I am hesitant to ship nucs and am wondering if I am worried about nothing. We have had a number of requests from Texas for nucs and they seem willing to pay the rather high shipping rates. I thought Texas was the place one went to make splits and nucs... but who knows. If we ship nucs out there and they wind up in bad shape, I know whose fault it will be.... ours! So I am wondering if some of you are successful at shipping nucs.


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## Vance G (Jan 6, 2011)

fatbeeman ships nucs from Georgia to friends of mine in North Dakota and Montana. He would probably teach you how. He may have magic bees though.


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## HONEYDEW (Mar 9, 2007)

I think you'd have to have rocks in your head to have a nuc shipped to you, I called a very prominent Cali. queen and nuc supplier about shipping nucs 700 miles straight up I-5 and it was nearly 100 dollars each add. for shipping..They said it was do to the extra work involved in packaging, such as having to double screen the nucs then over box them in a vented box etc. etc. there are to many suppliers more local all across the US to have them shipped in my opinion..


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

We ship lots of nucs......on trucks and we can't get them back fast enough. I wasnt even aware that folks actually shipped them through the mail. It all sounds kind of risky and pretty pricy. Assuming that there is no room for the frames to slide it seems like you might also need to figure a way to secure the bottom bars to eliminate the frames from slapping. I assume provisions are also made for water and lots of venting. I guess it is all possible assuming no shipping delays.


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## Ted Kretschmann (Feb 2, 2011)

Hubert Tubbs of Mississippi used to ship nucs by mail. I have never tried mailing one. I have the customer pick them up here at the farm. Like Jim stated, put them on the truck and wave bye. After one customer had six bees get out in the SUV that freaked out his wife.--Hobbyist never seem to own a pickup truck.-- I had to drive 30 miles to stop a wee hole up with duct tape. I am now enacting a "tail light guarantee". When the vehicle drives down the drive way and I can not see the tail lights anymore. It is not my problem after that. Commercial beekeepers are much easier to deal with. TK


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## Solomon Parker (Dec 21, 2002)

I have purchased nucs from fatbeeman. He makes nucs out of thin plywood. They are not double screened, no provision for water or anything else. 6/6 on shipping, 2/6 surviving the first winter.


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## Ted Kretschmann (Feb 2, 2011)

Two nucs out of six surviving the first winter is not very good odds. TK


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## Riverratbees (Feb 10, 2010)

Friend of mine recieved a nuc in mail.There was little blocksbetween each frame to keep them from banging together.There were holes in the side about the diameter of silver dollars with screens. Then it was in a mosketo screen and then in another box with wire screen on both sides and both ends. The bees were in good condition had plenty of ventilation for the bees. There were 2 sponges in the bottom that were barely damp. They were only in the truck for 1 1/2 days though


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## Solomon Parker (Dec 21, 2002)

I'm not sure what the problem is there Ted, perhaps you could watch his YouTube videos and tell us what you think. I have my doubts from what I've seen, but I'm not as experienced as you.


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## Honey-4-All (Dec 19, 2008)

Nothing said on what shipping method you would use. 

Consider these options:

Mail. (might as well kill the bees before you send them)

Ups overnight ( lets rob 2 bank first)

Trucking. (Maybe in a refrigerated well ventilated truck doing supersonic speed)


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## hpm08161947 (May 16, 2009)

Our only option appears to be UPS (3-4 days)... from $40-$70 depending on the weight of the package.. our nucs are not light. 

We have told the customers to send us a check for $165 and we will return the difference in what the actual shipping costs are. We also strongly pointed out what a gamble it is... 50-50 at best!

So far 1 customer has asked how to make the check out.... have not seen a check yet though.


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## Honey-4-All (Dec 19, 2008)

HPM

As one who helped get UPS to ship bees I ask that you please not mess it up for us who ship bees on UPS. It took a bunch of work to convince them to do so.

Here is the link to the rules page on shipping bees


http://www.ups.com/content/us/en/resources/ship/packaging/guidelines/animals.html


The main point being..... copied and pasted from UPS below is: 

"Service Type
Live animals will only be accepted for transportation when shipped by a UPS service that guarantees delivery the next day."

Don't ship them any other way. Some folks are already trying to do so and its beginning to mess stuff up in our attempt to get people live bees. inch:


There are going to be a lot of big queen producers on your tail if you induce UPS to stop taking bees. :ws:


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## hpm08161947 (May 16, 2009)

Actually - they never mentioned it when we told them they were bees.... So next day comes to $212.00 +95 for the nuc... $317 for 1 nuc... can not imagine anyone paying that!

You can not ship them by mail and UPS is cost prohibitive... so guess there is no way!

We did not want to mess with shipping anyway... too much trouble.


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## Solomon Parker (Dec 21, 2002)

Is anyone else a fan of the 'road trip'?


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## JohnK and Sheri (Nov 28, 2004)

Honey-4-All said:


> There are going to be a lot of big queen producers on your tail if you induce UPS to stop taking bees.


Not just the producers, but all _their_ customers. We buy a ton of queens every year, all shipped overnight UPS. For the most part, they make it just fine..... For the most part.

As for shipping nucs, we produce and sell them but would never send them either mail or UPS, just not worth the cost, hassle or risk to the bees, in our opinion. We have pick up only at our farm, but customers often help each other out with delivery to points closer. We keep a data base of customer locations on google earth so we can easily see who lives near to who, so we can help coordinate delivery.
Sheri


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## NasalSponge (Jul 22, 2008)

Am I really posting something in the Commercial section?? The reason the post office won't anymore is that FedEx flies all their stuff and after several mishaps with loose bees on the plane we said no more. Below is a picture I took before the ban of a couple of postal nucs coming thru FedEx.


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## Omie (Nov 10, 2009)

hpm08161947 said:


> Actually - they never mentioned it when we told them they were bees.... So next day comes to $212.00 +95 for the nuc... $317 for 1 nuc... can not imagine anyone paying that!
> 
> You can not ship them by mail and UPS is cost prohibitive... so guess there is no way!


Just got my two nucs, US Mail ground service- 4 days from GA to NY- $60 shipping for both (included insurance and confirmation). They arrived fine. Same exact experience last year except it only took 24 hours last year.

I probably won't repeat this again, it's not the ideal way to get bees. I want to start raising my own splits, queens, and nucs this year utilizing local drones, and will try to overwinter if my colonies look good this Fall.


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## Skinner Apiaries (Sep 1, 2009)

lol, don't see the need to ship a couple, bees are a breeze to sell local. When I put an ad up here I had guys buying pickup loads.


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## Honey-4-All (Dec 19, 2008)

Omie,

Is true postal insurance available from Georgia to NY on bees? Seems out of range as they will not insure in generally outside of a 500 mile range or beyond 4 postal zones. 

Wonder if you could have collected if there was a failure even though you paid for it? 

Besides the poor regularity of the delivery schedule its the reason we jumped to all UPS overnight air. 

The last two years our loss rate on shipped packages was less than 2%. 

Best way to ship bees is Fresh, Cool, Dark, and Fast. Nothing else works.


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## Omie (Nov 10, 2009)

Honey-4-All said:


> Omie,
> Is true postal insurance available from Georgia to NY on bees? Seems out of range as they will not insure in generally outside of a 500 mile range or beyond 4 postal zones.
> Wonder if you could have collected if there was a failure even though you paid for it?


I wonder too. Doubtless it would not have been a breeze. If the package had been lost I bet I would have collected no problem, with delivery confirmation included. If the bees were dead that would have been harder to collect I bet.
thankfully there was no problem.


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## HONEYDEW (Mar 9, 2007)

No wonder there where problems, those lids are just sitting there.....


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

Hope there is more ventilation than the small screened hole on the end. Those nucs must be really small or really dead.


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## Omie (Nov 10, 2009)

HONEYDEW said:


> No wonder there where problems, those lids are just sitting there.....


Maybe the lids were nailed on?

My nucs were all tightly stapled together, quite sturdy.


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