A nucleus colony (or ‘nuc’ for short—like “nuke”) is essentially a downsized hive. Where a hive typically centers around honey production, nucs typically center around the production of bees and brood. Michael Palmer at French Hill Apiaries in Vermont often refers to nucs as “brood factories.” 

A nuc is also a perfect way to sell an already established and productive honey bee colony due to its small, portable size.

Like a good hive, a nuc contains a laying queen, a healthy population of worker bees, and frames of drawn comb. The comb contains a combination of honey stores, open brood (larvae), capped brood (pupae), and empty space in which the queen can continue to lay. Where as each box in a hive contains eight to ten frames, each box in a nuc typically contains four or five. When sold or bought, a nuc ususally consists of one box with four or five frames.

Once purchased, most people transfer their nuc (the frames and bees thereon) into eight or ten frame hive equipment to start their own beehive.

Overwintered nucleus colonies are Pioneer Valley Apiaries’ specialty! Overwintered nucleus colonies are nucs with bees and—most crucially—a queen that have already survived a winter. The focus is almost entirely on the queen because it is her job—and her job alone—to lay the eggs. She is the mother of every other bee in the colony. She is the source of the colony’s genetics. The other bees may last only a few weeks, but she persists to keep the colony going. If the colony does great, the queen gets the credit. If the colony does poorly, the queen is blamed.

Getting colonies to survive the winter is a beekeeper’s biggest challenge, so nucs with queens that have done it before (i.e., overwintered nucs) can have a great advantage over non-overwintered nucs. Simply put, overwintered nucs provide extra assurance that—with proper care—they will survive the winter. The bees have done it before, and they can do it again!

A spring-made nuc is a nuc that does not contain an overwintered queen (i.e., the nuc is not overwintered). It’s queen is newer than that. She is raised and mated in the spring shortly before her nuc is put together.

Spring-made nucs can have advantages over overwintered ones. One is that new queens are generally more productive since egg laying is thought to gradually worsen with age. Many large commercial operations will requeen all of their colonies every year in order to keep the queens as new and productive as possible.

Another advantage new spring queens have is that they are less likely to swarm, especially in the spring. In a typical swarming scenario, half the bees in a colony leave a hive en masse with the queen to find a new home. Inside the hive, a replacement queen is already in the works. A new queen will emerge from one of many queen cells erected in the hive and kill the other queen cells. If other new queens have emerged as well, they will fight when they encounter each other until one remains.

Swarming is how honeybee colonies naturally proliferate—one colony divides into two. In a natural setting, this is good. For many beekeepers, though, swarming is a headache. Swarming means half of the hive’s productiveness flies away with a queen that the beekeeper was likely very invested in.

Usually, a colony will start making queen cells in anticipation of swarming (i.e., “swarm cells”) when it has grown so much that it no longer has enough space in the hive. Sometimes, though, colonies will erect swarm cells even when this isn’t the case. It’s thought that overwintered colonies have a natural impulse to swarm in the spring simply if they are big and strong enough to do so. And once swarm cells start going up in a hive, it can be very hard for a beekeeper to squash the impulse. Colonies with a new spring queen, however, would have no such impulse, as their situation is effectively identical to that of a recently swarmed hive: they’ve lost much of their former colony and now have a fresh, new queen.

They are both great! No matter which kind you receive, I promise you are going to like your bees and the queen. And if you find an issue with your queen in its first season with you, I will help you address it and, if needed, replace it. That’s my guarantee.

Nucleus colonies are generally expected to be available for pick up in April or May. Unanticipated circumstances (like weather) may force pick up dates into June, but it is highly unlikely. When your nucleus colony (or colonies) is nearly ready for pick up, I will contact you to coordinate a pick up date and time. Pick up times will be limited to hours either early in the morning or later in the evening when temperatures are cooler. This is to ensure your nuc does not overheat and suffocate. When I contact you, I will also provide you with a pick up location in the Northampton/Hadley/Amherst area.

The nuc will be contained in a secure box at pick up, although you may have a bee or two escape the box during transport. If you plan to transport your nuc back home inside the cabin of your vehicle, you can bring a mesh laundry bag to place the nuc into so that any escaped bees are contained and do not fly around you while you are driving. You can also dress warmly for the drive and keep the cabin as cool as possible to keep the bees inactive.