I've helped family work bees off and on for years. I've finally decided to start a couple of hives of my own and am looking for everyone's opinion on installation. I've seen from YouTube that there are as many ways to install packages as there are beeks! Bang, dump; putting the package in the brood box until the next day; candy plug up vs. candy plug down, etc! Just looking for some input from the "old hands"!!!!
There is no right way...they all work. and if you ever watch a video of how the bees are put into the package box....well lets just say thinking you have to be gentle getting them out is sort of silly. A lot of it depends on what equipment you are using and your comfort level putting a lot of bees in the air as a beginner :-)
My 2c
Whack and dump works very well...and it gets the bees out of the travel box and starting to work the frames and releasing the queen much faster than the "gentle release" method. And you can leave them be for 3 days and skip a next day intrusion to bump and dump any stragglers.
Candy plug up or down only matters if there are nurse bees in the cage with the queen... if so....up in the event one dies and prevents her escape...but typical package queens don't have nurse bees in her cage so it likely wont be an issue.
Hope this helps.
Like KeyLargoBees said, if there are caretakers in the cage with her, have pointed upward.
I've seen people put the package in an empty box and put their brood box on top. Many people spray the package with water or sugar water before whack and dump. I think one of the mods here has a video of simply pulling the screen off one side of the package and dumping it.
I whack and dump myself, without spraying them.