Cutout whipped me

[bluegrass]

It would have been any other cutout except there is no power at the house and I forgot to barrow the generator before I went home for the week. The hive is in a very old farm house that is standing in a cow field. I started around 10 am and decided to use a chainsaw to open it up and just remove and brush bees the old fashoned way, no vacuum. The colony is two joists wide and about 8' tall. I don't really like doing cutouts this late in the season because all the honey gets on everything and you spend alot of time washing gloves and tools off. I got the siding off and started at the bottom of one bay and started up......only took about five seconds to get my first sting through the suit and decided to give them more smoke and let them calm some. I took a 15 min break and smoked them some more before I started removing capped honey and placing it in a 5 gal. bucket. Up and down the ladder for about 2 hours and having to make a trip to the wash bucket every trip down. Bees stayed pretty intent on trying to knock me off the ladder and my trusty honey hound who had been laying at the bottom of the ladder decided it was time to retreat to the safety of the jeep, even though it was 80 outside and probably closer to 100 inside the car. Well 4 hours in I was only about 4' up the first wall bay making the 1000th or so trip to the wash bucket to find it empty and a very happy cow standing there licking her nose :'( So now it is time to review the current strategy; okay.....its not working......withdraw now!!! So with no water and only a 1/4 of the way in its time to call it quites and try again another day, with a generator and vacuum. Next issue is that I have nothing to close the hive up with so I am stuck leaving it open. So I build a shelf out of 2x4 and ratchet strapped my hive to it and left it behind. Either the bees will stay put, move into my hive, or abandon ship before I make it back out there.   

[Cindi]

Bluegrass, are you Brad?

Anyways, what a story.  I still can't get over all the forum friends that are involved in these intriguing cut outs.  I still don't know how you can get the guts to do these things.  I must take my hat off and give my regards.  Tell us more about how this enormous job turns out.  Have a wonderful day.  Cindi

[JP]

Bluegrass, its a total bummer when you don't have everything you need to do the job. I have gotten by without electricity, but you need it on just about every job. Its very tough when you don't have water. May I make a suggestion, keep a gallon or two with you and a clean bucket to add some to on the job. To me water is the most important thing you can have when doing a cut-out. I feel your pain on this one. There are jobs that make you just wanna run and keep running. I had one last week that I almost passed out on, because I kept pushing myself, saying I will take a break after I do this or that, and I kept prolonging my breaks, and it just about caught up with me. I had plenty of fluids and my truck was right there, I could've gone in and taken breaks with the ac blasting, but noooo, I had to push myself beyond human means like an idiot, in 95 degree heat, no less. Good luck finishing this job, Jp.

[bluegrass]

Oh I have water available if I wanted to drive back out of the field to the farm house, but by that time I had about had it. Its a friends farm and I am taking the bees because I want them, not because anybody cares they are there. I usually barrow a generator from work when I don't have power on site, but forgot......so I left the beevac home and then found out when I got there that my friend has a generator :roll:

You should try a cutout sometime Cindi, they are alot of fun and every one will present different challenges to over come.

Brad

[Cindi]

Brad, it would be interesting to see what kind of swarm calls swarm catchers in our areas do.  I wonder if there are cutouts around here that they do, I am going to find out one day, just for fun.  Our swarming season is short, maybe May to the end of July, latest, usually.  We have too cold weather for bees to even consider the swarm outside of these months.  But they may live in places that cutouts would have to be done on, but again, not too sure about this.

I highly doubt if it would ever be something that I would want to do.  Too much work for me, and it involves wood, which really is not my baleywick.  Have a wonderful day, great life.  Cindi