Hi Rita,
        The folk-lore I have heard is that one should move hives less than
three feet, or more than three miles.  I have personal experience of a less
than honest beekeeper who sold me a nuc, with full knowledge of where I
lived.  I drove the ten miles or so to his home and picked up the nuc, which
he had kindly installed into our equipment for us.  Got the bees home, and
shortly afterwards noticed that the population of the hive dwindled very
quickly.  They eventually built up to full strength, but I didn't get the
honey crop I had been "promised".  I was a new beekeeper at the time, so I
didn't understand what was going on.  After talking about it with a number
of others, I learned that this particular beekeeper had an out-yard about a
mile from my home.  The general agreement was that he had taken the nuc from
that local site, moved it to his house, and then allowed us to bring them
"back to the neighborhood".  The field bees promptly went home to the original
apiary, and we were left with a weak hive.  I wonder how many times he was
able to sell that particular group of bees.....
 
Rick Hough, a beekeeper from Hamilton, MA, USA (45 minutes NE of Boston)
[log in to unmask]