Hello,

I built a hive and bought a swarm (3-4 lbs) from a local beekeeper.  I had
some questions, and hoped someone here might help.

1. Is the appropriate time to install a swarm in a hive approx. 1-1 1/2
hours before dark?
2. What am I supposed to do to make the bees stop crawling out and down the
sides before I have the inner and outer lid on?  I used the bee brush and
put a little pressure to make them move up and into the hive (no
squishing).  They complained a little but went inside.
3. After the initial install (shake) of the box to drop the ball of bees
into the hive, the insides of the box were still covered with thousands of
bees.  I waited until they made little clusters in the box, shook it again,
waited, shook, waited, shook, etc.  Is this the right way to get all the
bees out of the box?  It took a long time.
4. Does it matter if there were two little clusters of bees left on the
outside over night (providing of course, the queen was inside the hive)?
Will they go inside later?
5. There were six combs inside the cardboard box, the largest being 5
inches long.  Is there a way to estimate how long the swarm was in the box
based on the comb size?
6. When I shook the bees into the super (minus three frames) the comb fell
from the box into the hive, which I retrieved with a kitchen utensil.
Should I have taken the loose comb out of the hive?  I thought I should not
replace the three frames as long as the comb was in the bottom as I did not
want to squish any bees by forcing the frames.
7. How am I supposed to know if there is comb in the box, and is there a
trick to keep it from falling into the hive when installing the swarm?
8. Feeding on the inside cover, inside an empty super.  The sugar bottle
does not cover the entire hole in the inner cover.  What's to stop the bees
from crawling up into the empty super and making comb there?  What's to
stop the sugar water from wicking where the bottle touches the inner cover?
 If it does wick, will the bees clean it up or do I have to take action?
9. How long should I expect a hive of bees to take to empty a 1-quart jar
of sugar water?
10. Will the bees glue together the seams between the supers and inner
cover?  If so, is it hard to break free with the hive tool?

Any information is appreciated.  If anyone has specific advice, it's very
welcome.  I don't have a local mentor yet.  Thank you.

Linda Hagedorn
Novice beekeeper