Brood showing - but only through disaster!!!!!!!

Some background first - before brood and disaster details

So the in-laws had a couple of weak Langstroth NUCs they wanted me to look after
The father-in-law was worried about ants attacking the weak hive/NUCs
So he phoned me to take them to my place to see if I could help them
There was a lot of dead bees around the NUCs when I arrived - (maybe too much ant poison)

Once entrances taped up after dark, placed in the back of my ute, it was back to my place 20 minutes up the road. The next morning I removed the tape over the entrances and placed them for the day near my other bee hives as despite it being school holidays I had to pop into school for day to catch up on some ordering for my materials Design  and digital design subjects I teach
but only a few bees exited the entrances once opened.

All day while doing paperwork - I was working out how to help the hives and incorporate them into the Top Bar style hive system

I decided to make a cradle to sit on top of the top bar hive to allow the NUC bees to incorporate into the top bar hive.


My youngest daughter helped me make it and a few lids for some medium sized top bar hives I have been making.





















I added a feeder to the following board. Blogged about this previously how my feeder stations was made and why.
The four frames from the NUCs would fit into this cradle and be sealed in. See images hereabouts

Anyway - get home in afternoon - and the 8yr old daughter and I get into our beekeeping suits and start the process of transferring the NUC frames. We stoke our smoker and get it lighted. keen to help the NUCs

But no one home in either NUC but dead flies.

Found an empty queen cell, a couple of capped brood, and there was one frame of capped honey untouched

Very sad!
Why all the dead bees? - most likely the ant poison wafting into the NUCs

But then the real Disaster  !!!!!!!

There was a bit of wind gusting about and all of sudden our best hive about 4 meters away with the most bees and comb - falls off its perch with another gust of wind - see video at end for consequences

Bugger to say the least!

I righted the hive and tried to save some comb but it was all too fresh (i.e. not hardened wax comb) and the jolt when the hive hit the ground damaged the comb and crushed countless bees
Hopefully not the queen - could not see it amongst the crushed comb but not holding my breathe either

I found heaps of brood that I didn't see during the first hive inspection. so the queen was there before the fall.

Feeling quite upset at the whole thing - devastated. My 8 yr old more so.
I had been slowly re-orientating the hive to face the north so I could transfer the top bars to a large hive box.

Normally I would rest it against the crate it is near for extra support but it wasn't today - bugger!

Hopefully the queen survived and the hive recovers quickly
 Updates soon!

This would not occur later as I was planning to place a steel post in the ground with a plate on top of it to screw the hive to. Much more secure but that is spilled milk now! No getting it back.