PSBA 2022 Package, Nuc and Queen Sponsor Suppliers
	(Alphabetical)
Sponsor	Elite Honey and Bee(formerly Cascade Natural Honey)	Hive 5 Bees/Pacific Northwest Honey Company	Northwest Bee Supply	Rainey Day Bees	Woodland Bee Company
Contact	Company mailing address: 3038 Walnut Ave. SW, Seattle, WA 98116 Bee pickup address: 3045 125th Avenue NE, Bellevue, WA 98005 Website: www.elitehoneyandbee.com	Mailing address: PO Box 788, Rochester, WA 98579 Website: Hive5Bees.com Contact Names, phones, emails: Kevin or Chris, (360-706-4978), Rochesterbees@gmail.com	Radford180@gmail.com 907-360-8182 Mike Radford          https://www.northwestbeesupply.com/	Website: rainydaybees.com Contact Names, phones, emails: Peter Nolte, (206-519-8505), peter@rainydaybees.com	Jason Kardong jason@woodlandbeecompany.com 206-335-5060
Business Description	Elite Honey & Bee is a small-scale honey producer and marketer of local urban honey since 2011. Founder Dave Schiefelbein has been transporting and selling bees for almost as long. In addition to founder/owner Cary Therriault, the Cascade Natural Honey team also includes Dave Schiefelbein and T.J. Main. When combined, Elite Honey & Bee and Cascade Natural Honey have over 30 years of solid experience with the sale and safe long-distance transport of packages and nucs.	Your partners in beekeeping success - with a purchase of a NUC we provide ongoing educational resources, videos and customer support to help you achieve beekeeping success.	Largest Nuc Supplier the Northwest	Rainy Day Bees runs numerous small urban apiaries in the Seattle area and maintains breeding yards in Shoreline and Carnation. We produce local queens, and each Spring source high quality nucleus hives from Golden West Bees, run by Eric and Randy Oliver of Scientific Beekeeping.	Based out of the Ballard neighborhood, I work with folks who love bees but need assistance in proper beekeeping. We have bees all over the city, on roofs, the Columbia Center and Google!
Breeding Stock	Bee breeding is a business, and like any business if it does not strive for constant improvement, it will fail.  Established and reputable breeders (like Heitkam’s Honey Bees, our supplier) are careful in their practices and selective about the traits they try put into their bees. Heitkam’s has been working in cooperation with Steve Sheppard and his department’s research at WSU. VSH is just one of many traits that go into the selection process of the breeder queens from which our queens then are generated. A better way to describe our queens is that they come from breeder stock whose selected traits include productivity, hardiness, strong over-wintering and a reduced susceptibility to pests (including varroa) and pathogens. Artificially inseminated breeder queens, isolated mating yards, human-powered inspection of the brood pattern of new queens all lead to an exceptional product. Our multi-generational family breeder is in it for the long-term, and our decades-long association with them causes us to trust the quality of the product they produce.	Both our breeders/queen providers (Kona Queens & Z's Bees) utilize queens that have been overseen by some of the foremost experts in resilient genetics within commercial and hobbyist circles.	Bees are treated for Mites.	Golden West bees has been selecting for mite resistance in their operation for many years. Details on the current methodology can be found at https://scientificbeekeeping.com/selective-breeding-for-mite-resistance-walking-the-walk/	I am a strong proponent of proper mite treatments. My supplier uses all current methods of treatment, and I personally treat each package with OAX before handing off to buyers.
Nucs	Elite Honey & Bee will be selling 5-Frame early spring nucs from Heitkam’s Honey Bees in Orland, CA. With our 5-(deep) frame nucs you get bees on drawn comb, an established brood nest, honey & pollen stores, and most importantly, a young 2021 queen that has been accepted by the colony. All brood in the nuc is from the nuc's own queen. All queens are professionally patterned and graded in the field prior to being transported to Washington.  Each nuc will have 3-4 frames of brood in various stages, honey and pollen. Our nucs have been set up 4+ weeks prior to sale. We call them "aged" nucs. Nucs are delivered in permanent wood or hard plastic boxes, which customers can choose to keep or return. We purposely avoid using the disposable nuc boxes and WE ENCOURAGE RETURNS SO BOXES CAN BE RECYCLED & RE-USED IN SUBSEQUENT YEARS, THUS REDUCING COSTS TO OUR CUSTOMERS. Bees are Italian, Caucasian and New World Carniolan bees, subject to availability Cost is $276.70 total which INCLUDES sales tax ($20 is refundable upon return of the nuc box) Because he believes queen marking can unduly stress or damage a queen, our breeder does not mark queens.	Carniolan queens ... NUC price is $165 plus a fully refundable $10 deposit for the PRO NUC box. Customers have the option to either keep the PRO Nuc box or return for a $10 refund.	Five frame Nucs from Northern Oregon	Size: 5 deep frames. Generally 4 frames bees/brood, one frame honey, all fully drawn. Can vary some by colony and by year. Producer: Golden West Bees. Race: Mutts (mostly behave like Italians, but some are more carniolan-esque). Not marked. Not overwintered. $250 plus sales tax ($275.63 for Seattle).	Frame Count: 5 Bee Source: Woodland Bee Company, Seattle WA Race: Italian and Carniolan Marked Queen: N Overwintered Queen: Y Final Price To Members: $180 (incl tax/fees) FYI, I only run a very limited supply of Nucs as I'm really picky about what I create and sell. All Nucs must meet my standards and I tend to only sell between 10-20 depending
Packages	Elite Honey & Bee will be selling 3-pound Package Bees from Heitkam’s Honey Bees in Orland, CA. Buyers will have a choice of three races: Italian, New World Carniolan or Caucasian bees. Cost is $189.25 total which INCLUDES sales tax ($4 is refundable upon return of the core box) Because he believes queen marking can unduly stress or damage a queen, our breeder does not mark queens. For our customers that insist on marked queens, we do our best to accommodate.	NA	N/A	N/A	Size: 3 lbs Bee Source: Koehnen & Sons, Glenn California, (530) 891-5216 Race: Carniolan and Italian Price: $160 (incl tax and fees) Marked Queen: N Final Price To Members: $160
Queens	Elite Honey & Bee will be selling mated queens from Heitkam’s Honey Bees in Orland, CA and Koehnen’s Honey Bees in Glenn, CA. Buyers will have a choice between Italian, Caucasian and New World Carniolan queens. Usually our queens are unmarded, but periodically we have marked queens. Unlike many other suppliers we continue to have mated queens available throughout the season. Cost is $52.60 which INCLUDES sales tax	N/A	Queens are Italian or Carniolans Some are marked Some queens out of Hawaii and Oregon or California	Source: Rainy Day Bees Race: Local mutt Marked on request ($10 additional fee) $50 plus sales tax ($55.13 for Seattle)	Queen Source: Woodland Bee Company, Seattle WA Race Of Queens: Carniolan and Italian Marked: Y Final Price To Members: $32 (incl tax/fees)
Warranty	As always, customer satisfaction is our goal... so we stand behind the quality of the queens we sell with a full and immediate replacement warranty. Our queens are fully guaranteed to your reasonable satisfaction.  There is no time limit for warranty adjustments. We do our utmost best to work with the needs of our customers.	We pride ourselves in a 5-Star Review reputation on Google and Facebook... we'll make sure you feel taken care of :)	Please read warrantee on Website	Nucs that are found to be defective in the first two weeks after pickup due to queenlessness will be replaced, or a replacement queen offered depending on availability. Nucs that are found to be queenless more than two weeks after pickup, or are believed defective for other reasons may be replaced or other mitigation offered, at Rainy Day Bees' discretion.	In packages I guarantee a live queen and viable group of workers. I will support any purchaser via phone, email and in person. I want every single buyer to be happy and excited about having bees.
Anticipated Delivery Dates/Pickup	Our historical goal is to have the honey bees in Seattle the third week of April, with distribution on a weekend day. Our first load of bees is then followed by a second load of bees one week later. Specific pick-up details will be emailed to all customers as soon as we have the confirmation from our breeder.	Pickup will be at our retail honey store in Rochester, Washington. Arrival:  Middle April... but later delivery with later in the spring orders	Early April for Survivor Nucs Third week of April until all delivered	Late April, from our house in Shoreline.	Mid April. Pick up will be at my location in Ballard. Special accomodations can be made if necessary.