Buy a bumblebee hive for your home garden or greenhouse! Garden hives are available year round, couriered to your door (or someone in town), freight free. Please Note: Rural Delivery gives poor outcomes with live animals and should be avoided! We strongly recommend avoiding rural delivery and cannot guarantee the safe and timely arrival of hives through the rural system. South Island rural deliver orders for garden hives will only be dispatched on Mondays due to delivery delays, please be aware of this when ordering. If using the cardboard outer, it is vital to protect the hive from rain and damp ground. If unable to adequately do so, or if temperatures are still cool, we recommend selecting the insulated packaging option. Bumblebees are exceptional pollinators, in many aspects superior to honeybees, and are an absolute delight to watch!. Insulated Box Opening Instructions Ideal for pollinating a wide variety of garden plants, especially food crops including, apples, apricots, avocado, beans, blueberries, cherries, courgettes, eggplants, kiwifruit, melons, peaches, pears, persimmons, plums, pumpkin, raspberries, strawberries, sunflowers and many more! We recommend getting the hive a few weeks in advance of the pollination of larger trees, which will allow the hive some time to develop beforehand. Ideal for plants grown under cover, both plastic and glass. The hive contains an active queen, her workers and developing brood. The packaging is identical to that supplied to commercial users. The packaging is not weather resistant and we recommend providing it with some additional shelter or a wooden housing to protect it from rain (if placing in a glasshouse, this is unnecessary). The bees will follow their natural life-cycle, the hive will develop in strength before eventually declining in numbers and ultimately ceasing to exist. Nearing the end of the hive's life, many new queens should be produced, these will hopefully take up residence in your area the following season. Hives are guaranteed for 4 weeks, but typically last for 6-8 weeks, however they may persist for even longer.Bumblebees are usually more docile than honeybees, hence the misconception that they can't sting. It is important to note that they are capable of stinging and will do so if threatened. Hives should be placed out of the way of young children and inquisitive pets. Please visit our safety section for more information. This is a small colony, not suitable for commercial customers. For those interested in commercial pollination we recommend you consider our commercial hive options, starting from the Medium Hive.