Set up a conventional bee hive - PEP BB animal.straw.beehive

Could existing bee hives work for this? For example,  if one was broken down into the components parts for a complete inspection then reassembled? Bees intact of course.

I would think if it was sufficiently deconstructed, that would count.

I built 4 complete hive boxes & started 4 nucs this summer. Finally moved the last beehive to it's permanent location today. I think they'll like it, especially once their field is planted with wildflowers! Here are pix of the move. Will dismantle one of them in the next few days for a good inspection & take more pix to satisfy the BB. These girls weren't very happy today. It was a fairly long bumpy ride.

Needed to inspect hives before winter so disassembled this one further than normal for the BB. Some unassembled new boxes & frames are shown next to the cardboard box. Those will be added early next spring.

I was wondering if this counts as setting  up a beehive. This is one of my educational videos on installing package bees we do.




if not no worries I can do a picture setup.

-Justyn

I installed a Nuc in my hive.
Baseboard

box

frames with pulled wax

frames installed

Nuc ready for installation on completed hive


Bees using the hive.

I got bees! I built this Kenyan top bar hive with a shed-style roof last year from all found wood and materials, but only got around to finishing the top bars this spring. I did have to purchase new wood to make the top bars and follower boards, because those need to be perfectly straight in order for the top bar hive to function properly.

You can see how I made the bars. I found the perfect thin wooden molding strip at a big box hardware store, then nailed some to each bar. Then I coated it with melted beeswax to give the bees a good head start to build their own comb.

Many thanks to @phil.chandler, the Barefoot Beekeeper for providing the open source plans for the TBH!

My friend Pete, who is a bee rescuer brought me this beautiful large swarm of about 10,000 Italian honeybees he had just caught on a nearby job. They seem to be taking well to the new home and they don't mind me.

Hello! I’m so excited about this program. I read about it in Mother Earth News and had to sign up.

I took a beekeeping class this spring and recently installed this hive from a nuc.

I purchased the boxes, mesh bottom board and top pre-assembled, but I assembled my own wax foundation frames. The last one I built looks a lot better than the first. :)

The bees have been doing well and enjoying the rain we got this week. I’m happy to share additional photos if needed. I added a second brood box last week, and I’ll be checking their progress soon.

Thank you!

Update: I’ve added a couple photos of these using the box. Thanks again!!

Hi again! Adding a couple more photos of the bees using their Langstroth box. Thanks!

I've been setting myself up to steward bees near my garden for a few seasons. This year, it finally happened! I bought a nuclear hive of 5 frames, for about $200. I drove it home and set up a hive for them. In this video, you can see how much I was learning about how the hive pieces fit together:  
Now, I have bees! I harvested two frames of honey from them this year. I left 8 in the hive.

Please follow all the requirements exactly. This BB requires pictures of a fully assembled hive, a picture midway through set up, & pictures of bees actually using the boxes. The video is a decent explanation of the parts but doesn't meet all the requirements.

The queen excluder doesn't belong on the bottom. It goes between the brood boxes & the honey supers. Swarming is the bees natural survival technique. The typical way to help prevent swarming is to make splits before they get too crowded. One could also just let them swarm & either try to capture them or just let them go to their new home. When bees swarm the old queen is the one who leaves. There is already a few new queens in progress to take over. They fight it out to the death to determine which one will be the new queen. Queens have a finite laying capacity so bees replacing their queens is normal.

When bees swarm they starve the queen until she loses enough weight to fly. She might be able to get past the queen excluder. The purpose of the excluder is to keep her from laying eggs in the honey supers. If winters are cold having the excluder will just add extra volume for them to keep warm. Bees work very hard to stay warm so any extra volume makes it that much harder for them to survive.

I suggest adding an inner cover.

It is generally recommended not to harvest honey the first year of a nuc. Make sure they have enough food for winter.

Mike Barkley wrote:Please follow all the requirements exactly. This BB requires pictures of a fully assembled hive, a picture midway through set up, & pictures of bees actually using the boxes. The video is a decent explanation of the parts but doesn't meet all the requirements.


I suggest adding an inner cover.

The picture shows the hive, fully assembled, with bees inside and bees upon the inner cover you recommend. I read them and feel like I met them. What else do you determine I am missing for the requirements?

We need to see a picture of the partially set up hive. The video shows the parts but it's not assembled in any way. Also include a close up of some bees using the hive. Impossible to be sure those are bees shown on the inner cover. I don't doubt they are because they do that often BUT we need to see better proof.

Thank you for your helpful responses and clarification, Mike. I am still learning a lot. Like when I checked for mites a few weeks back, and the upper and lower were tied together with comb. I couldn't lift it! That pushed me to make the horizontal hive I have been wanting. Less to lift at a time.

There's very little set up and few pieces, which is lovely! I moved the exact langstroph frames my bees have been using all year into a coffin-looking horizontal langstroph hive I built a week ago from spare lumber.

    - Bee hive parts
    - Midway through setting it up
    - Fully assembled hive
    - Bees using the hive

Thank you, Mike! 😁 my nearest beekeeper association is an hour away. I hope to participate this spring, but it's a long shot. Learning all I can online!