Tag Archives: bee hive

Adapter to allow inserting a warre frame into a langstroth hive
Jul 23 2012

Easy way to shift Warre top bars to a Langstroth Nuc

Though there are many positive aspects to Abbé Émile Warré (1867-1951) beehive design, one of the drawbacks is the incompatibility between it and other hive systems. As I’m learning more and more about starting splits, queen rearing and using nucs in the classes offered by West Sound Beekeepers Association I’m seeing how much of a hassle it is to work between Warre and Langstroth hives.

In this particular case I wanted to start a split using several frames of brood and pollen and several frames of honey. Typically you would take these from one or more strong hives and just move the frames into a nuc, however the Warre bars are quite a bit shorter than the Langstroth nuc…so what to do….what to do?

Adapter to allow inserting a warre frame into a langstroth hive

Warre frame adapter

One option is to build an adaptor. This will allow you to slide the smaller Warre bar with its comb into a frame that will then fit into a Langstroth nuc. Fortunately for me I have a friend/fellow beekeeper who is a master wood worker. Darren, House of Bees.com, built a slick frame that allows just that. You can see to the side what it looks like.

Another option is one I devised on the fly before Darren proposed his Warre adapter. Simply take the top bar of aLangstroth frame and

Zip ties to connect warre top bar to a langstroth beehive frame

Zip ties used to attach larger langstroth bar to a warre topbar

beekeeping warre bee hives
zip tie connecting the two bars

lay it along the top of the Warre bar. Run two zip ties through the comb and around cinching the two top bars together. Then simply hang the combination into your nuc or other Langstroth hive. As you can see in the photo the bees are more than happy to fill in the space.

The big difference between the two approaches is that Darrens adaptor can easily be undone if you wanted to move the Warre bar back into a Warre box. My zip tie method would be a little messier.

Honey comb, Warre beehive, Langstroth bee hives

Bees have filled in the space around the warre topbar

 

Apr 25 2012

Spring Bee Packages Arrived, Installation of bees into a new hive


 

FINALLY…..it seemed a long wait for the bees to arrive. I started reading, studying and researching everything about bees since October or so and now I’m finally a “beekeeper”. I can tell you first hand, despite all the research and discussion, nothing prepares you for the first time you unleash 10,000 bees into an open hive. Even with the bee suite on I kept thinking…..what if they turn on me????

Well, of course they didn’t. They are every bit as gentle as you treat them. I did get stung twice but both were my fault. One girl stung me because she got trapped under the wrist band of my watch (lesson..don’t wear that again) and the second bit me because I was not looking at what I was grabbing. I turned to pick up the top of the hive, grabbed it without looking and got stung for my carlessness.

This video is the installation of the first package into a new Warre hive. These are Italians. I also purchased a package of Carniolans which I installed the next day. I’ll post that video in the next week or so.

They have both settled nicely into their new homes and are drinking lots of sugar water as it is still pretty rainy.

Please feel free to comment below and link back if you have a website about bees that you have found interesting.

Apr 7 2012

Video showing break down of the Warre beehives that we are starting out with.

Several people have asked me about the details of the hives that we are using here in Seabeck. Here is a video that Darren from House of Bees put together that shows all of the aspects of this hive.

Darren does an excellent job with the craftsmanship of these hives.

You can also purchase plans from him if you want to do it yourself…click here for that link.

Feb 24 2012

Sex and Honey Bees

When talking with children about sex, why do we often refer to it as “The Birds and the Bees”? I can tell you that from what I’ve been learning about how bees reproduce …… it has nothing to do with human sexuality.

Most of the bees in a hive are female. What makes one female a queen when the rest are worker bees is what they are fed (another fascinating story).  Once the pupae emerges from its comb as a queen it first goes in search of other queens in the hive. If there are several queens being reared by the colony the one that emerges first and is the strongest will kill off the others and after spending 5 to 10 days getting her bearings she goes in search of mates.

Honey Bee LoveThe virgin queen fly’s from the hive some distance and into a zone, often refereed to as a mating yard, where males hang out hoping to meet up with a female. Nature has already figured out the correct distance from the hive she must fly so that she has a higher chance of mating with drones that are not from her hive or surrounding hives, thus diversifying her hives genetics.

Over the course of several flights she will mate with, on average, 12 males, or drone bees. The queen collects and stores sperm in her spermatheca. Once her spermatheca is full she will return to the hive never to mate again. The now mated queen begins laying eggs. From here on out she will lay between 1500 and 3000 eggs per day.

Though that my sound like a lot of eggs please keep in mind that a strong colony, in the summer when necter is flowing, will contain between 60,000 and 80,000 bees. The average worker bee during the busy season will only live for 6 to 8 weeks before working herself to death.

When the queen lays an egg she chooses, depending on the needs of her colony, to either fertilize the egg, which produces a female or to not fertilize the egg which will result in a male. A typical hive will have between 10% and 15%  drones in its population.

A hives health, cleanliness and attitude all come from the queen bee. She emits pheromones that drive the needs and personality of the colony. Queens can live up to 5 years but typically beekeepers will replace the queen after a season or two to ensure the health and vibrancy of the colony.

So, next time you hear someone say, we need to have the talk…you know, the one about the birds and the bees…..well, at least you will know better.

Sources for this information:

The Beekeepers Handbook

WA State Beekeepers Association Apprentice Beekeepers Handbook