Natural beekeeping

[grahamhobbs]

Have been thinking about keeping bees for some time now. I did a beekeeping course a long time ago and have worked with my friend on his hives.
My motive is partly to produce honey (we don't need much), an interest in bees and recently a concern about the decline in bee numbers.
The latter has led me to discussions about natural beekeeping. The idea is that the 'normal' hive is in fact unhealthy for bees. Although I have found written descriptions of 'natural' hives, I haven't found any diagrams from which I can build one.
Does anyone have any drawings of a natural hive and any experience of natural beekeeping?

[sortanormalish]

Horizontal top bar hives are easy on you and the bees. Check out biobees, I think there is a link on the homepage here. I can't imagine ever needing to know anything about beekeeping that isn't on their site or in their forum.

Also, sloped sides don't seem to make a difference because of the way the bees build comb, but I'm sure a google search would find someone that has actually done a field trial.

And, very useful information, diluted peppermint oil works much better than smoke.

The honey yield in a top bar hive is a little lower, but for the reduction in manageent, I think well worth it.

[southeast-isher]

Hi Graham, this guy selling natural beekeeping kit and media may be of use to you:

http://myworld.ebay.co.uk/1trelill/

We have a natural beekeeping course near here in Forest Row - not sure if you could get to that?

[southeast-isher]

[forgot to mention that ebay seller sells plans of natural hives]

[sortanormalish]

Try www.backyardhives, biobees and also google "The Original TBH Information sent by Paul Magnuson" I can't remember which one, but one of these sites allows you to download free plans for a hive.

I strongly suggest a copy of The Barefoot Beekeeper

You don't need to purchase a kit or plans if you are even remotely skilled in the 'bang two boards together' department. There are numerous free plans online. We just googled "topbar hive plans" to find everything we wanted. They are simple to build, you can even get your lumber cut point of sale to make it easier.

We found all sorts of free plans online. We settled on the horizontal top bar because of
1. Better for bees
2. reduced management
3. Cheap to build
4. Even cheaper to maintain

[ADG]

heres the plans

http://www.lulu.com/product/ebook/how-t ... ve/6288193

[grahamhobbs]

Thanks to everyone for all the links, I'm well into it now. There appears to be 2 types of hive, the horizontal 'Kenyan' type, that the Barefoot Beekeeper goes for, and a vertical stacking (and outwardly more conventional looking) Andre Warre hive. As the kenyan type is so simple this is what I will make myself to start with.

However as we are based in London I am slightly concerned about swarming, which appears to be, if not exactly encouraged, to be fully accepted under natural beekeeping. Are there any techniques for encouraging the swarm not to travel too far but to settle close to our allotment to avoid neighbours getting upset?

[savoyard]

A colony of bees has a group or "corporate" personality - just like a football crowd has - quite distinct from that of the individual bees.

Swarming is the collective reproductive instinct. It can't be suppressed, but it can be steered - and that is a major topic in beekeeping, and is quite a black art.

Most swarm control techniques involve moving bees around between different boxes, but this is only possible if all the boxes (hives) in an apiary are EXACTLY alike.

My big concern with these "natural" hives is that the parts are not always interchangeable. Also, if the dimensions are not adhered to within a couple of millimetres or so, the bees will glue things together, or build comb where you don't want it. This makes handling difficult.

Three strong colonies can easily produce a hundredweight of honey, and if you can't mechanise the process, then extracting and bottling the honey can be a VERY messy business.

If you live in Bristol, then I am giving a presentation on bee-keeping (with conventional hives) at the Skill-share meeting at Betterfoods on 13 July.

Regards

Savoyard

[sortanormalish]

If you will read in barefoot beekeeping about swarming, he will explain how to keep them where you want them. An empty hive three feet away worked out just fine for me, and it wasn't identical. You only need identical parts if you are going to be rearranging supers. But keep in mind that by using excluders you can change the size of a hive, which is essentially like adding a super, that helps too.

Also, swarming is a reproductive urge that all bees will experience, but the more stress they are under, the more queen eggs the current queen will lay, thus more swarming. Natural beekeeping doesn't eliminate swarming, if it did we would quickly run out of bees, but it does reduce swarming to a level found in nature.

We built our hives to accept a standard frame, so everything is interchangeble. But after we harvest the standard frames, which is a pain in the bum without a very expensive extractor, it is replaced with a topbar. Never had anything stuck together with propolis, except an excluder, which is exactly what they were supposed to do.

I was under the impression you wanted to produce just enough honey for your family, the horizontals make harvesting on a need based schedule very easy. Not to mention that you only need to look at them about once of month, if you're very hands on. But if you're looking to turn a profit, natural beekeeping is going to limit your income, we only get 80% what our neighbor with standards gets. The emphasis is on a quality hive culture resulting in long term prosperity of the hive (translate that as low/no mantenance) rather than maximum honey out put as it is with standard hives. Just something to keep in mind. It's really all about how much effort you are willing to invest and how much honey you want out of the deal.

[grahamhobbs]

Thanks Sortofnormalish, very much the answer I was hoping for. We are not looking to make money just some honey for ourselves and friends whilst leaving the bees with plenty. Until last weekend I had never heard of natural beekeeping but I have rapidly warmed to the natural beekeeping philosophy.

[DeneciePie]

We opted for the Warre hive and got our first bees April 10. About 6 weeks later they swarmed and DH caught them and we put them into our second Warre hive. 19 days later...you guessed it...swarmed again, this time disappearing over the back fence. We would have pursued and corralled those bees but had no place to keep more nor anyone to give them to.

So far it has been a very interesting hobby. Only one sting so far. I guess I was annoying them sitting close by observing the day before the first swarm. We have high hopes of some honey in the Fall. But it wouldn't be the end of the world if there wasn't enough for us to to take some.

People get all worried about swarms but actually the bees are highly unlikely to sting at that time since they are filled up with all the honey they can hold and basically drugged with it. Plus bees without a hive have nothing to defend so no guard bees. They are only interested in keeping together and finding a home.

We have them in the back corner of the garden and we have been run into by bees returning with forage (in a bee line) but no harm to them or us. It does feel odd.

DH has built all the wooden ware based on free internet plans. The other bits and pieces are fairly inexpensive. I think anyone who has an interest in keeping bees should try it if they have a place where they can keep them.

YMMV

DeneciePie