Book recommendations?

[SavvySalli]

Conclusion

If its all about el natural would the Rose Hive method suit the bees better, in fact i quite like the rose hive method to some extent as everything is the same size.

Had a look through the Rose Hive designer's website & slide show: http://www.-----------------/uploads/2/3/9/3/2393505/slide_show.pdf

I think that the weight would easily stump me and I'd need an assistant! A brood box sized super full of honey would be completely beyond me, my not quite full national supers were only liftable because they weren't full! All that moving boxes around too.

The TBH lets the bees make their own comb in their own way, it replicates an old log (especially if bits of leaf mould, bark, branches etc are in the bottom), and it leaves them to themselves as much as possible - bearing in mind all the predators, mites and diseases that we have to keep on top of for their safety, so it's as natural as we can make it when we're combining their expertise with our greed for honey!

I am planning to put two or three empty top bars into the national hive as well for them to draw their own comb (because we had requests for comb this year).

Meanwhile I'll order the Barefoot Beekeeper to learn more about it, and I'll watch Phil Chandler's You Tube videos as they're entertaining - lot better than most TV these days!

Thank you all, and for the humour!

 

[Millet]

Well i'm glad supers are smaller, have you ever tried moving a 14x12 full of honey

I have moved a lot heavier daily for the past 30+ yrs, my bones ache but your comment reminds me of someone who has never humped,

 

[Millet]

Had a look through the Rose Hive designer's website & slide show: http://www.-----------------/uploads/2/3/9/3/2393505/slide_show.pdf

I think that the weight would easily stump me and I'd need an assistant! A brood box sized super full of honey would be completely beyond me, my not quite full national supers were only liftable because they weren't full! All that moving boxes around too.

The TBH lets the bees make their own comb in their own way, it replicates an old log (especially if bits of leaf mould, bark, branches etc are in the bottom), and it leaves them to themselves as much as possible - bearing in mind all the predators, mites and diseases that we have to keep on top of for their safety, so it's as natural as we can make it when we're combining their expertise with our greed for honey!

I am planning to put two or three empty top bars into the national hive as well for them to draw their own comb (because we had requests for comb this year).

Meanwhile I'll order the Barefoot Beekeeper to learn more about it, and I'll watch Phil Chandler's You Tube videos as they're entertaining - lot better than most TV these days!

Thank you all, and for the humour!

If you are weak as wee wee stick with what you are doing.

 

[BeeJayBee]

The TBH lets the bees make their own comb in their own way, it replicates an old log (especially if bits of leaf mould, bark, branches etc are in the bottom), and it leaves them to themselves as much as possible - bearing in mind all the predators, mites and diseases that we have to keep on top of for their safety, so it's as natural as we can make it when we're combining their expertise with our greed for honey!

I suppose that's one way or organising a top bar hive, but most people who use them will give at least starter strips as a comb drawing guide.

If you leave bees entirely to their own devices, and let them build completely random comb, how might a colony be inspected and given a health check if foulbrood is discovered nearby?

 

[pargyle]

If I ever get round to making another TBH ( got husband to make one from biobees recipe before I ever got bees, looked at it, went to bee keeping classes and ended up putting plants in it) I would spend a long time drawing up plans to make it double skinned and filled with PIR. It might get planted up again though

Yes ... and make the sides vertical and make it so that it will take 14 x 12 frames ....

Been there - done that ...still have it and there's stil bees in it ...

https://www.flickr.com/photos/99514363@N06/sets/72157634865981506/

Top Bar Hives for beginners are not ideal to learn about beekeeping. Lots of reasons - start with a hive with frames in it - doesn't matter which type of hive you start with. The hive has very little to do with so called 'natural beekeeping' - it's what you do with the bees and how you treat them that defines the genre ... But it's a tricky path for a new beekeeper to follow with lots of potential pitfalls.

Start in a more traditional manner, learn the craft and then get your TBH and fight your way to being an alternative style beekeeper. And buy a tin hat because you will need it !!!

 

[REDWOOD]

I have moved a lot heavier daily for the past 30+ yrs, my bones ache but your comment reminds me of someone who has never humped,

Believe me I have done a lot of humping

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Let's get one thing straight shall we - long Top bar hives have SFA to do with 'Natural' beekeeping, they were designed as an affordable, easily worked and sustainable beehive and an alternative to the traditional log hives where the brood nest had to be destroyed to get the honey; for use in sub Saharan Africa - originally called the Kenyan top bar it is now more often referred to as the African Top bar hive or box hive.

 

[Fritillary]

Oh well that's a very dull and reductionist take on things JBM isn't it?

- Mean of you to try and take the wind out of the sails of (a) those who clearly feel, if you have a top bar hive, that you've fallen in with a very doubtful cult, and who then for instance feel entitled to demand that you defend it and tell them how it can possibly work... and (b) some who on the other hand clearly feel you've Betrayed the Faith if you are more pro-active in your beekeeping than they think is right!

 

[REDWOOD]

So in short nothing to do with being natural just an alternative to a log

 

[Swarm]

My first TBH overwintered in 2010-2911 when we saw -16C. The bees survived.. A stalactite of ice 30 cms long hung from one end - pale honey coloured. It tasted nice.

One hell of a winter

 

[madasafish]

Oh well that's a very dull and reductionist take on things JBM isn't it?

- Mean of you to try and take the wind out of the sails of (a) those who clearly feel, if you have a top bar hive, that you've fallen in with a very doubtful cult, and who then for instance feel entitled to demand that you defend it and tell them how it can possibly work... and (b) some who on the other hand clearly feel you've Betrayed the Faith if you are more pro-active in your beekeeping than they think is right!

I find people who preach at you when they are selling something tend to be incompetents, liars or plain hypocrites..

(Like politicians who oppose private schooling .. but send their own children to private schools.)

 

[Erichalfbee]

One hell of a winter

Certainly was.
I recall a satellite picture of the British Isles, white from top to bottom

 

[Swarm]

2010-2911 ....
Yes, I remember thick snow on the ground at Christmas 2010. The year before our daughter went to Australia.

 

[madasafish]

Certainly was.
I recall a satellite picture of the British Isles, white from top to bottom

2011-2012 was colder..here -18C.

(Lots of condensing boilers failed due to horizontal waste water runs freezing up and blocking the outlet so the boiler switched off.)

I would imagine all fixed now...

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

I find people who preach at you when they are selling something tend to be incompetents, liars or plain hypocrites..

(Like politicians who oppose private schooling .. but send their own children to private schools.)

Not trying to sell anything - quite the opposite.
Unlike when I'm in Africa then I try and discourage the obsession with Langstroths and get them to built ATB hives

 

[Fusion_power]

discourage the obsession with Langstroths

I didn't think there was much of anything on the face of this earth that I could agree with you on, but I can agree that Langstroth hives are an amazingly poor design.

 

[Finman]

I didn't think there was much of anything on the face of this earth that I could agree with you on, but I can agree that Langstroth hives are an amazingly poor design.

Best hive however in the world.
.

 

[Finman]

I wonder if Finnmann has ever attempted to keep bees in one?

Yeghes da

Top bars?


Never atempted. I heard first time 10 years ago that it such hobby exists. It is a miracle, when they hang those natural combs with the wooden stick.

If it comes into my mind, it goes at once away.
.

 

[For want of a better word]

Best hive however in the world.
.

But made to dimensions more suitable for frozen fish or sweet Californian wine!

With little modification of the floor the Rose hive OSB boxex fit snugly into the stock WBC outers... and save on using all that nasty Colotex / Kingspan stuff.

I have hear tell of a lady in north east Cornwall who is converting US deepfreezers into top bar hives... the frames must be massive!

Yeghes da