Celotex insulation techniques

[Millet]

Tidy job Erica, however have a try of one of these as i think you will be happy with them and it saves messing on with a cosy, i have three of them up to now but i suspect the numbers will rise..

 

[Swarm]

A house and a hive still have to obey the same physics. There is no special exemption for honeybees.

Don't talk tripe, a house is not a hive.
Explain how bees survive and thrive in hives that don't meet your standards or should we believe the 'survive not thrive' nonsense as well?
As I've said, I am concerned when confronted by novice beekeepers in a panic, spending needlessly to cover their hive 'because they heard it at some talk'.
I had an interesting evening listening to the rubbish they'd been told but I managed to make them understand that it was totally unnecessary and a waste of money they could ill afford.
We had a good laugh about it afterwards.

 

[Wingy]

Just to throw the "heat rises" into the mix. I have a log burner in the living room, it heats up the living room & dining room quite easily. Some heat will be lost up the chimney that's to be expected.
Now some of the heat makes it into the hallway and can be felt at the top of the stairs but without the radiators on the bedrooms are noticeably cold.
Now open a bedroom window and that bedroom will warm up. The warm air will be drawn to the upper room with the open window not the other upper rooms.
Nothing to do with hives,
Wingy

 

[Erichalfbee]

Tidy job Erica, however have a try of one of these as i think you will be happy with them and it saves messing on with a cosy, i have three of them up to now but i suspect the numbers will rise..

I like their deep roofs but like them even deeper so that they cover a super on top. So all my poly hives have a PIR top. I’m not keen on poly floors either but the box looks robust enough. I am not allowed any more kit. No more bees either. With splits in summer I can get up to 16 hives and that’s far too many.

 

[user 6228]

Don't talk tripe, a house is not a hive.
Explain how bees survive and thrive in hives that don't meet your standards or should we believe the 'survive not thrive' nonsense as well?
...

I dont have to explain why some bees thrive in adverse conditions, the laws of physics are the same regardless.
What proof have you got that hives are subject to different laws?

A house is just a box w with some internal partitions a heat and vapour source in it
A hive is just a smaller box with some internal partitions a heat and vapour source in it.

So what is difference in physics between a house and a hive?
one has cavities with ~ 10m^3 and larger the other 0.25m^3.
That makes the renolds and raleigh numbers differ a bit. Thats it

water vapour is buoyant in air in both
air at an elevated temperature is still buoyant in both, conduction,radiation and convection
still occur, the 3 laws of thermodynamics still occur in both.
The bees cant stop energy moving through a wall, once it escapes the bees, thats it.
And if they want to maintain temperature they have to replace the energy. If they dont have the means to replace the energy they die or mechanism to replace the energy fails they die. If some parasitical organism takes advantage of the additional stress they may die. That leaves a lot of gaps in which to live, maybe not thrive to the same extent perhaps

An absence of a bee colony death does not invalidate the laws of physics.

A house is just a box w with some internal partitions a heat and vapour source in it
A hive is just a smaller box with some internal partitions a heat and vapour source in it.

 

[ShinySideUp]

One thing on the house/hive comparison that no one seems to have mentioned is that in a house the fire is usually on the ground floor and although it has a chimney that is open to the air only the air that is at the bottom of the house is drawn out while the rest of the heat sits above the outlet that is the fire and keeps the place warm. If you moved that system to a beehive then you would have to put the ventilation (the 'fireplace') with the chimney at the bottom next to the open mesh floor; so a bit pointless really.

The comparison that someone gave earlier about leaving the loft hatch open is a much better one. You wouldn't do it in your house, don't do it in the beehive.

 

[user 6228]

One thing on the house/hive comparison that no one seems to have mentioned is that in a house the fire is usually on the ground floor and although it has a chimney that is open to the air only the air that is at the bottom of the house is drawn out while the rest of the heat sits above the outlet that is the fire and keeps the place warm. If you moved that system to a beehive then you would have to put the ventilation (the 'fireplace') with the chimney at the bottom next to the open mesh floor; so a bit pointless really.

The comparison that someone gave earlier about leaving the loft hatch open is a much better one. You wouldn't do it in your house, don't do it in the beehive.

in a high heat loss structure the addition of a vent diverts some heat from going through the roof to out the vent/window. The change in total heat loss is not much. In contrast, a low heat loss structure a vent/window dramatically increases the total heat loss.
THose who remember living in houses where the only insulation in the house was around the pipes in the loft will also remember having the windows open in winter. You got warm from the heat radiated from the fire, not conducted by the air temperature that came later with the advent of central heating.
You needed to have to windows open because of the condensation from the inhabitants and attempts to warm the air from parafin heaters.
50 years later we can have houses that only need the heat from the inhabitants to remain very comfortable, something bees have had in trees for thousands of years.

 

[Beefriendly]

50 years later we can have houses that only need the heat from the inhabitants to remain very comfortable, something bees have had in trees for thousands of years.

Something bees not living in the "ideal" tree cavity don't have.
One should never think that tree nests are their only nesting place. Bees are well equipped to survive in many less than ideal situations., such as cold damp holes in field walls, open tree hollows, nests in underground caves, cavity walls etc etc.

 

[user 6228]

Something bees not living in the "ideal" tree cavity don't have.
One should never think that tree nests are their only nesting place. Bees are well equipped to survive in many less than ideal situations., such as cold damp holes in field walls, open tree hollows, nests in underground caves, cavity walls etc etc.

While I take your point, these advantages are available in the average tree cavity from the Seeley survey of 1976. In a pre modern landscape of mature forests the tree hollows are the abundant accommodation available according to T.D. Seeley

 

[Beefriendly]

While I take your point, these advantages are available in the average tree cavity from the Seeley survey of 1976

If you ONLY examine nests in trees then your data and ideas are not going to reflect reality.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

One should never think that tree nests are their only nesting place. .

Prozactly - people tend to forget that with the intensive management of our trees for centuries and most of our 'forests' were more open moorland for hunting rather than acre of trees, it is only lately that bees have had the luxury of old, rotten, hollow trees to inhabit.

While I take your point, these advantages are available in the average tree cavity from the Seeley survey of 1976

Yup - although I respect Seeley's work greatly, his studies took place in America where honeybees are definite newcomers, there are more older, rotten trees and it was probably the first and most convenient place the first feral swarms found to settle.

 

[Millet]

I like their deep roofs but like them even deeper so that they cover a super on top. So all my poly hives have a PIR top. I’m not keen on poly floors either but the box looks robust enough. I am not allowed any more kit. No more bees either. With splits in summer I can get up to 16 hives and that’s far too many.

Them boxes in the picture are double brood/deeps, the Abelo roofs do not fully cover a super/shallow but if the roofs where 1.5in deeper they would cover the super.. , it's a shame you are not allowed anymore equipment, maybe a nice Christmas pressie may persuade the one who wears the trousers that it will be beneficial for the bees and the hobby.. .. explain you can do the splits and splat any unwanted Queens and then unite colonies to get the numbers back down, if anything goes wrong you have plenty of time to make excuses up..lol

 

[user 6228]

If you ONLY examine nests in trees then your data and ideas are not going to reflect reality.

In the reality of the landscape of deforestation by man, bees make the best they can according to the criteria they evolved with.

 

[Swarm]

Something bees not living in the "ideal" tree cavity don't have.
One should never think that tree nests are their only nesting place. Bees are well equipped to survive in many less than ideal situations., such as cold damp holes in field walls, open tree hollows, nests in underground caves, cavity walls etc etc.

I laugh when I hear the term 'typical tree nest'. Show me one because all the examples I've seen are quite different, the ones actually in trees that is. If the other examples (no tree) are added, it appears the bees are very versatile and don't go looking for the highly insulated conditions being spouted.
Perhaps there was a reason they chose to live in cooler climes? I don't know. Nature is a wonderful thing and creatures exhibit strange and fascinating behaviour. Why do Polar Bears head North in Winter? Why do male Emperor Penguins Winter in the coldest place on Earth? We should not judge animals by our standards, our needs are not the same. What we call 'adverse' conditions could be just what the bees are looking for.
The laws of physics keep being manipulated in our house, it's called heating. We have timers and thermostats and we open windows for fresh air.
I simply object when novices are misled into believing they need to cover a perfectly good hive with celotex or whatever, they believe what they are told. No wonder they get confused.

 

[Beefriendly]

bees make the best they can according to the criteria they evolved with.

??? One day you will create sentences that make sense. This is gibberish.

 

[user 6228]

I laugh when I hear the term 'typical tree nest'. Show me one because all the examples I've seen are quite different, the ones actually in trees that is. If the other examples (no tree) are added, it appears the bees are very versatile and don't go looking for the highly insulated conditions being spouted.
Perhaps there was a reason they chose to live in cooler climes? I don't know. Nature is a wonderful thing and creatures exhibit strange and fascinating behaviour. Why do Polar Bears head North in Winter? Why do male Emperor Penguins Winter in the coldest place on Earth? We should not judge animals by our standards, our needs are not the same. What we call 'adverse' conditions could be just what the bees are looking for.
The laws of physics keep being manipulated in our house, it's called heating. We have timers and thermostats and we open windows for fresh air.
I simply object when novices are misled into believing they need to cover a perfectly good hive with celotex or whatever, they believe what they are told. No wonder they get con

Have you ever studied physics?
have you ever compiled a comfort diagram, let alone one for bees? Do you know what one is ? Do you know the metabolic rate relationship with respect to temperature?
Polar bears, emperor penguins all obey the laws of physics.

The following was found in Norfolk.

 

[Hivemaker.]

The following was found in Norfolk.

National beehive, also have those in Somerset, minus the roof vents here.

 

[user 6228]

National beehive, also have those in Somerset, minus the roof vents here.

 

[Swarm]

Have you ever studied physics?
have you ever compiled a comfort diagram, let alone one for bees? Do you know what one is ? Do you know the metabolic rate relationship with respect to temperature?
Polar bears, emperor penguins all obey the laws of physics.

Do you know the colour of pair 28 in a fifty pair concentric cable? How many units are there in a two thousand four hundred pair?
I really couldn't care less about what subject you are into but unfortunately you are going around misleading novice beekeepers.

You post one example. There are five examples in one WBKA magazine, I've already told you about them, all different.

 

[user 6228]

Do you know the colour of pair 28 in a fifty pair concentric cable? How many units are there in a two thousand four hundred pair?
I really couldn't care less about what subject you are into but unfortunately you are going around misleading novice beekeepers.

You post one example. There are five examples in one WBKA magazine, I've already told you about them, all different.

you dont seem to be able to recognise the salient evidence to your argument and instead talk about wiring.

here is the data on 30 nests

Seeley, T. D., & Morse, R. A. (1976). The nest of the honey bee (Apis mellifera L.). Insectes Sociaux, 23(4), 495–512. http://doi.org/10.1007/BF02223477

If a novice beekeeper wants to know how his/her hive compares to the abode honeybees evolved in, then my arguments and discussion are relavent and not misleading. If they insist on treating honeybees so as to satisfy the drivers of the 1940's wartime and postwar economy, then they should listen to old fossils, read old beekeeping books, and believe rather than reason.

Do you actually know the difference between heat and temperature?