You don't need to lever them up completely - but - if you look at the photos, the frames are set in a rebate and are flush up against each other and they are very short lugs ... they will need a bit of prising to get them to the point where he can lift the frames to inspect. There are no runners to support the frame - they just sit in the rebate. It's not going to be an easy hive to inspect - more so with those ultra deep frames.
Nope, no problems at all I have used my hives for a few years and compared to the Langs they are a treat. There is no problem prising the frames up because you leave a space at the back or front of the hive, loosen the follower and then the rest just come out. I have not yet once rolled bees or struggled while pulling a frame, the length of the hive gives the space needed unlike a lang in which the frames are packed tight.
The hive is long and with a follower frame you can keep the number of frames to any number you wish. I make sure the follower only goes a few frames ahead of the bees and always make sure to have at least a one inch space free at the back of the hive.
My physics might be wrong on this, but if you lever up a 19" deep frame are you not going to squash a lot of bees between side bar and wall?
Nope, you remove the follower and as you draw up the frame you just turn it a fraction no bees are killed in the process.
1 Learn basic beekeeping first- if that's what you are really trying to do.
2 It's best done in well proven ,readily accessible,interchangeable format hive.
3 Hold off the woodwork until you know how a hive is supposed to work - it will save lots of time effort and dead bees.
Hmmm? I respectfully disagree. I started with the Layens and that was the best thing for me. Learning on the hive I wanted to work with made the most sense. Many of the same procedures cross the boundaries into the Layens and the rest is just a matter of working it out. I built all my own equipment right from the beginning, and believe me I am no carpenter. The bee space is a little anal for me, I have not had one frame stuck to the sides, or comb built in a space that was a little bigger, the same with the bottom space. I go into my hives and rarely find that they have built below into the 3" bottom space. The odd time it happens just break of the piece and move on. No dead bees or wasted time has resulted from any of my screw ups. I think we are the problem, the bees do just fine it is us that this extra bit of comb bothers if you let it.
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Well that’s such a shame. You’ve been given a lot of good advice here. You’d never have got a tenth of the help anywhere else. I hope you stick around.
And yet, much of the advice is not from users of the Layens bar one or two.
I find it interesting that the consensus is to dismiss what you do not know. Bees and their behaviours are expertly dealt with but stray into a different hive construction and even though all the same bee theory and manipulations apply somehow it is dismissed out of hand as 'wacky'. The long deep hives are a wonderful way to keep bees, heck I have even been able to inspect my dry sugar stores in the middle of winter and top up when needed to keep them from starving. I was in these hives 5 times last winter because it was so long and brutal and my bees came thru busting at the seams, thriving to this day. Some beekeeping rules can be broken successfully, sticking to the tried and true can lead to stagnant thinking.
