Leave insulated eke in place or not??

[angeJ]

I'm probably close to completing feeding using a shallow as an eke which I packed around with insulation. Is there any reason not to leave the shallow with its insulation in place once I remove the feeder? They seem they'd be warmer that way but, as with anything in beekeeping, there often seems to be as good a reason not to do something as there is to do it.

 

[Erichalfbee]

My wooden boxes have 50mm of insulation on to of crownboard all year

 

[angeJ]

Thanks ericA - we probably share similar climate. Is that insulation in a shallow then?

 

[itma]

Insulation is good, all the time.
Mind you, after you take that fully on board, you'll be buying poly hives … … or following DerekM and crafting them yourself from insulation material!

 

[Erichalfbee]

Thanks ericA - we probably share similar climate. Is that insulation in a shallow then?

Yes it can be though if you have deep roofs you can just put the insulation on the crown board and pop roof straight on.
Lots of people here have the insulation permanently wedged into the roof.

 

[pargyle]

My wooden boxes have 50mm of insulation on to of crownboard all year

+1 ... and two of mine are polys and the other one is a very heavily insulated timber/poly sandwich. Makes sense from all angles IMO.

 

[user 6228]

I'm probably close to completing feeding using a shallow as an eke which I packed around with insulation. Is there any reason not to leave the shallow with its insulation in place once I remove the feeder? They seem they'd be warmer that way but, as with anything in beekeeping, there often seems to be as good a reason not to do something as there is to do it.

Its all down to the details of how exactly you insulated it and sealed the insulation.

Any void above the bees that is poorly insulated from the bees is generally not a good thing as this can increase the heated surface area and places the bees lower down in the layers of temperature.

However the devil is in the detail: e.g. a small void but with a increased level of insulation may be a net benefit.

Some pics might help