Log Hives

[TooBee...]

Just stumbled across this five minute section starting at 13:18
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YYK9-_HyTk

amazing to think that this is still being practiced and kept alive in France today, ... I would love to know what the over-wintering rates are, etc. Maybe one day if I visit France I can visit one of these apiaries - got the impression that the beekeeper seemed to hold classes or something.

 

[Podilia]

Not only in France. This kind of beekeeping is still exist in north-west Ukraine. This is a region of forests and marshes. People install logs in trees - really hard work.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqbcwEEtAsE

They use no treatment, no swarm control, no all those operations of conventional beekeeping. Minimun intrusion into bees' life. Swarms usually occupy logs and live there several years. Some of them die sooner or later. At 5:30 the log on a single tree. The beekeeper says that colony has been living there since 2011.This winter was mild and good for bees. All colonies are alive. He says that in fact there are a lot of logs in those forests.