Minimum equipment

[whoosling]

After getting a hive, suit, smoker, hive tool (kindly left in my garden by a friend giving up beekeeping and now filled with bees) I've now bought another complete hive with frames etc as I soon realised you can't get by with just a few extra frames but was wondering what else I need. What can't you live without?

 

[flemage]

A sense of humour for when it doesn’t stop raining for .....years

 

[VEG]

More beekeeping stuff lol

 

[stephenpug]

An understanding wife lol

 

[ultreen1]

A wheelbarrow to carry those heavy, honey filled supers.....lol

 

[stephenpug]

A wheelbarrow to carry those heavy, honey filled supers.....lol

 

[enrico]

A queen

 

[Excession]

Money.

 

[alanf]

wondering what else I need....

Storage space. You'll soon find however much you have isn't enough.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

A discreet mother who takes in your mail for you
...... and sturdy joists in the attic.

 

[itma]

After getting a hive, suit, smoker, hive tool (kindly left in my garden by a friend giving up beekeeping and now filled with bees) I've now bought another complete hive with frames etc as I soon realised you can't get by with just a few extra frames but was wondering what else I need. What can't you live without?

Seriously, you should already be thinking of better-than-standard queen excluder, cover board and clearer board.

A framed (for your National) rigid wire queen excluder is so much less hassle to remove and replace for inspection. Use one and you'll start to loathe the galvanised or plastic sheet-type.
A no-hole see-through beespace-framed cover board is a really great upgrade. You can SEE what the bees are up to without opening the hive.
Then get a cheap plastic Rhombus 'escape' (£3 ?). Make your own clearer board to carry it from thick marine ply. Give it a taller frame on one side (for the Rhombus) and a standard beespace on the other, then, when you take off the Rhombus and flip it over, you can use it as a feeder board. Because you got thick ply, it won't sag under the weight of your feeder.
Both Rhombus and feeder will work nicely with a single large circular hole in the middle of the board.
Don't trust Porter escapes! Try it. See if they stop bees coming 'up' for you. Then make your Rhombus/feeder board! (Or get someone to knock one together for you, but its easy enough for me to do.)


/// and I'm still troubled by the image of a hive tool full of bees ....

 

[m100]

Training and/or a mentor
A catalogue from Th*rnes
Storage space
Workshop
Honey extraction room
Perfect weather
Good forage
Good luck

 

[itma]

Should have said first:
A second colony - so you have a full set of (bee) spares. Otherwise accidents of fate (or plain clumsiness and/or stupidity) can leave you at the mercy of the generosity of others.

And with two colonies, you need lots more spare hive bits, etc ...

Which is where the madness starts.

 

[Suzi Q]

A couple of nuc boxes, poly, and spare suit and hive tool, for when you find a hole in the veil and can't find your hive tool. And a nice supply of smoker fuel, collected from a rotten tree and dried until flaky and will light without newspaper.

 

[GrumpyBunny]

The one thing I can't do without and would like more of is ... time. So much to do!

 

[jp19sqn]

Poly Nucs, amazing how useful they are. From hiving your AS temporarily to catching swarms or as a bait hive. Also can be used to place the frame with the Queen on when doing more radical manipulations. A must have. Also good for bringing milk and ice cream back from Tescos if you can't find Finnish honey there of course.

 

[barratt_sab]

A gas blow-torch with auto lighter.

In the summer I use it for flaming out hives (wood - I've not tried it on poly yet ), cleaning floors and lighting the smoker. In the winter I use it for lighting the woodburner.

 

[isc26]

X 2 the equipment you ever thought you would need

x 3 the mony you ever thought you would need

x 4 the time you ever thought you would need

 

[Luminos]

After getting a hive, suit, smoker, hive tool (kindly left in my garden by a friend giving up beekeeping and now filled with bees) I've now bought another complete hive with frames etc as I soon realised you can't get by with just a few extra frames but was wondering what else I need. What can't you live without?

A rich husband

 

[VEG]

lol I only wanted 2 hives