Paynes Poly National Feeder

[pargyle]

Good to know I'm not the only one who is having trouble with these. Have you a picture of this modification for housing a rapid feeder inside the Paynes national feeder? I will be carving these up myself tomorrow if I see anymore carnage in them.

I've only ever used rapid feeders .. never had a single drowned bee .. even when filling them they just back up the cone. I know it means filling the feeders fairly regularly when they are taking syrup down but for anyone with hives accessible on a daily basis it's a no-brainer IMO.

 

[Beecarer]

I'd be cautions using them again aswel, can't see user error being the problem when you can watch the bees falling into the syrup and drowning before your eyes, this is before they've drank to anywhere near the bottom. Tried all sorts of solutions bits of grass / straw, wooden floater sticks like the poly nucs which helped a bit but then solidified and became a caked mess of dead sugar coated bees and debris, the floating sticks would get stuck because of the slope down to the feed where as if it was the same as the nuc they'd just drop down evenly as the syrup is taken up, looking at the picture of Maisies feeder seems to have no slope into the feed?

http://www.bees-online.co.uk/detail.asp?ID=330&name=Nat-Poly-Hive-Miller-Feeder-with-Clear-Cover

I found that the central removable pieces protrude slightly above the sides - almost caused the death of one of my hives because it meat that the roof wasn't flush and the wasps got in. I took a hammer to them and squashed them down so now the roof sits tight over the feeder. That is the only (and last) one of these feeders I'll use - just too dangerous.

Same problem with ours and the wasps they were what alerted us to the roof gap issue and had to cut some covers for the feed reservoir the same as the cover on the center feed channel even notching the removable inserts so they were flush with the roof didn't seem to solve it.

never had a problem with either the Maisies or Payne's top feeders - to avoid bees creeping into the main reservoir - keep it topped up.
Sounda like a lot of user error to me - never had to adjust any of them with a hammer!

It's weird that other people don't have these issues, I gave mine a serious coating of sand on all sides of the feed chamber but they still toppled in and couldn't get out, hardly user error there? I'll be taking a sledge to mine not to mind a hammer if I see a similar result if I use them again.

I've only ever used rapid feeders .. never had a single drowned bee .. even when filling them they just back up the cone. I know it means filling the feeders fairly regularly when they are taking syrup down but for anyone with hives accessible on a daily basis it's a no-brainer IMO.

I agree the rapid feeders never give a problem just as noted need topping up more often but compared to that mess described above rapid feeders are a 'no-brainer'

I guess the slope could be cut / filed down flat and just put in a wider stick making it the same as the nuc feed chamber.