What to buy

Monsieur Abeille · Nov 11, 2010

Lois - this would be the ideal time to take stock of where you are and where you want to be, which sounds exactly like what you are doing.

The natural thing would be to get a copy of everything you already have, but this is also the best time to consider any changes you want to make such as larger brood box or moving to OMF.

If you are on a standard national and staying there, then I can echo what Drex says re the Thornes flat pack. Not difficult to assemble - if I can do it I'm sure you or hubby can - and the Bees on a Budget one comes with everything (though only 2 supers, you may need a 3rd

) Of course you can wait for the sale though I doubt youd get much of a further discount.

https://secure.thorne.co.uk/popup/package1.htm

oliver90owner · Nov 11, 2010

Or, wait to see the pricing structure for the MBS poly hivs coming to the market - that is if you are not averse to the construction materials. I would think they are likely to seriously shake up the cedar hive market, on price.

They may be a little more aesthetically pleasing than previous efforts, too.

Regards, RAB

rae · Nov 11, 2010

Work out where you want to get to next year. Assuming they make it through the winter in good form, the problem next year will be "increase". Do you want more colonies? I assume with only one, the answer is "yes". How many do you want? When you need to AS them, you can go to two...or three....or four.

If you want to go to two, then you need another "proper" hive, whatever that means to you. Poly, cedar, doesn't matter, but it needs to last.

If you want to go to two, but (rightly) worry that there is a chance your split might not get mated (we got 3/4 this year), then you might want to run three boxes over the spring/summer and drop back to two at the end of the season. So in this case, you need a proper hive...and something made out of ply or whatever to get you through the summer. A couple of ply boxes are pretty handy anyway to deal with emergencies and swarms.

Our "evolution" has been like this (not saying it is right....)

- Started with two cedar hives (Thornes flat pack)
- Did AS in spades in April this year, involving emergency trips to Thornes and late night assembly.
- We now have 6 hives, and this is where we want to say.
- At the moment I am making supers and nuc boxes ready for next season - all 18mm ply and pine. They will only be out in the spring/summer, so I'm not overly worried about materials.

oliver90owner · Nov 11, 2010

Rae,

Does that mean you presently have only two spare brood boxes?

If so, not really enough. Someones law says they will all need an A/S at the same time!

You probably need brood-and-a-half or even possibly double broods to reduce this swarming instinct your bees have?!?

Two supers and a 20mm eke will be OK as a makeshift 14 x 12 brood, so maybe supers (lots of them) might suffice.

Regards, RAB

rae · Nov 11, 2010

oliver90owner said:
Rae,

Does that mean you presently have only two spare brood boxes?

If so, not really enough. Someones law says they will all need an A/S at the same time!

You probably need brood-and-a-half or even possibly double broods to reduce this swarming instinct your bees have?!?

Two supers and a 20mm eke will be OK as a makeshift 14 x 12 brood, so maybe supers (lots of them) might suffice.

Regards, RAB

To clarify!

I have 6 operational hives, with plenty of stores and bees. Hopefully they will all make it.

I have an average of 1.5 supers per hive if all 6 survive. This is not enough, hence why I have set up the production line in the garage. I now have parts for 10, which gets me roughly to three per hive. If I need more, it is an evening's work to run off another 10.

I have one spare brood box at the moment! I want to go to 8 hives max, so I will get another "quality" 14x12. I will also knock up a couple of ply broods so that I am covered for "emergencies".

My plan with the increase next year is to AS the lot of them as soon as there is any sign of queen cells! Two of the hives will be AS-ed into the brood boxes and kept on. The rest will be divided into a number of nucs, which I will make of ply (though I do have some very nice second-hand Thornes nuc boxes as well). Depending on where we get to with mating, I will either be selling a few nucs, or combining.

As far as nuc sales go, my plan is to offer them at a reasonable price (£100) as fully working little colonies. My only problem is that I am not a real "bee breeder", so the temperament of the queens will be pot luck. This year, three of the new queens have been lovely, the other one has been awful. So the pricing allows for someone to replace the queen if she turns out to be a tyrant.