My
beekeeping year 2014
30dec13
Samuel
Murray, Ugchelen
I have
access to between one and four beekeepers' club apiaries/bee stalls near my
house, where I would like to place three self-made bee hives each. The three hives include a wooden long-deep
hive, a wooden short-deep hive, and a styrofoam hive.
My aim with
these hives is that they are cheap and easy to build.
The
styrofoam hive is the cheapest and simplest to build, involving nothing more
than 40 cm thick insulation-grade styrofoam sheets, lots duct tape, and some
plastic foil. It takes up to 8 frames
per box. The outside dimensions are 53
cm square. These boxes are so easy to make
that they can be made to take any of the three frame sizes I use.
The wooden
long-deep and short-deep hives use a jumbo sized frame (of my own design) for
the brood nest, and standard Dutch simplex honey frames for the supers. They are made from the cheapest wood
available. Due to the use of simple
joints, I'll probably use thicker wood than what is usual for bee hives in this
region.
The
short-deep hive can take up to 12 frames, although it is usual to add spacers
to such hives and use only 8-10 frames per box.
The short-deep's outside dimensions are 50 cm square. The long-deep hive is designed for 19 frames.
It's outside dimensions are 50 cm by 75
cm. The honey supers are 25 cm wide,
which means that two of them fit side-by-side on top of a short-deep box, and
three of them on top of a long-deep box.
|
|
high |
wide |
deep |
# frames |
|
Styrofoam
hive |
any |
53 cm |
53 cm |
8 |
|
Wooden
honey super |
15 cm |
25 cm |
50 cm |
5 |
|
Short-deep
brood box |
37 cm |
50 cm |
50 cm |
up to 12 |
|
Long-deep
brood box |
37 cm |
75 cm |
50 cm |
19 |
The
beekeeping method I intend to follow in the long-deep hive is that of the
Dartington hive, a.k.a. the Omlet Beehaus hive.
As far as I know, there are no other beekeepers in my area that use this
hive type. Our summers are about a month
longer than in Hitchin, but we have 5-7 more rain days per month, and our
winters are 2 degrees colder. That said,
we have not had a "typical" summer nor a "typical" winter
in 5 years. It will be interesting to
see how the Dartington method fares in our climate.
For the
short-deep hive I'll implement the orthodox beekeeping method of the region and
new beekeeper mentors where I live. I
use jumbo sized frames for the brood nest, which is uncommon in my region, and
I don't know if the bees will fill two brood boxes, although I'm told that the
local hobbyist bee (Buckfast) can easily manage that, if given half a chance.
This is
what the short-deep and long-deep hives would look like at the height of flow:
|
|
A
few words about the Dartington hive
The design
of my long-deep hive is based my understanding of what the Dartington hive must
have been live, and on information provided by about the Omlet Beehaus, which
is based on the Dartington hive.
Although it is a long hive, the beekeeping method used in it has little
in common with e.g. the top-bar hive, which is also a long hive.
The
Dartington hive consists of a single, long, deep brood box with 21 frames in
summer and 9 frames in winter. There are
entrance holes on both sides of the hive, and one can create splits inside the
single box, and even overwinter two colonies in the single box.
A storey of
four honey supers with 5 frames each can be placed on top of the Dartington
hive, in summer. In fact, one can add a
second storey of honey boxes on top of the first storey, if there is sufficient
flow, or if one doesn't want to harvest yet.
For the
brood chamber, the Dartington uses British National "14x12" deep
frames. For the honey supers, the
Dartington uses National super frames, which are practically the same size as
Dutch simplex honey frames. The National
frames also have 4 cm long ears, like the Dutch simplex frames.
|
|
The classic Dartington |
My long-deep hive |
|
Frame
type |
National
14x12 deep |
Anderhalf
simplex |
|
Per-frame
area |
0.199 m2 |
0.214 m2 |
|
Summer
size |
21 frames |
19 frames |
|
Maximum
comb area |
4.179 m2 |
4.066 m2 |
|
Supers
per storey |
4 |
3 |
|
Honey
frames per storey |
20 |
15-18 |
Here is a
classic Dartington hive, with seven of the eight supers on (notice that the
upper left box sits on top of a clearing board and is therefore either not part
of the hive or may contain a syrup feeder):
|
|
My own
long-deep hive is slightly smaller than the Dartington hive but has roughly the
same brood frame shape and area, so hopefully the bees will behave similarly.
The
"anderhalf simplex" frame
For the
brood boxes in both my long-deep and short-deep hives, I will use what I call
"anderhalf simplex" frames (lit: simplex-and-a-half). Let me know if you can think of a better name
:-).
An
anderhalf simplex frame consists of a simplex honey frame, with ears intact,
plus a simplex brood frame, with the ears removed.
|
|
The
original simplex brood frame is not altered in any way except for removing the
ears, which means that it can be separated and re-attached to any honey
frame. The two frames are held together
using two or three metal push clamps, or with cable ties. This means that one could separate and
re-join frames even if there are bees on them.
A normal
simplex honey frame's comb area is 0.081 m2 (total for both sides), and the
normal simplex brood frame's comb area is 0.133 m2. The anderhalf simplex frame therefore has a
comb surface area of 0.214 m2. This makes it smaller than the Langstroth
jumbo (0.234 m2) and just a tad larger than the National "14x12" deep
(0.199 m2).
Two
anderhalf simplex boxes would have a comb area of just over 3 simplex brood
boxes. If I understand local beekeeping
methods correctly, I should therefore be able to use two anderhalf simplex
boxes in summer and one anderhalf simplex box in winter.
Comparison of the brood frame sizes:
|
|
Comb area
per frame (incl. both sides) |
|
Simplex
honey frame |
0.081 m2 |
|
Simplex
brood frame |
0.133 m2 |
|
Double
honey (so-called "duhoka") |
0.175 m2 |
|
National
"14x12" deep |
0.199 m2 |
|
Anderhalf
simplex |
0.214 m2 |
|
Langstroth
jumbo |
0.234 m2 |
Below is a
visual comparison between the anderhalf simplex frame and two other short-deep
frames (from the US and UK), and between the anderhalf simplex frame and other
simplex frame sizes used in this area:
|
|
Overview
of my long-deep and short-deep hives
My hives
were designed to keep these principles in mind:
- They must be cheap to build
- They must be easy to build with
hand-tools only
- They must use locally available
frame sizes
- The hive parts must have
interchangeable dimensions
Each
long-deep will consist of one brood box plus at least three honey supers. Each
short-deep will consist of two brood boxes and at least two honey supers
(preferably four).
The boxes
will use bottom bee space (i.e. the top of the frame will be flush with the top
of the box), because it is much simpler for me to make. To affix
the frame rests correctly, simply turn the box upside down, put some
upside-down frames in it, and fit the frame rests accordingly.
Both
short-deep and long-deep hive will have a bottom board, fit to size. The short-deep will have one varroa tray and
the long-deep will have two. The
position of the tray opening will depend on how the long-deep will be
positioned in the apiary.
Both the
long-deep and the short-deep will use 25 mm wide inner covers, followed by a
roof. This will allow me to use the same
inner covers for both hive sizes and the honey supers as well, and make it
easier to inspect only part of the hive without exposing an entire box to air
and light. The short-deep may be covered
by a Warré-style quilt box.
The image
below shows roughly what the three boxes would look like, from above, if made
from 3 cm thick steiger wood.
|
|
Dimensions: Long-deep: 37 cm
tall, 50 cm broad, 75 cm wide 19
anderhalf simplex frames Short-deep: 37 cm
tall, 50 cm broad, 50 cm wide Up to 12
anderhalf simplex frames Honey
super: 15 cm
tall, 50 cm broad, 25 cm wide 5 simplex
honey frames (If the honey supers are made with 16 mm
planks instead of 30 mm planks on the long sides, they would be able to take
6 frames instead of 5 frames.) |
3 cm
wood versus 1.6 cm wood
Although it
would have been ideal to use wooden boards that are cut to the exact sizes,
that option works out to be quite expensive for the amount of material that I
intend to use. The cheapest options that
are also easy to construct are 3 cm steiger wood planks and/or 1.6 cm yard
planking.
I have my doubts
about whether I can join the 1.6 cm planks in a sufficiently strong manner,
therefore the options that I consider are:
(a) boxes
that use steiger wood exclusively and
(b) boxes
that use steiger wood for the sides parallel to the frames and yard planking
for the other sides.
In my
design, boxes built using both options can be used interchangeably.
Since the
honey supers are 15 cm high and the yard planking is 14 cm "high", I
could make honey supers using the yard planking that consist of a 14 cm high
box plus a 1 cm shim. The image below
shows the honey super with shims.
Theoretically one can fit 6 frames with 35 mm heart-to-heart distance,
or 5 frames with 42 mm heart-to-heart distance.
|
|
The image
below shows the honey super if built with steiger wood (blue) sides. When using steiger wood, there is the option
to reduce the number of shim planks (grey) needed, but I suspect it will
require more accurate sawing than I can manage.
This box can take 5 frames.
|
|
Both the
short-deep (50 cm) and long-deep (75 cm) boxes follow the design in the image
below. The figures between brackets
indicate the separate planks, e.g. the purple sides consist of two 14 cm planks
plus one 9 cm plank, to make 37 cm in total.
|
|
Bottom
board
The image
below shows the design of the bottom board/varroa tray. The bottom board consists of three
"layers" of wood (as can be seen from the front). The red horizontal line in the second image
is the varroa grille.
|
|
Available
materials
|
|
The steiger
wood from Gamma works out to EUR 5.20 per meter. If bought at regional wood shops, the price
is about EUR 2.50 per meter.
http://www.bouwmarktdevries.nl/ =
EUR 2.25 per meter (Vaassen)
http://www.brinkmarkt.nl/ = EUR 3.00 per
meter (Kootwijkerbroek)
http://www.wijnensteigermeubels.nl/
= EUR 2.50 per meter (Luntheren)
http://www.kouswijkjansen.nl/ = ???
(Klarenbeek)
http://www.tuinhoutenzo.nl/ = ???
(Apeldoorn)
|
|
|
|
|
Costing
(as per Gamma prices)
Long-deep brood box
For one
long-deep box (steiger wood plus yard planking):
|
1 x 195
mm steiger wood planks |
EUR 13,00 |
|
2 x 14.2
mm yard planking |
EUR 10,00 |
|
0.6 x
multiplex board, cut to size by the wood store |
EUR 4,00 |
|
1.3 x 30
mm steiger wood planks |
EUR 4,00 |
|
TOTAL PER LONG-DEEP (wood only) |
EUR 31,00 |
Or, for one long-deep box (steiger
wood only):
|
2 x 195 mm steiger wood planks |
EUR 26,00 |
|
0.6 x multiplex board, cut to
size by the wood store |
EUR 4,00 |
|
1.3 x 30 mm steiger wood planks |
EUR 4,00 |
|
TOTAL PER LONG-DEEP (wood only) |
EUR 34,00 |
Short-deep brood box
For TWO
short-deep boxes (steiger wood plus yard planking):
|
2 x 195
mm steiger wood planks |
EUR 26,00 |
|
3 x 14.2
mm yard planking |
EUR 15,00 |
|
1 x
multiplex board, cut to size by the wood store |
EUR 5,00 |
|
1 x 30 mm
steiger wood planks |
EUR 3,00 |
|
TOTAL PER 2 x SHORT-DEEP (wood only) |
EUR 49,00 |
Or, for TWO short-deep
boxes (steiger wood only):
|
3.5 x 195 mm steiger wood
planks |
EUR 45,00 |
|
1 x multiplex board, cut to
size by the wood store |
EUR 5,00 |
|
1 x 30 mm steiger wood planks |
EUR 3,00 |
|
TOTAL PER 2 x SHORT-DEEP (wood
only) |
EUR 53,00 |
Honey super
For one
honey super (yard planking only, excluding shims):
|
0.6 x
14.2 mm yard planking |
EUR 3,00 |
|
0.2 x
multiplex board, cut to size by the wood store |
EUR 1,00 |
|
0.3 x 30
mm steiger wood planks |
EUR 1,00 |
|
TOTAL PER thin-wood HONEY SUPER (wood only) |
EUR 5,00 |
Or, for one honey super (steiger
wood plus yard planking, excluding shims):
|
0.2 x 195 mm steiger wood
planks |
EUR 3,00 |
|
0.3 x 14.2 mm yard planking |
EUR 2,00 |
|
0.2 x multiplex board, cut to
size by the wood store |
EUR 1,00 |
|
0.3 x 30 mm steiger wood planks |
EUR 1,00 |
|
TOTAL PER thick/thin-wood HONEY
SUPER (wood only) |
EUR 7,00 |
Or, for one honey super (steiger wood on all four sides):
|
0.6 x 195 mm steiger wood
planks |
EUR 8,00 |
|
0.2 x multiplex board, cut to
size by the wood store |
EUR 1,00 |
|
0.3 x 30 mm steiger wood planks |
EUR 1,00 |
|
TOTAL PER thick-wood HONEY
SUPER (wood only) |
EUR 10,00 |
Cost
per hive (wood only) (Gamma wood prices)
Long-deep
1 x
long-deep brood + 3 x honey supers = EUR 31 + EUR 15 = EUR 46
1 x
long-deep brood + 6 x honey supers = EUR 31 + EUR 30 = EUR 61
Short-deep
2 x
short-deep brood + 2 x honey supers = EUR 49 + EUR 10 = EUR 59
2 x
short-deep brood + 4 x honey supers = EUR 49 + EUR 20 = EUR 69