Build a Pallet Beehive

[VicParticipant @vic]

Thank you for your post Alan, I found the video both interesting and amusing. Thank you also Jonathan for your comments, you answered many of the queries I had. I would have made one of these if I still lived at my old house with its huge garden but our present green space is very much smaller. Could you build a smaller version and if so would it be of any use to our little friends? I suppose the problem might be birds using it for nesting?!

[jaCK HobsonParticipant @jackhobson50760]

Good info all round. Thanks to everyone for reasonable presentations from both sides of the argument! Absolutely the sort of discussion I would hope is encouraged without fear of moderation. I don't think you could get this quality of dicsussion on the more modern social media.

 

At the moment, I'm inclined to build a wild beehive. I suspect I'm quite a way from the nearest domestic hives…

However, I will keep reading with an open mind.

Edited By jaCK Hobson on 08/10/2021 11:44:43

[not done it yetParticipant @notdoneityet]

I missed this thread – away in Scotland that week.

I wholeheartedly agree with Jonathon. A thinking beekeeper.

One point he doesn’t make is that a normal swarm does not occupy a site close to its parent colony – bees are clever enough to spread out so that in a natural environment they are not competing as directly as if they set up home close to the parent colony. That also avoids the spread of disease. Only about 25% of new colonies survive more than a year – ‘selection of the fittest’ at work!

Re bees finding a hive. Certainly not one in a million!!

Scout bees go looking for forage crops every suitable day before the rest of the colony are active (conserving energy and pin-pointing forage). A bee colony knows a couple of weeks (or more) ahead of swarming, so again bees will be searching out any and every possibility for a new home and that information will be passed to others in the colony for further inspection of the most promising sites.

A typical strong farmed colony might be 50 thousand bees of which approximately one third would be foragers. Say a wild colony only had half that number, they would not notice a small drop in forager numbers that are directed to home scouting duties. Furthermore, swarming would often be initiated soon after a strong flow has ceased, thus there being many more foragers without any urgent foraging need – so more can go scouting for a new home.

Since my heart bypass, I have much reduced the amount of honey harvested from my reduced number of hives and, yes, the bees varroa problems are reduced – either by what Jonathon says or by the fact that the colonies are not disrupted by as many weekly inspections as intensively farmed colonies.

Only dummies treat for varroa every nine days. Most sensible beekeepers treat as and when necessary. One very effective treatment can be applied three times at 5 day intervals – to kill off nearly all the phoretic mites, initially, and then any emerging mites from capped cells, as the bees emerge from them. Others treat when there is no brood in the hive, when only a single dose of the varroicide is required.  Dummies that treat every nine days do exist, I suppose – but they are not proper beekeepers.🙂

Regarding Roy’s comment re pheasants, there would also be far less coppiced and wooded land if those that shoot did not act as land conservators.

On a similar note – re managed land – why do we get more serious fires on the moors? Simply because the ‘greenies’ have reduced the regular controlled heather moor burning, which would normally limit fires to smaller, more controllable areas. Certainly climate change is a factor, but so is the reduced land management.

Edited By not done it yet on 08/10/2021 12:53:25

[Clive HartlandParticipant @clivehartland94829]

One aspect of beekeeping is that where there are several colonies say in a 2 to 3 km. radius there is a Drone congregation sets itself up.The Queens will find this Drone congregation to mate.

This has been confirmed by scientific observations.

Now, no Drone congregation there will be no mating of Queens.

I had a friend who set up a colonie of 3 hives and he had so much trouble with them. Moved to a more colonied area and has'nt looked back.

The idea of leave alone beekeeping is not new, it means that the best working bees and Queens survive and you get a honey harvest.

Manipulated colonies do seem to suffer problems as people dabble at beekeeping and disturb them.

[Author]

Posts