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Thread: Poly hive musings.

  1. #471
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kate Atchley View Post
    How very dull these pages would be if we all agreed on the same methods and kit, based on the latest information ... i.e. wholly rational, proven choices!
    I couldn't agree more!
    Lol to the herding cats.
    I tend to accumulate equipment in piecemeal lots, I understand this means I don't always get a competitive price but it has allowed me to keep my overheads down as I've not needed to borrow large chunks of money.
    It's the same old story of the easiest way to make a small fortune is to start with a big one, I didn't get that choice but manage ok.
    They say you should never start bee farming without a bit of money behind you, 20 years later I'm still skint.

  2. #472
    Senior Member busybeephilip's Avatar
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    re : What I see is that many associations have a guy who is the de factor supplier of kit to the new and established beekeepers, often at very high prices.



    Yes, usually called 'agents' for beekeeping supply houses. Ordering in bulk is the way to go, just need to be careful that youre not left holding a lot of unwanted stock
    Last edited by busybeephilip; 18-03-2016 at 12:48 PM.

  3. #473

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    Interesting mininuc discussion guys. I'm pretty much an apidea man myself but was tempted by 5 of these last year

    http://www.sbai.org.uk/sbai_forum/sh...9246#post29246

    Haven't used them yet but the concertina-d National frame puts them one up on the miniplus in my opinion. Found the top bar fantoucherie of Kielers a pain in the rear end.

  4. #474

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    Quote Originally Posted by drumgerry View Post
    Interesting mininuc discussion guys. I'm pretty much an apidea man myself but was tempted by 5 of these last year

    http://www.sbai.org.uk/sbai_forum/sh...9246#post29246

    Haven't used them yet but the concertina-d National frame puts them one up on the miniplus in my opinion. Found the top bar fantoucherie of Kielers a pain in the rear end.

    These are not at all uncommon in Europe, though mainly to take a folded up Langstroth.

    One bee supply place I was in in Italy had then in all sizes up to six in a row, though threes and fours were the most popular. I got prices for them but the owner said they were not big sellers, and that Kielers (both original and Polish copy) and Apideas remained the most popular by far. He also had both types of mini plus but the local breeders preferred other options.

    I met one guy using the concertina frames and he was a mix of happy with them, as it made moving them into full hives so easy, but also scathing, as he said it was an embarrassing reality that the lovely new queen occasionally ended up dead or damaged as she had been nipped as the frame returned to the non concertina shape. the bees propensity for filling in some ladder comb etc around the sides of the unit also meant that many of the frames need a bit of a scrape off before they would go to the straight frame format.

    I took a price for them from him, and the four unit box, including the assembled frames was 14 euros, and was made in Romania. They were wooden and looked very well made. Could be discounted down to as low as 9 euros for a large order.

    Was a big bee supply house, and their showroom and shop was like a modest sized supermarket.
    Last edited by Calluna4u; 18-03-2016 at 07:48 PM.

  5. #475
    Senior Member prakel's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by mbc View Post
    I've made some four frame nucs to take miniplus frames along the same lines as the ones PeteL showed photos of on the beeforum, if i rememer rightly his are half national size and similar in design to what Mike Coller uses, I particularly liked the half milk bottle feeder on the end
    Yes, we did the same a couple of years back (tried all sorts of variants infact). My own favourite was the use of a simple mating box made from OSB3 which could be worked in conjunction with an additional box which fits on top of an extra wide nuc box holding standard frames. This allows spare mini-plus frames to be drawn and filled so that store combs can be given in preference to putting raw feed into the mating nucs. I also used exactly the same principle with our own 'small frame' nucs but in that case the boxes are the right width to fit on top of a standard 5 frame bs nuc (picture). OK, so I'm adding a photo of a home made wooden box to the polyhive thread....

    But they do say that there's nothing new in bees; having convinced myself that I'd built something unique I then saw a POLYSTYRENE version (designed to work with the other mini-plus and a poly nuc box) on a German blog!

    060.jpg
    Last edited by prakel; 18-03-2016 at 10:09 PM.

  6. #476

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    Thanks for the heads up on the nipped queens C4U! I'm wondering whether once they have drawn comb on to the folded up frame it'll hold its shape? And then the danger of nipping will only be at the final stage once the frame is extended to be moved into a proper hive. But then finding her might be a problem if it gets stuck in that position for the whole season! Hmmm......

    I'm intending to give them a go this summer so I'll report back. I got them as an experiment really as I can't imagine forking out the Thorne's price to get them in relative bulk. Maybe a case for a joint order with some other "cats" if we can be made to stay in one place long enough! I'm a bit like MBC though - have to get kit when I can spare the cash and that wouldn't necessarily coincide with the circumstances of other beekeepers.

    My build up to bigger numbers is a long slow process because of this. I have the kit to raise about 50 queens at one time now - more than I need. My colony numbers (only 15 as we speak which includes a couple of overwintered nucs) can't really support as many mininucs as this and still get me a honey crop.

  7. #477
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    Less is more with mini nucs. The simpler the better.
    The only thing I change with Apideas is the queen excluder as the home made one allows 20 entrance slots instead of 3.
    I only use these if I think the risk of absconding is high.

    drones-behind-apidea-excluder.jpg

    Edit - the forum still wont show my photos Gav.

  8. #478

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    http://www.localmatters.co.nz/News/M...Highway+1.html

    Does not get any simpler than these things, sadly I don't have a close up of them. They are effectively a micro nucleus developed by Russell Berry in New Zealand (owner of Arataki). Even smaller than a mini nuc. One comb only. I think its 12 get stacked in a milk crate.

    They get filled at home base with a very small amount of bees and a virgin, stacked on a pallet, then driven to an area with good but unrelated drones for mating with and all set out (they have a spike on the bottom) and just left for 2 weeks or so, then, good or bad, they are collected up in their thousands and taken back to base. Good laying queens are harvested, bad ones discarded, then start all over again. If its not mated and laying in the short window then they reckon is not likely to be great anyway so all get emptied out and start over.
    Last edited by Calluna4u; 18-03-2016 at 10:26 PM.

  9. #479

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    [QUOTE=drumgerry;35106]Thanks for the heads up on the nipped queens C4U! /QUOTE]

    You can squash them in apideas easily as well though DG
    I have squashed her when putting the frames back and she nips under the top bar
    Likewise if the keilers are not level they build the comb to suit and lifting straight up can squash them

    Lost another overwintered single keiler (starved out) so down to 8 now still not bad (while to go yet)

  10. #480
    Senior Member prakel's Avatar
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    I see that 'Modern Beekeeping' the well known UK distributor for Paradise Honey hives are advertising that they're going to be stocking the other Finnish hive range from Honey Paw; boxes which have flat surfaces. Presumably only langstroth.

    http://www.modernbeekeeping.co.uk/im...oney%20Paw.pdf
    Last edited by prakel; 11-04-2016 at 10:34 AM.

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