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Thread: Bee House

  1. #51
    Senior Member fatshark's Avatar
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    The 'connecting tunnels' is easy to implement ... I did this with mini-nucs overwintering in a greenhouse last year. I used 40mm diameter drainpipe but smaller would work just as well. It should be opaque to avoid confusion. It should also be flush to the outside wall ... I nailed a small separate landing board underneath each entrance and had entrances about 30 cm apart and there seemed to be little confusion or obvious signs of drifting. Make sure they slope downwards from the hive entrance to the outside to avoid driving rain causing a flood!

    An additional advantage of an entrance tunnel is that, with a little ingenuity, it should be possible to block the exterior and interior 'ends' of the tunnel and so minimise bees escaping when moving hives. I lacked this ingenuity but intend to give it a bit more thought.

    I used a glue gun to stick the drainpipe in place, semi-permanently attached to the building wall, allowing the hive to be moved as needed. The beauty of a full hive is that it's heavy enough to not move if accidentally knocked ... this doesn't apply to mini-nucs as I learned to my cost

    Great pics Bridget ... like Bumble I'm suffering from shed envy.

  2. #52
    Senior Member Bridget's Avatar
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    We had a short weekend break with friends in Switzerland. About an hour south of Basle and as we are all keen cyclists we had a couple of trips out. Well we came across lots of bee houses. All the same design so they must be being produced commercially, but it seems that it is just a panel that can be inserted into the wall of a garage or shed. Some were in the woods another in the centre of a small village. The photos show a couple of them and then a bunch of brood boxes stored outside a house in a village each with their own distinguishing markings and colours.
    We liked the sloping landing boards (as Fatshark mentioned above) and also the landing board was hinged to allow it to be semi closed up. I presume this is to stop the glare from the snow in winter, so is also a good idea. What type of hives are they stacked up? they looked a good deal smaller than ours. I would not be able to stack my brood boxes one above the other as the supers would not fit so I'm not sure what they do. Weather was cold so no evidence of bees flying. More pictures in the next post. the local honey for sale was in the Saturday market and about 16francs for a standard jar - thats nearly £11.
    photo 2.JPGphoto 3.JPGphoto 4.JPGphoto 5.JPGphoto 1.JPG
    Last edited by Bridget; 23-11-2013 at 07:47 PM. Reason: Sorry can't get next photos to load - will try later

  3. #53
    Senior Member Mellifera Crofter's Avatar
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    Interesting photos, Bridget - but I think your beehouse is far better.
    Kitta

  4. #54
    Senior Member Bridget's Avatar
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    More Bee house photos - the one behind the tree is an inset into the wall of a garage.
    photo 25.JPGphoto 13.JPGphoto 24.JPG
    Attached Images Attached Images

  5. #55
    Senior Member Bridget's Avatar
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    Default Bee House

    We've had a weekend of work on the bee house. Changing the entrances to the hives and how the hives butted up against the entrances
    mainly as the driving rain had caused the wood to warp and small holes were appearing in the wrong places. We,ve also been given some fancy corrugated roofing by a neighbour who had some over after he had put up his new shed kit roof. Despite wanting a sedum roof I think this will be better in the long run. Thats next weekends work. Nice weather, lots of bees flying and bringing in pollen so fingers crossed looking good to go.


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  6. #56
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    Quote Originally Posted by Bridget View Post
    We liked the sloping landing boards (as Fatshark mentioned above) and also the landing board was hinged to allow it to be semi closed up. I presume this is to stop the glare from the snow in winter, so is also a good idea. photo 2.JPGphoto 3.JPGphoto 4.JPGphoto 5.JPGphoto 1.JPG
    hi,
    the landing board is hinged up so the entrance can be closed (if the hive is vacant). I just place an enpty brood box in the space to close the entrance (mine are not nailed down).
    Prevents bees getting confused, and other animals gaining entrance... Also it is illegal in Germany & I assume Switzerland to leave empty hives openly accessable.
    br
    calum
    Last edited by Calum; 31-03-2014 at 03:57 PM.

  7. #57
    Senior Member Bridget's Avatar
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    Repairing the roof on the bee house today'
    Nice new metal roof off cuts donated by a neighbour. Bit of a jigsaw though.



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  8. #58

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    Well done Bridget, it looks good. i have not built one, but this is encouraging me to think about it again.

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