Anybody used a Glenn Hive ?
Anybody used a Glenn Hive ?
I have the inner box of one but have never used it for the purpose it was made. I'll bet that Murray could lift one of these, full and single-handed. He's a big fellow.
We've just had the highly unusual situation in which it took the two of us to lift each of 3 supers off the biggest hive ... at the end of May!!!!!!! Even the overwintered nucs have had to be supered up. Going to have to do a spring extraction for the first time in 20 years, just to have enough supers to go round.
Hi Trog. I extracted 4 supers of very dark honey yesterday. Not sure what it is but I suspect hawthorn or sycamore. Does anyone know if either or both of these produce a dark brown honey. I have quite a few more supers to extract and all of these were filled in the past 2 weeks.
Dunno, Jon. Last time we had really dark honey it was a Hampshire autumn harvest and was largely bramble, I believe. One colony seems to be working blackcurrant; the others may be on hawthorn as well as the last of the sycamores to flower. Bluebells probably coming to an end - haven't had time to go down into the wood. Clover just coming in ... not much blossom on the apple trees; I think that cold snap in April may have something to do with that (or the wretched deer taking off all the buds).
The bramble and clover are just starting here as well. I never see much of a June gap unless the weather happens to be very poor in June. I often see a dearth in August due to poor weather. If the sun is shining the bees find something to forage on.
Hi Gavin, I seem to remember Murray McGregor writing on the beekeeping forum that there was no doubt in his mind (through his own personal observation) that bees seem to prefer the deeper frames -standard langstroth- and do better on them. If that's the case, and if I'm not attributing words to him wrongly, I wonder why he's running more than half of his colonies on mediums? I'm assuming that his labour pool is sufficient to deal with deeps.Originally Posted by gavin
I agree that it would be really good to get his direct input to this forum, there's no doubt that his posts elsewhere on and about beekeeping stand out head and shoulders above the bickering and snide remarks of some self proclaimed experts that inhabit the same board.
Last edited by prakel; 05-06-2012 at 03:01 PM.
Standard Langstroths is what I mean - are they regarded as mediums?
Yup, Murray is very knowledgeable and it would be great to see him posting here. I know that he does read it sometimes. However he's a very busy man with his new Bee Farmers Association responsibilities and a huge beekeeping operation to run, now probably at the busiest time of the year.
Ah, my mistake; I was thinking medium langstroth = dadant depth shallow hence my confusion.
No, not your mistake. I moaned about my one-box system, and it wasn't immediately clear that I meant Langstroth mediums (or Dadant shallows). Using the standard boxes will mean less lifting and moving of boxes, but perhaps a bit heavy. I'd still like to hear how he works.
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks