Beehives for Honey Production...management practices can be employed to boost honey production to levels undreamt of in the early 1800's. Frame hives are probably the best to use for

BEEHIVES

FOR

HONEY PRODUCTION Mike Schmolke

September 2009

Content

The Need for Manageable Hives

Hollow Log – Fixed Comb Hives (Vertical)

Hollow Log or Bark – Fixed Comb Hives (Horizontal)

Skeps – Fixed Comb Hives

Miscellaneous: Fixed Comb Hives

Greek Basket Hives with Moveable Combs

Frame Hives with Moveable Combs

Kenya Top-bar Hives with Moveable Combs

Width of Top-bars

Guide Lines on Top-bars

Deciding which Kind of Hive to use

Some Advantages and Disadvantages of the Different Hives

The Need for Manageable Hives Wherever honeybees occur, the honey that they store in their honeycombs has been taken from them by people who enjoy eating honey. This practise is called honey hunting and it often results in the destruction of the bee colony. Long ago, however, people started putting out various containers (bee-hives) into which the bees were enticed. Bee hives varied (and still do) in size and shape and some of them proved to provide better homes for the bees than others. Some of them proved to make it easier for people to get at the honey while others didn't help much. Beekeepers who want to manage their bees and encourage them to store much more honey than the bees need for their own use also want to open the hives and see what is going on inside the hive. The beekeepers will want to take out each comb, examine it, and then replace it undamaged. What the beekeepers see can tell them what management steps to follow next. Hollow Log – Fixed Comb Hives (Vertical) In Europe beekeepers used to cut sections of hollow trees, place them on end, put tops on the "hives", and wait for bees to take up residence. The bees, as always, built combs hanging down from the tops or roofs and also attached the combs to the sides of the hollow logs. Suitable for the bees but not very suitable for the beekeeper – the combs had to be cut out and could not be replaced undamaged. Hollow Log or Bark – Fixed Comb Hives (Horizontal) In Africa, hollow logs or cylinders of bark were and are still used as hives by many traditional beekeepers. Here the hives are suspended horizontally in trees for safety against honey badgers and grass fires. The bees may build the combs lengthways down the hive, or they may follow the rudimentary guidelines made by the beekeeper and build round combs across the hive – this makes it easier for the beekeeper when the full honey combs are to be removed. Again, these hives are acceptable to the bees but the combs still cannot be removed unless they are cut or broken out and the combs cannot then be returned undamaged to the hive after the inspection.

Fig. 1 Log Hives with fixed or immovable combs.

Photo 1 – Fixed Combs in Log Hive Photo 2 – Removing Comb from Log Hive Skeps – Fixed Comb Hives In Europe, hives fashioned out of coils of grass or straw were later made in the shape of upside –down round baskets. Again, the combs were attached to the roof and sides of the hives, called skeps, and could not be inspected. At the end of the season the bees were killed by the beekeeper who placed the heavier hives over burning sulphur (poisonous sulphur dioxide was produced) and the combs could be removed without the beekeeper getting stung by live bees. The more progressive beekeepers persuaded the whole colony of bees to move into a new skep before they cropped the honey.

Fig. 2 Skep Hive with fixed or immovable combs. Miscellaneous Fixed Comb Hives Wooden boxes and other empty containers of various shapes and sizes were tried over time but all had the same drawback – the combs could not be removed and replaced without damage after inspection. Such fixed comb hives are now banned in many countries because it is difficult or even impossible to examine the combs to determine whether or not the bees are healthy. These examinations are very necessary because bees may be infected with some serious bee diseases and or may be troubled by nasty parasites which need to be controlled. Greek Basket Hives with Moveable Combs The Greeks were apparently the first people to use moveable comb hives. The hive bodies were round, open topped baskets which were plastered with a mixture of cow-dung and mud and were covered with narrow planks on which the bees built their combs. The planks, or top-bars as they are now called, could each be lifted out with an undamaged comb attached, and could be replaced after examination. A grass roof was used to keep out the rain. These

moveable comb hives were, unfortunately, not recognized as being particularly useful and were not brought into general use although the Greeks had used them for hundreds of years.

Fig. 3 Greek Basket Hive with moveable combs.

Photo 3 – Beekeepers buying Baskets Photo 4 – Plastering a Greek Basket Hive

Photo 5 – Combs with Honey above and Brood below Frame Hives with Moveable Combs The search for a bee-hive that suited the bees as well as the beekeepers continued for many years until, in the mid-1800's, the Reverend Langstroth in America made a breakthrough. He constructed rectangular frames of thin, narrow planks and fixed pieces of comb into the frames. The top-bars of the frames projected beyond the side bars and rested on rebates in the edges

of the wooden box which made the hive. The only places where the bees attached the frames to the hive body were the narrow projections of the frames. It was thus quite easy to break the "bee glue" and lift the frames with their undamaged combs from the hives and to return them to the hives after the inspection. Frames with combs full of honey could easily be harvested, or cropped.

Fig. 4 Frame hive with two hive bodies on top of each other.

The top or cover of the hive was placed so that there was a passage way or "bee space" above the frames and the bees did not then glue the lid to the frames although they did glue it to the top of the hive body. The lid could be prised loose without too much disturbance to the bees. The frames were spaced evenly apart in the hive body so that the combs within them were separated from each other with, again, a passage way for the bees to pass in and to work on their combs. Today we use thin sheets of beeswax, called foundation, carefully fixed in the centre of each frame to guide the bees to construct their combs straight on the wax foundations so that an even space is left between each pair of combs. The bottom bars of the frames are held a bee space or more above the floors of the hives so that the bees are not so likely to stick them to the floor boards. Frame hives can be constructed so that they hold as many frames as the beekeeper wants, all on one level in a long hive body. The most common arrangement today,

however, is to have open ended hive bodies, holding say ten frames, and to place a second or even more hive bodies on top of the first when the bees need more room to live and work in. Of course, a bee space is left between the top bars of the frames in the lower boxes and the bottom bars of the upper boxes.

Photo 6 – Inspecting Brood Frame

Frames can be made to any size and shape and the hive bodies must, of course, be constructed to match the frames and to leave the correct bee spaces where are required. Incorrect construction can lead to all the frames being stuck firmly; for instance to the insides of the hive bodies, and the frames, therefore, become virtually immovable. Expensive machinery is needed if hive parts are to be made accurately. Frame hives are today used universally and have proved to be very adaptable. Sophisticated management practices can be employed to boost honey production to levels undreamt of in the early 1800's. Frame hives are probably the best to use for large-scale enterprises but only when beekeepers can undergo lengthy training in theoretical and practical hive management. Small scale and hobby beekeepers can also, of course, use frame hives. Kenya Top-bar Hives with Moveable Combs

Photo 7 – Two Kenya Top-bar Hives Photo 8 – Apiary with Kenya Top-bar Hives This hive is now gaining in popularity in a number of different countries but it is not expected that it will replace the versatile frame hive, particularly when the hives have to be moved to different areas either for the bees to collect nectar for honey production from a different source, or when the hives have to be moved for the bees to pollinate the flowers of different crops e.g. granadillas, sunflowers, cashew nuts, etc. The KTBH was developed, as its name implies, in Kenya by Patterson in the 1970's – over 100 years after Langstroth started constructing bee hives with bee spaces and moveable combs. It can be seen as an extension of the Greek Basket Top-bar moveable comb hive theme but it is much easier for the beekeeper to use than the basket hive and it is just as acceptable to the bees.

Fig. 5 The Kenya Top-bar Hive

The combs are built by the bees to fit the shape of the hive body and they are seldom firmly attached to the sloping sides of the hive even when heavy with honey. The bees will use a number of adjacent combs for brood rearing. These combs will have a fairly small crown of honey above the brood with some cells containing stored pollen between the brood and the honey crown. With a little bit of manipulation (moving) of top-bars with combs attached, it is quite easy to induce the bees to fill some combs completely with honey only – this makes cropping the honey easy – and to have the bees use other combs mostly for brood rearing. The dimensions of the KTBH can be varied to suit circumstances e.g. they can be made longer to accommodate more top-bars and combs where big crops of honey are expected. Experience of beekeeping in a particular area will indicate if hives are of a suitable size for the bees and the conditions in a particular area. None of the dimensions of the hive body are critical although it should have a reasonable slope to the sides to minimize the attachment of the combs to the sides. The top-bars need only to be thick enough so that they do not bend with the weight of honey on them. They must however, be the correct width to meet the requirements of the bees which are to occupy the hives. Width of Top-bars The honeybees (Apis mellifera scutellata) that are commonly found in Zimbabwe build their combs, in their natural nests, with the centres of the combs 32 mm apart. This leaves enough space between the combs, when they have been fully built out, for the bees to move between the combs. We use top-bars 32 to 33 mm wide to satisfy the bees and have them build one comb only on each top-bar. A different race of honeybees (Apis mellifera littorea) is found along the eastern coastal areas of Africa and these bees are smaller than scutellata bees. The distance between the centres of their adjacent combs are thus to be less than the distance between the centres of combs built by scutellata bees. Littorea bees, therefore, need narrower top-bars (30-31 mm wide) if they are to build combs straight on each top-bar. (Bees only tend to build straight combs when left to their own devices but they do not invariably do so – beekeepers must be prepared to correct any deviations from the straight and narrow!) Guide Lines on Top-bars Beekeepers can place ridges or lines of beeswax down the centres of each top-bar to "encourage" the bees to build a straight comb on each top-bar. This is an important step as straight combs are easy to lift out of the hive while it is not possible to lift out crooked combs which are built across the bars or built from one bar to the next. Deciding which Kind of Hive to use When people decide that they want to keep bees, they have to decide what kind of bee hive they want to use. The decisions they make will probably be influenced by what they see established beekeepers in their areas using. They might, for instance, know about the many hollow log hives being used by traditional beekeepers in their areas. Many tons of honey-combs are cropped annually in Zimbabwe alone from such hives and potential beekeepers may be impressed by the amount of honey brought in. They may not know that it could be easier and more productive for them to use other types of hives. Or potential beekeepers may be

persuaded by agents from aid agencies who, for various reasons, introduce frame hives without delivering the very necessary but costly and lengthy training in beekeeping which should follow the delivery of frame hives to potential beekeepers. Some Advantages and Disadvantages of the Different Hives To help beekeepers, including potential beekeepers, to make better informed decisions about what type of hive to use, some of the advantages and some of the disadvantages relating to the different hives already discussed are listed. 1. Hollow Log – Fixed Comb Hives (Vertical)

Advantages

· Cheap to acquire in forest area. · Can give fair to good amounts of broken honey combs.

Disadvantages

· Difficult to control the bees while cropping. · Combs difficult to remove. · Hives cannot easily be moved to different areas. · Beekeeper cannot provide more working space for bees. · Honey and brood on same combs.

2. Hollow Log or Bark – Fixed Comb Hives (Horizontal)

Advantages

· Well known to traditional beekeepers in Africa. · Many hives can be set up for little or no monetary cost. · Much honey can be collected. · Not much technical knowledge is required. · Can be placed up in trees away from fires and honey badgers.

Disadvantages

· Growing trees which are sources of pollen and nectar for the bees may be cut down, or be ring barked (the trees die).

· Difficult to control the bees. · Difficult and sometimes dangerous to climb up the trees to reach them. · Care is needed to produce good quality, clean honey combs. · Impossible to inspect combs for diseases. · Difficult to assess whether or not there is a good queen bee present. · Difficult to implement any management practices to improve honey production. · Honey and brood often on same combs. · Women are generally excluded from becoming beekeepers although they may handle

the honey crop.

3. Skeps – Fixed Comb Hives

Advantages

· Can be used to trap or collect swarms. · Cheap to make locally.

Disadvantages

· Bees killed or displaced before cropping. · Proper inspections impossible. · Honey and brood on same combs. · Difficult to crop honey.

Miscellaneous: Fixed Comb Hives

The odd boxes etc. which are used as fixed comb hives all suffer the same disadvantages given above. Any beekeepers who are familiar with the advantages of using moveable comb hives, which allow good management practices to be followed, are unlikely to choose to use fixed comb hives. However, in many cases impoverished rural people just do not have the limited cash resources to purchase even cheap hives or the materials to construct them. They are then left with no option but to use log or bark hives.

It must be realised that the total amount of honey produced in log and bark hives in Africa is considerable. The producers can quite easily be taught to grade their honeycombs properly so that they realize the best prices for their produce. While honeycombs (complete with the wax used by the bees to construct the combs) can be sold to a central processing unit where the honey is separated from the wax, a lot more beeswax could be recovered fairly easily if beekeepers themselves can be taught to process old or empty combs as well. Traditional beekeepers are often proud of their skills, handed down to them by their forefathers, and they should not be condemned out of hand for following familiar methods of beekeeping. They will often gain much by being taught to grade honey combs properly and so gain better prices. They also often need to be taught how to process beeswax.

4. Greek Basket Hives with Moveable Combs

Advantages

· Basket making is a common practise in many rural areas and the hives can easily be acquired cheaply.

· Baskets can be made using split bamboo or reeds, or thin, flexible plant stems. · Mud and cow-dung are freely available. · Combs can be inspected and many good management practices are possible. · Disease and pest control measures can be implemented. · Old brood combs can be replaced. · Good quality, clean, newly built honey combs can be produced. · Top bars of the correct width are the only parts of the hives which need to be cut

accurately. · The bees readily build new combs to replace those removed by the beekeeper who

can recover the beeswax from the honey combs and from old combs.

Disadvantages

· Top bars vary in length and so the combs built on them will also vary in size; they cannot be swapped around too easily.

· Some of the larger combs will contain honey in the top half and brood in the bottom half – cropping the honey is thus difficult.

· The larger honey combs will be heavy and difficult to handle without breakages occurring.

· Basket hives can be suspended in trees but this can be difficult. · Baskets cannot be extended in size to accommodate all the bees of very strong

colonies.

5. Frame Hives with Moveable Combs

Advantages

· These hives are used universally because they can be managed to produce the maximum crop of honey. (A good knowledge of hive management practices is necessary. This knowledge takes a long time to acquire.)

· A knowledge of the local conditions and the changes which occur with the seasons, which affect the development and decline of colonies, is also necessary.

· The advantages are many, but listing all of them would entail describing various management practices and this is not the place to consider all of them.

· Honey can be extracted from the combs which can be returned to the bees for re-use.

· Hives can be increased in size to accommodate large colonies of bees for maximum production.

· The hives are compact enough to allow easy transport to different areas. · Very many books and publications covering the use and management of these hives

are available.

Disadvantages

· Frame hives are costly to acquire because expensive good quality timber is used in their construction.

· Hive parts must all be accurately machined to "respect" the "bee space". · Foundation-wax sheets for fixing in the frames are costly and not always available. · Special wire for the frames, and queen excluders, also need to be sourced. · Honey extractors (centrifuges) are necessary but costly and difficult to obtain. · It is not really feasible for village carpenters to make all frame-hive parts properly

and to exact specifications. · After a basic hive (floor, brood box, queen excluder, honey box, inner cover and roof)

has been acquired, a beekeeper will still have to purchase extra supers. · Last, but not least, it must be stressed that it can take a lot of time (some years) for

beekeepers to learn how to use frame hives properly. It must also be noted that badly managed frame hives can be considerably less productive than say a well managed Greek Basket Hive or Kenya Top-bar Hive.

6. Kenya Top-bar Hives with Moveable Combs

Advantages

· These hives can easily be constructed even by village carpenters without wood-working machines.

· There is only one measurement of importance i.e. the width of the top-bars. · The sizes of the combs are uniform, and manipulations involving the movement of

combs from one place in the hive to another are easy. · Combs and top-bars can be moved from one place to another in the hive so that only

some combs are used for brood rearing, while other combs are used solely for honey storage.

· Examinations to check the health and wellbeing of the bees are quick and easy. · Old brood combs (darkened and with smaller worker cells) can be removed easily. · KTBH's can be suspended at working height, by wires attached to each end, to keep

them out of reach of honey badgers, grass fires, and ants. · It is easy to keep the bees under control because, unlike with frame hives, it is not

necessary to completely open the top of the hive for examinations. · Poor management will not necessarily result in complete loss of the honey crop.

· Traditional log hive beekeepers readily accept and learn to use the KTBH. · Instructing both old and new beekeepers how to make and effectively use the KTBH

is relatively quick and easy compared to teaching them to effectively use frame hives. · KTBH's are easy to manage and people can quickly and easily learn how to set them

up and use them. · There is no need to purchase any extra hive parts. Costly queen excluders are

unnecessary. · The bees readily build new combs to replace those removed by the beekeeper who

can recover the beeswax from the honey combs and from old combs.

Disadvantages

· (If NONE is entered here no-one will believe it, and that would also expose the writer's liking for these hives! So some disadvantages have to be written in.)

· The KTBH cannot be increased in size by adding extra hive bodies to accommodate extra large colonies.

· It cannot easily be transported safely when fully occupied because the combs hang freely and are not supported by wire or frames.

About the writer: Mike Schmolke Started beekeeping in 1965 with Langstroth Frames Hives which were the only ones he knew about. Later had a few Greek Basket Top-bar Hives and in 1975 started keeping bees in Kenya Top-bar Hives. Government Apiculturist for nearly 20 years up to 1991. Taught beekeeping to many beekeepers: hobbyists, small scale, rural peasant farmers and commercial. Organised beekeeping conferences, field days, meetings, etc. Visited beekeepers in Botswana, Romania, Germany, Canada, England, and South Africa. Beekeeping Development Projects for rural beekeepers in Zimbabwe with assistance from USAID, NZAID, etc. Hired out bees for crop pollination with 600 hives, produces honey from 300 hives, purchases honeycombs from rural beekeepers who mostly use log or bark hives (up to 50 tons per annum). Taught rural village carpenters to construct KTBH; taught rural tinsmiths to make bellows bee smokers; taught rural women to sew simple bee veils. Consultant on Beekeeping Development Projects in Botswana, Mozambique, Malawi.

Photo 9 – Mike Schmolke demonstrating, to Beekeepers, with African Honeybees in a Greek Basket Hive