Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Express Top Bar Hive

Im almost finished with the hive :) its left to make the top bars and thats it :)
This is my personal hive and I will try to make at least one more during this course. I am hoping to buy a farm in the winter and to start my own Top Bar Apiary :)

This hive has a permanent sealed floorand will have a top entrance. I am considering two alternatives:
1) Top Entrance by Bush
2) Diagonal Slip Entrance by Anastasia (The Ringing Cedars of Russia)
There is the third alternative which i used on the firat hive and that is the
3) Periscope entrance by Phil Chandler. He also advocates the low entrance in his book and the TBH building plans. I have both Low and Periscope on the school's hive and would like to try something different on my personal hive.

Im very much concerned with the stable hive atmosphere and how to contain as much of it as possible. Bees produce Lactic Acid in their stomack which ends up in the honey and some Lactic Acid fumes (together with other acid fumes from plant nectar) floats in the hive. Varroa mites dont prefer these fumes and for that reason im looking for a way to keep the fumes in. Since they are heavier than air they will naturally sink to the bottom of the hive. Low entrance will allow these fumes to exit the hive and so do bottomless hives (net).
Im focusing on the high entrance but still I must think about the condensation and how to get rid of it. Humidity over 70% harms Varroa but can aparently stress bees which can because of it get Nosema (diarrhea).
The legs are simple and intended to be put on bigger bricks or blocks. The floor is permanently closed. I count that bees will clean the hive properly anyway. 
It took me some time to make the roof because I was short on material. There were  not enough Larch tiles for the roof and the ones I found were too short for my origianl plan so had to work with what was there. This took some time otherwise the hive would be totally finished today.  
As you can see there are no entrances on the hive. Im still deciding what type of entrance to use; low, periscope, top or diagonal. Not sure if its gonna be on the sides or ends ... must ponder and follow the gut feeling :)
Coated in linseed oil and drying ...

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