How To Archives - Beecentric Hive

Assemble a Beecentric Hive

April 2, 2019 by Dustin Bajer

Beecentric Hive Components, Diagram, and Assembly

Whether you’ve ordered a Beecentric Hive through the mail or your just curious about how it all goes together, we’re a brief overview of the Beecentric Hive components and how to assemble them.

The Beecentric Hive has four general components: the Vented Roof, the Screened Quilt Box, Bottom Board, and Boxes.

Vented Roof
The Vented Roof is designed to shed the elements a allow moisture to escape the Quilt Box.

Screened Quilt Box and Bottom Board
The Quilt Box and Bottom Board are inverse versions of each other. The Quilt Box is deeper to accommodate insulation and sits on top of the hive with the screened side facing down. The Bottom Board sits on the bottom of the hive with the screen facing up. A coroplast insert can be slid under the Bottom Board to close it off to the elements or to do a mite count.

The Quit and Bottom Board have built-in entrances and thus come with small and large entrance reducers. Reducers can be moved between the Quilt and Bottom Board or tilted ninety-degrees to close entrances off.

To keep the bees warm in the Winter and cool in the Summer, add a loose fill of insulation into the cavity of the Quilt-Box. As odd as it sounds, I like wood shavings like those that you might find at a pet store. I double-check the shavings each Fall to ensure that they are dry and fluffy. This combination will insulate the hive while allowing excess moisture to escape.

Boxes
The Beecentric Hive is different from a conventional Langstroth in that it uses the same medium boxes for brood and honey. As a result, it does not need a queen excluder, and new boxes can be added to the top (supering) or bottom (nadiring) of the hive.

Boxes
The Beecentric Hive is different from a conventional Langstroth in that it uses the same medium boxes for brood and honey. As a result, it does not need a queen excluder, and new boxes can be added to the top (supering) or bottom (nadiring) of the hive.

Deep Frame Adapter (Optional Add On)
If you have ordered a Deep Frame Adapter, you can convert one of your boxes into a deep box that will accept deep frames. Adapters are useful for accepting frames from nucleus hives or making a split from a conventional deep Langstroth box.

Stacking Beecentric Hive Components

When stacked on top of each other, the Beecentric Hive should resemble the following diagram. From the ground up; Bottom Board with large reducer, Boxes, Quilt Box with small reducer, Vented Roof.

Assemble Beecentric Hive Components Diagram — Beecentric Hive, Expanded View

Assembling Beecentric Hive Boxes

To keep shipping costs affordable, Beecentric Hives in shipped with unassembled boxes. Each box consists of four pieces – two long sides and two short faces. All four parts will have handes nearest the top of the box. When assembling, make sure that handles are on the outside.

To assemble your boxes, you will need:

A flat, Level Working Surface
Exterior Wood Glue
Speed Square
Rubber mallet
A Brad Nailer with 1 1/2″ to 2″ Exterior Brad Nails OR Exterior Finishing Nails OR Exterior Screws

Identify two side pieces and two face pieces required to build one box.
Pick up one of the long side pieces and identify the handle. Rotate the piece such that the handle appears to be near the top.
Flip the piece horizontally such that the handle is facing your working surface.
Dab or brush the surface of the finger-joints with wood glue.
One at a time, insert the shorter two pieces into the freshly glued finger joints. The frame rests should be facing each other while the handles should be facing outwards.
Gently tap the boards together with a rubber mallet. If you do not have a rubber mallet, use a block of wood and a hammer.
Use a square to test that both boards are perpendicular to the working surface.
Dab or brush the exposed surfaces of the finger joints.
Use a mallet to insert the remaining piece ensuring that the handle is on the outside and nearest the top of the box.
Rotate your box, using your mallet and square to close any gaps and test for square.
Use a brad-nailer to add a nail to the outermost finger joints. Be careful not to nail into the frame rests. If you do not have a brad-nailer, use thin exterior finishing screws or nails. When using nails or screws, it is advisable to drill a 1/16″ pilot hole which will prevent the wood from splitting.

Painting Your Beecentric Hive

To protect your hive from the elements and increase its longevity paint all of its exterior surfaces. Products such as exterior-grade primers and latex or oil paints work well but should be allowed to dry thoroughly before exposing to honeybees.

Only paint the outside surfaces of the hive and leave any internal surfaces natural as the bees will cover it was a layer or propolis – a sticky resin collected from plants.

Painted Beecentric Hive in an Edmonton Backyard — A Painted Beecentric Hive

For a more natural look like the hives pictured on this website, apply two or three treatments of linseed oil. Linseed oil is pressed from flax and is food safe. Though, admittedly, it is not as durable as paint and will need annual reapplications.

For a more durable natural finish, buy or make a linseed oil and beeswax finish. I’ve have been tempted to try tung oil but have not done so yet.

Overwintering A Beecentric Hive

November 29, 2018 by Dustin Bajer

Check Winter Food Stores

How much honey they need to get through the winter will depend on your specific climate, so it’s worth talking with other local beekeepers. Here in Alberta, beekeepers like their bees to have between 80 and 90 pounds of honey and a few frames of pollen. Pollen is necessary for the queen to raise small batches of brood and for spring build up.

Since the Beecentric Hive uses medium boxes for brood and honey, I generally overwinter in three boxes; two honey filled boxes on top and a bottom box that will have some honey and the clustering bees. I have wintered colonies on two boxes many times.

As Micheal Bush says in Practical Beekeeping “the best time to feed your bees is never.” because they have all the honey that they need. I like to leave the bees with enough honey to get them through the winter. While sugar will work, it’s not the same thing as honey, but if your bees are going into winter without resources, you’ll need to feed them.

Reducing Disease and Stress Load

One of the biggest things you can do it make sure that your hive is going into winter with as little disease and stress as possible. Healthy bees will be able to cluster and manage the internal environment much better than stressed ones. Larger overwintering clusters have a smaller surface area to volume ratio and conserve heat more effectively than smaller clusters.

Insulating The Beecentic Hive Top-Quilt

Unlike most conventional hives with solid inner and outer covers, the Beecentric Hive has a Warre inspired quilt-box. Filling the top-quilt with insulation will keep your hive warm in the winter and cool in the summer while still offering adequate ventilation for the colony. The primary purpose of the quilt is to hold in the warmth and to reduce condensation on the upper surface of the hive.

If that warm moist air meets a thin cold surface or an open bee escape hole, it will condense and dump cold liquid water back onto the cluster. Bees can tolerate extremely low temperatures while dry, but if you wet them in cold temperatures, they will die.
The vertical sides represent about 25% of the total heat loss with the remaining heat [75%] exiting from the top. – Beeculture.com

For best results, fill the top-quilt with dry organic material like straw or woodchips. My current favourite medium is wood shavings available at most pet stores. Make sure to fill the quilt box but to leave the bedding fluffy as it’s the air trapped within the medium that insulates the hive. Since you can pull the vented roof off without opening the hive, you can check the bedding in the middle of winter; it should always be nice and dry.

As a pro-tip, add your bedding to an old pillowcase and place the pillowcase into the quilt-box. Using a pillowcase will allow you to add or remove the bedding with little mess and give you the option on peeking under the pillowcase to peek in on your bees without opening the hive up (not recommended when cold outside).

One More (Optional) Step

There’s a little over 4 inches of room there which is lots of space to add bedding. The key is that you want to fill it up will still be light and fluffy. The bees are going to make a lot of warm, and moist air and it will be able to slowly work its way through the quilt without condensing and raining back down on the bees.

If you’re feeling ambitious, you can staple a layer of reflective wrap under the vented roof that will reflect escaping radiant heat towards the quilt. This reflective layer only works if there’s an air gap between the insulation in the quilt-box and vented roof – which there will be since you won’t overfill the quilt.

Reducing the Entrances for Winter

The Beecentic Hive comes with one small and one large entrance reducer. I generally add the larger opening on the bottom and the smaller one at the top and leave this configuration year-round.

Since the quilt-box acts as ventilation, it’s not necessary to keep the top entrance open, so I like to close it off by tipping it 90 degrees. When the weather warms in the spring, and the bees are in the upper box, I will tip it open to allow access for cleansing flights. This is not necessary but a nice option to have.

Wrapping A Beecentric Hive for Winter

Most commercial hive wraps have an R-value of 8 which is, coincidentally, a little warmer than the walls of a typical hollow tree trunk. You can buy eight frame bee wraps online, or you can make your own with fibreglass, Rockwool, or rigid foam.

Making Your Hive Wrap

To build my hive wraps, I custom cut a panel for each of the hive’s four sites. If I’m using Rockwool or fibreglass batons, I wrap each panel in a black construction grade bag and seal the ends with tuck tape. You can achieve the same thing with rigid foam wrapping each piece in black tarpaper like four presents. In both cases, I use bungee cords to secure the panels to the side of the hive.

Back and Side Panels

Insulate from the bottom of the bottom board to the bottom of the vented roof where it sits over the top quilt.

Front Panel

Insulted from the top of the bottom entrance to the bottom of the top entrance. Having a shorter panel on the front will keep the bottom entrance open (large entrance reducer on) and allow for fresh air to enter the hive from the below. This technique also allows you to access the top entrance and to tip it open in the spring.

Additional Reading

Elise Watson, of ABC Bees in Calgary, put together an excellent overwintering guide for hives in Alberta. The guide is for 10 Frame langstroth hives is still very useful for anyone using a Beecentric Hive. Winterization Guide for Beekeeping

I quoted the Beeculture.com article, “Winter Management” by William Hesbach above. The article is refreshing as it uses honeybee biology and the physics of natural beehives as a template for overwintering honeybee colonies. Winter Managment

12 Steps to Start Beekeeping In Edmonton

January 3, 2017 by Dustin Bajer

A Step-By-Step Guide To Beekeeping In Edmonton

If you’re thinking about keeping honeybees in Edmonton you’ve probably come across the City of Edmonton’s Urban Beekeeping page. If so, you’ve read about four steps, city guidelines, swarm plans, PID numbers, and provincial agriculturalists. And if you’re like me, you’re probably a little confused, overwhelmed, and still unclear about what to do. Not to worry. For clarity, I’ve deconstructed and reassembled the Edmonton Beekeeping application process into a dozen baby-steps. By completing the following checklist, you’ll have everything you need to start beekeeping in Edmonton. [Read more…]