Show a pic of your setup

Oops - too quick on the reply - thanks for the link!

This is a pic of my setup. It gets early morning sun and shade the rest of the day. I built the bench with lip at the back so that nothing rolls of behind while I am extracting honey or inspecting. I used a marine grade varnish on both the bench and the hive.


I have tried putting a camera inside my hive using a Raspberry Pi with a pi camera 2 noir which is a camera that is designed for low light and does not employ an infrared filter. (NoIR = No Infrared.) This means that pictures you take by daylight will look decidedly curious, but it gives you the ability to see in the dark with infrared lighting.

The cool thing is the camera is super small and connects via a thin ribbon cable so easily slips in between frames. Unfortunately the girls donā€™t seem to like any IR led light so no matter where in the hive I place my camera it is far too dark to get a good picture.

So far I have settled for placing the camera next to the bird/bee bath I created for them which is next to the hive and on a hot day (which we get often) the girls will often have pool parties.
I have the bee bath setup to my retic so it can easily be refilled and I am currently programming some sensors so if the water level drops to zero my retic turns on.

For anyone interested in watching my girls from the camera I am even streaming it to twitch :slight_smile:
(yes I am a nerd)

You can watch them here at https://www.twitch.tv/balgabee?tt_medium=live_embed&tt_content=text_link
unless its night time and too dark

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Hi all,

Now almost Spring 2017: hereā€™s a couple pixā€™s of my growing apiary.

Cheers,
Gerald

P.S. Just finished another cedar wood 8 frame hive 2/17 that as Wx warms up my one winter over 5 frame Nuc will go into. . I have one more 8 frame cedar hive coming soon with Obs windows to show visitors my bees without opening n totally disturbing the girls each time.

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@Gerald_Nickel, it looks like some of those hives have their backs against the fence. Is there room to make withdrawals?

Hi Tripp, looks are deceiving ā€¦ :wink:. Good observation but I can easily walk n work on all those hives from behind. I donā€™t like working a hive from the front unless I have too. I made sure I had room even wearing my big bulky ventilated suit.

Just finished another deep 8 frame hive n set on my new Nuc hive stand. This 8 frame will eventually sit next to my Flow-hive n the over-wintered Nuc of bees will go in it. Iā€™m waiting for the Wx to warm up.

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Crikey Gerard your back yard is going to be a bee city! Do you have any hive number restrictions in your neck of the woods? Here in sunny West Oz in my area we are only allowed 4 hives per half acre and each needs to be 3 metres errr I mean 3 meters err, take three, I mean 9.84 feet from the boundary.
Nice and tidy looking apiary, looking forward to seeing all those boxes full. :+1:

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I have had the dreaded hive beetles since setting up the hive.

Been catching initially a lot under mesh bottom on corflute/table cloth material.

Then took out all flow frames, twice, and vacuumed up a number from empty frame cells.

Not sure if they are flying in, coming from brood box or coming out of the ground beneath, but in next few days will take apart and have a good look at brood box to see whatā€™s going on.

We wonā€™t get any honey this season, it appears as only 1 or 2 flow frames with some capped honey.

Appears to be a bad season here around Albury, so other Apiarists are saying.

Wow, that would be a lot of bees in your area if everyone had hives!!!

We were aiming for one hive per acre here,
but there is no way that many hives could have survived the year we have just had. Perhaps with extensive planting we may get there some day.

Cheers,

Julia

Hiya @Jingles, yeah it would be a lot of bees, IF everyone had bees. Fortunately not everyone does. I have asked the question in the past about how many are too many bees in an area and didnā€™t really get a definitive answer, of course how much forage plays a big part and as you know the last couple of years have been poor forage but previous years have been good.
I currently have 5 hives and know of 2 tree colonys on our little 3/4 acre block which I have been filling with native trees, shrubs and ground covers for many years.
Remembering bees travel in excess of a 2km radius and having national park across the road I donā€™t think Iā€™m over stocked although Iā€™ve yet to crop a dropā€¦ What can I do if free colonys keep popping up? I can hardly sell them as Iā€™ve no idea of the colonys productivity. Come swarm season and if I need to split what then? Iā€™m maxed out now! I am seeking friends properties to move hives to but will I have time to care for them? Probably not although as we donā€™t have the worlds problems with pests, bees can pretty much look after themselves, our main consternation is duty of care with swarms and the like.
I see people with many more hives than myself and have to mollycoddle them due to varroa or shb so I feel lucky to be able to have bees at this time.
Iā€™m currently out of boxes and have already spent more than I had budgeted for with little gain, the fact that bee keeping is addictive is a problemā€¦
For the moment Iā€™m enjoying my new hobby but weā€™ll see where Iā€™m at in a years time, with the added experience I may feel confident to sell a colony or two and even become a mentor of sorts to up and coming newbeeks.

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rawii, Try the Apithor trap if you have a bad infestation of SHB.

I mostly use 2 AJ beetle traps per hive, baited with 2mL of vinegar and 8mL of canola oil. I will try and remember to take a few pics next time I change baits.

I have 10 hives in a central apiary on my 5 acre property. They are not too crowded and Iā€™m at my maximum number for my licence.

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Alright, today we built the stand in our back acre, mulched around it, and got the equipment out there.

I should get my two packages on Thursday, but owing to the low temps expected, I will likely not hive the bees until Friday.

We already have a number of fruit trees out there, and weā€™re hoping this helps pollination of those and other things weā€™re growing. And, of course, maybe some honey by next summer!

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Looks great well done. Do you have ant plans?
Since we have kept bees we have had a bumper crop of citrus from our trees weā€™re sure itā€™s due to the bees but it may have just been a good yearā€¦
Good luck with your install.

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My plan is to not have ants!

If we do have ants, Iā€™ll see about wrapping the posts with a band of aluminum or sheet metal, just like youā€™d do for trees.

Thank you!

I went to University of Tennessee for grad school, so we have a lot of things painted orange. Where most people have a ā€œFlorida Roomā€ we have a ā€œTennessee Roomā€ instead. Go Vols!

I think of that one as my V-Hive!

A friend of mine added the flowers.

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Thanks Sciencemaster,

Where are you located ?

Will have a look on ebay to get some traps.

Ray

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Here is my set up 10 months later, two deeps full of bees, just added the Flow super which they immediately starting filling up!

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Thanks Cowgirl, I was amazed how quickly bees adopted the flow frames, canā€™t wait for the first harvest!

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Iā€™m at Mullumbimby near Byron Bay, the Easternmost part of Australia. Itā€™s raining right now and has been off and on for a few days. I have some work to do with my hives if this rain clears up and will take some pics than. I might even have a few in my photo collection already.

Well I moved from being an enthusiast yesterday to being a novice bee keeper. Have an 8 frame brood box and a 4 frame nuc so that I am ready to add honey super as early as I can after winter. Have heaps to learnā€¦

Location Bunbury, Western Australia

Picture of my setup

Another one showing watering point

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Thereā€™s my hive in the background- and the frame in front is where it needs to get to:

And this is my tall hive:

And this is wax dipped flow hive (hoop pine):

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