Hello there - having fun assembling the Honeyflow and the house is full of a wonderful cedar smell.
Just wondering about the frames in the brood chamber which have holes presumably for wires to presumably support wax sheets as in conventional hives - no mention of any of this in the booklet - advice please?
Have discovered a couple of tiny things which might be improved in the direction btw i.e. the illustration for the assembly of the flow super shows the metal bottom strip at the bottom of the front panel whereas it is really to be located under the access cover panel (this is shown correctly in the assembly diagramme but just a little constructive criticism. There was only one rebate btw on the 2 side panels - not too difficult to create the other 3 - just letting you know. Must say, it is aesthetically very beautiful and just love the logo. Bee happy
You can use wire & wax foundation which is my personal choice. You simply attach the wire to the frames making it reasonably tight & then embed the wax foundation to the wires. You might be able to find some assistance doing that from a local bee club, good luck with that, cheers.
@Cirrus it is possible you have used the 2nd rebate side on your brood box
A lot of people talk about this which is undoubtedly what the holes are for. It seems a faff for a hobbyist. Cant you use pre-wired foundation?
I am trialling a couple of colonies with no foundation but wiring the frames with fishing line.
Sorry for the confusion.
Here is a video from us which shows the complete hive assembly - and includes a discription about the holes in the Frames.
Thanks everyone for your help with this but it seems that beekeepers especially traditional beekeepers have different methods for foundation in the brood box. What I would really like to know from Cedar and the guys who developed the HoneyFlow hive what their recommendations are i.e. they have developed this hive to work in the best possible way. I live in southern queensland not very far from where this was developed so would really appreciate some more HoneyFlow advice for Australian conditions i.e. how to locate the bottom boards, whether to screen the vent hole to the roof; whether to mininize the entry access when first introducing the bees perhaps in short a book - A Guide for newcomers to beekeeping who have recently acquired their Honeyflow hives beyond just the construction. It would be a best seller!!
There is no difference to keeping a colony with a traditional super above the brood box to keeping one with Flow frames in a super. The Flow system is a system for extracting the honey. The maintenance of your bees remains the same as any other beehive with moveable frames.
Isn’t the brood box just a standard Lang?
Sort of… it is a standard 8-Frame Lang, whereas most people are on 10-Frame.
Your welcome @Cirrus Richard, it’s as @Dee says, it’s the same as keeping bees in a traditional hive. I’m not far from you, I’m in Buderim. I’m having success with solid floors & an average size entrance & no ventilation in the lids. I space my frames evenly with 9 frames in 10 frame supers, brood & honey. I’m able to carry on without the use of beetle traps. Good luck with everything, cheers
Thank you Dawn
Looking at Lang specs there seem to be a myriad of sizes from country to country.
No wonder we drive on the left here
I am going to try two colonies with solid floors. All my floors have screened bottom boards so rather than take them out I’m deepening the floors and putting in a solid sliding ply floor that I can periodically remove to get the grunge out that the bees have no access to. As you know, we don’t have beetle here; if we did I suspect that wouldn’t work.
At my beekeepers’ group we have older beekeepers who are all still on solid floors and mumble about us newbies with mesh floors. It’s all coming full circle?
The screened board is supposed to help with varroa but it has been shown time and time again that it makes absolutely no difference. The bees like to be enclosed in an area where they can control their own environment. They probably know best.