I put my hive together and hoping to get bees Mid-March. Wahoo!!!
That looks amazing!!!
Very beautiful hive! Looks great on your wood floor, too. Is that oak? We have hickory pecan flooring - just love natural wood. Our nucleus is coming mid-April. I ordered in early November, but the local apiary was already sold out for March. 
Let us know how your installation of bees goes.
Dawn
Hello, I live in Half Moon Bay - so very close to you but slightly different climate. I just got my Flow Hive and assembled it today - I would be very interested in checking out the San Mateo Beekeepers Club! When do you have meetings? Thank you!
Hey California Flow Beeks,
I am in San Diego, CA. I have 60 hives, fancy myself a natural beekeeper. I do love bee removal and I teach beekeeping classes here every month. I also do an online version of my Introduction to beekeeping class. www.girlnextdoorhoney.com Additionally, I will be presenting on the Flow Hive at next monthās San Diego Beekeeping Society meeting (Feb. 8). I also started a blog late last year www.beekeepinglikeagirl.com and post frequently on Instagram (@girlnextdoorhoney) if you want to follow my Flowhive adventures this spring.
Great to see you here, Hilary. Despite this being the Flow forum (cue the evil musicā¦ 
), there are actually a lot of natural practice beekeepers here, including @Michael_Bush and @JeffH. Of course Stu and Cedar (founders of Flow) are proponents of natural methods in their management too. My point is, despite what Rusty (among many others) thinks of this system, you are among friends! 
Dawn
Hi Dawn, Iām probably more of a traditional beekeeper than a ānaturalā beekeeper. I use all wax foundation which is frowned upon by ānatural beekeepersā from what I understand. I assist people in getting nice straight comb to get started in Top Bar or Warre hives with the colonies I sell them.
Some people claim that letting bees build all their own comb without foundation is better for the health of the colonies. I canāt say that I agree with that. I found that good management of the bees is generally best for the bees in hives that are managed.
And you donāt use traps or chemicals for SHBā¦ 
You are more natural than you think
Hi all, i have to chuckle about " Natural BeeKeeping" ā¦ The only pure truely natural is beekeeping is bees in hollow trees. caves, logs , more ā¦
. All other beekeeping in straw homes or boxes or others truly by true diffinition "arenāt purely natural beekeeping ! But we know it is not practicicsl to Raid n Rob these type of natural colonies. Thus we do the best we can try to duplicate ! I
Personally enjoy the langstroths method n others their method. Bees do well in most of these boxes or cavities. Enjoy what you prefer.
Gerald
Yes, me too.
Top bar keepers pride themselves on it so I suppose it might be the closest but top bars are not for beginners in my opinion. Mind you you can manage a long hive in a similar fashion with foundation-less frames which would make it much easier.
This is an entertaining video from Phil Chandler
PS, I love the Witchazelā¦I can almost smell it.
Mine isnāt out yet but part of the garden is carpeted in Winter Aconiteā¦so beautiful
Hi Dee, those are bees with an attitude n a half. Yahā¦ Iāve watched many of these Top-bar vids. Think Iāll stay with what I know. As a teenager back in the 1950ās n 60ās we had langstroths hives so it was no mystery that Iād go back to what I know n are familiar too.
Been a bit mild for several weeks with various warm wet Pacific frontal systems bringing moisture to the foothills n lowland but snow to our Cascade Mtns this year. Last year was very bad for the entire west coast Cali to our Pacific NW coast n Mtns. We hardly got a drip n temps popped up quickly. This year is mild but freezing levels low enough n moisture off Pacific to push our snow pack to near record level. No drought this Spring !
I think I mentioned I have two 10 frame set ups done n painted with the third about half done out in my small woodshop. Not building the frames because too much labor for what Iād save ! But the hives are easy ! Just bought one for an accurate pattern. The tops, inner cover, top feeder n bottom board were cheaper n much easier to buy. Boxes are so easy.
Well I have to send in my daily Wx data n weather report to NOAA now. Thanks for the note ! Damp here this morning with the next warm front.
Take care,
Gerald.
Geraldā¦those boxes are looking good.
A good reason for beginners not to go for TBH
Great vid. I have a hive like that and but I let them be for this winter and will split them into nucs in the Spring and execute the queen.
Keep bees long enough and this will happen. He wishes he would have lit his smoker in the vid but once theyāre ticked off, itās too late lol.
Great video Dee, what do those blokes have against smoke? Thatās one thing about Langs, if you have an angry hive like that, you can move the supers several meters away to work on them & let the angry bees go back to the old location.
Thereās no way I wouldnāt have gotten savagely stung in my bee suit, trying to do that. They would have certainly found gaps.
It also makes me appreciate the Langstroth frames. What a pain, trying to close those bars together without squashing bees & without the aid of smoke.
If they say that smoke stresses bees & thatās the reason why they donāt use it. Well, those bees looked fairly stressed to me.
Yah Jeff,
Those Hummers were sure ticked n upset. You could easily hear them pinging off even the camera. Those wouldnāt work in the area I have planned for my new 3 hive. Would have to tame them down with a Queen replacement ASAP !
Nah, Iāll stick to my Langs I used 55 years ago. They were great then n guessing good enough for me to retire and raise honeybees now.
Hope you had a great Holiday you n your wife. Take care !
Gerald
Thank you Gerald, same to you & your family.
Most times I wear very little under my bee suit, bee stings go straight through it. They even go through the leather of those beekeeping gloves you can buy. I would have been hammered real bad with those bees. All they needed was a bit of smoke at the start & a bit more as required & it might have been a different story.
I helped a lady with a top bar hive once, I supplied the bees & queen. We actually found the squirt bottle with water to be fairly useless. It looked as though that gizmo with the powdered sugar wasnāt any better.
The lady still has her TBH & buys her honey from me:) Iāll ttyl, bye
Yep!
They were squashing a few and sliding the corpses away with their hive tools.
Good job they werenāt in a suburban back garden!
I have a bad tempered colony and while they are OK to inspect they are grumpy for days afterwards and chase anybody that comes within 50 metres of the hiveā¦I will have to deal with them this season.
As a returning somewhat novice because of all the disease n pests changes in Beekeeping I seen vids of the TBH many times now. It looks like a PAIN at best ! Bees attaching comb to side n bottoms. Comb coming loss n falling. Sure does look worth the trouble n effort . And as we know no more natural in realityā¦ Glad I had to sense to return to the easier n simpler proven Lang Hives. Just impatient n excitedly waiting my 3 new NUCs in Washington State. Gerald
Also in San Jose. About to get Flow in a month. Would love to connect, learn where you got your bees, and how itās going.