Where is the Cedar Wood coming from for the Flow Hives?
I ask this because it’s obviously imported from outside Australia and even with the company the Flow team has set up in the U.S. most of that wood comes from Canada into the States. They do have import and export rules and regulations for wood products, one being it must be Kiln dried and inspected for some countries (Air drying does not rid the wood for pests) it must be labeled and stamped as such. It’s to prevent the spread of insect infestation into other countries. I’m sure Stu and Cedar would have people working on this problem but I was just interested on where exactly the wood is coming from?
I’m not exactly sure where the timber comes from but I know it is an issue that is close to both Cedar ans Stu’s hearts, and the rest of the team. A lot of the family and some of the flow team have worked for NGOs in various environmental roles. I will see if I can find exactly where it comes from, I guess it would vary depending on the year who is supplying the timber but we are only using certified timber.
Our hive box supplier in North America is committed to sourcing Western Red Cedar from forestry operations that have been independently certified as meeting high environmental and social standards. All timber for the 2015 orders will be from forestry operations that are PEFC certified ( http://www.pefc.org/ ). We have asked our supplier that by the end of 2016, all timber should be sourced from FSC certified operations ( http://info.fsc.org/ ), which is a higher forestry standard.
I had a heck of time trying to buy Monkeypod wood from Hawaii one time. I doubt it would be good for hives, but it’s wood in such short supply that all I was able to get was about 6 linier board feet by 2 feet, wich was enough for my project but I had to buy it privately. I know this has nothing to do with Flowhive, but it is a wood statement, woodn’t you agree?
The boxes are coming from BeeThinking. Here is what they say from their own website.
Western Red Cedar
All of our top bar hives and Warre hives are made
from Western Red Cedar harvested in the Pacific Northwest in the United
States. While it costs more, we select only kiln dried, tight knot
Western Red Cedar for our hives. Our wood is kiln dried to between 12%
and 18% moisture to minimize warping and cracking. Other hive builders
use pine due to its availability and low cost. Pine, however, requires
painting in order to have a comparable longevity to Western Red Cedar.
We usually don’t paint our hives, but either leave them unfinished to
weather naturally, or seal them with Tung Oil.
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There is the place to get pure tung oil. Order online. Looks great.