There are two types of hives used by beekeepers - Warre and Langstroth, both named after their inventors. Warre hives are a top bar hive which encourages the bees to form their own comb and is seen to be more ‘natural.’ Langstroth hives use removable frames to guide the bees honeycomb building, which allows inspection and manipulation of the hive. The hives I use and sell are Langstroth hives. Langstroth hives can be made to hold eight or ten frames. I stick with the eight frame hives as they are easier to move around, especially when they are full of honey!
So where does the Flow Hive come in? The Flow Hive is a variety of Langstroth hive, which uses special plastic frames in its honey super. These frames have hexagonal cells that the bees seal up and fill with honey, which can then be broken open to allow the honey to flow down inside the frame and out a pipe to be harvested.
What’s a honey super? The hive (whether Flow Hive or traditional Langstroth) consists of a brood box or boxes at the bottom and honey supers at the top. The brood boxes are where the queen lays eggs and creates new bees. This is essential as worker bees only live around three weeks. A queen excluder can be used to keep the queen in the brood boxes, meaning that only worker bees can get up into the supers and store honey. These supers are where you harvest your honey at the height of the summer season.
So what do you need to get started?The basic hive is an eight frame Langstroth box with wax foundation sheets in the frames. The hive I supply has bees already in it, which will be a mixture of workers, drones and a new queen. Several of the frames will hold honey already as food for the bees. You also have the option of purchasing a super at the same time, and this will be required once the bees fill the initial brood box and need more space.
But what if you’ve already got a Flow Hive?You will still need bees in your Flow Hive and the bottom box is still a brood box. Remember that the Flow Hive is still a Langstroth hive. I can supply you will bees that we transfer into your Flow Hive brood box. This is a fairly easy process and gives you an instant hive.
So give me a call or send me an email if you’d like more info on getting a hive of your own.
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