Alberta Beekeeping Supplies, Designed For Bees
Modified Warre, 8 Frame Beehives Handcrafted, solid pine beehives built and sold in Edmonton. Specializing in cold-hardy hive designs and dimensions for the conscientious hobby beekeeper.
8-Frame, Medium Hives Supers (aka. Illinois Hives) 8 frame medium hive boxes are versatile, easy to lift, and ideal for Northern climate beekeeping. Made from solid pine, each box features sturdy finger joints and a handles on all four sides. Used these boxes for brood and honey will simplifies your operation and eliminate the need for additional equipment.
Why Use 8-Frame Boxes? Eight frame hives are ideal because they have the same width as the brood nest and the overwintering cluster of bees. With less space to heat, the bees don’t have to work as hard. More importantly, because the foundation is solid, honeybees can’t easily move laterally within the hive. In larger 10-frame hives, it’s not uncommon for overwintering bees to starve when the temperature drops down and they’re unable to reach honey contained within the last two frames. The 8-frame hive eliminates this problem by matching the hive to the natural dimensions of the bee cluster making is a must have piece of Alberta beekeeping equipment.
Why Use Medium Boxes? At 12 pounds per gallon, honey is heavy and takes a lot of work to lift and work with. For practical reasons, I’ve settled on medium depth hive boxes (6 5/8″ deep) which weigh between 40 and 45 lbs at harvest. What’s more, bees will happily raise brood and store honey in medium depth hives which eliminate the need for different hive boxes; decreasing costs and simplifying your operation. For reasons discussed in an earlier post, I prefer to manage my bees in the style of a Warre Hive by adding empty boxes to the bottom. If this is your plan, choosing medium depth hives will save you a lot of heavy lifting. Fits all standard medium frames and equipment.
Screened (IPM) Bottom Boards
With varroa mites on the rise, many beekeepers are turning to screened bottom boards. According to beekeeper and author Ross Conrad (Natural Beekeeping: Organic Approaches To Modern Apiculture), 10% to 20% of varroa mites fall off their hosts and onto the bottom of the hive. Equipping your hive with a screened bottom board (1/8th-inch wire mesh) ensures that tumbling mites fall out the bottom of the hive where they’re unable to climb back up and cause damage.
In addition, screened bottom boards provide exceptional ventilation which reduces moisture buildup and potentially fungal diseases within the colony. All screened bottom boards are equipped with a plastic insert that can be used to close the hive up during Winter or to perform mite counts.
8 Frame Warre Roof and Top-Quilt (2 Pieces) Inspired by the original Warre Hive this roof is designed to allow the bees to control the ventilation within their hive. Originally outlines in Warre’s book “Beekeeping For All“, this Warre style roof is made up of two separate pieces; a quilt box and a sloped roof.
Quilt Box The quilt is a shallow box that sits at the very top of the hive. Empty during the Spring and Summer the quilt contains a 1/8th-inches galvanized mesh that prevents bees from moving up while allowing exceptional ventilation. The bees, being as ingenious as they are, fill the nylon mesh with propolis to increase or decrease ventilation as they see fit. In the fall, the quilt’s cavity is loosely filled with insulation for the Winter.
Sloped Roof Built to shed water and snow, this sloped roof resign protects the hive from the elements while ensuring adequate ventilation. Designed to fit over the quilt and top super, you don’t need to worry about the wind blowing this one off! Oh, and it also looks great!
Purchasing A Hive
[…] Bajer has done a lot of research, reading and observation to build hives that will support bees. “They have a few added things like increased pest management, increased ventilation at the top which allows the bees to regulate their own internal environment within the hive, which is not something they can do as easily in a conventional hive,” says Bajer. Bajer has more detailed information about his hives on his website. […]