Beeman's Beehut

Outer Cover

This is a cover which protects the hive from wind and rain.  You would normally want to put a brick on this so the wind doesn’t blow it off of the hive.

Inner Cover

The purpose of the inner cover is to create a gap between the hive and the outer cover to aid in insulation of the hive.  Most inner covers you’ll see have a hole in the center of the board, this is for putting in a bee escape to aid in the removal of honey.

Supers

These are boxes with which the bees build comb and store the extra honey in.  They normally consist of 10 frames  but many beekeepers like using between 8 and 9 frames  which give the bees extra space to build thicker comb.  Thicker Comb makes it easier to uncap when harvesting.  The sizes supers come in are 6-5/8 inch and 5-11/16.  Remember to think about your back when purchasing supers, Too big means it will be heavy when the harvest comes.

Queen Excluder

The Queen Excluder “excludes” the queen from entering a section of a hive.  The most common use for these are to keep the queen out of the supers thus keeping eggs from getting mixed in with honey.

Hive Bodies

Hive Bodies are 9 5/8 inch big, twice the size o the supers.  These can be used as supers but are much heavier when full of honey.  The main purpose of hive bodies is to provide a place for the queen to lay her eggs. Its common to see two hive bodies on a hive because in some states the bees can store up enough honey in the two of these to last them the winter.  In other place you’ll see just one hive body and a super.

Bottom Board

This is the “Floor” of the hive and provides a runway for bees leaving and returning to the hive.  You may have to clean this off every now and again but good colonies will do a good job of keeping the inside clean.

The Hive Stand

Usually a wooden stand is sold at many places but I prefer two cinder blocks, bricks, build your own thingy-ma-bob to hold that hive off the ground.

Frames

Frames are what the bees build on and store honey.  There are usually 10 Frames in each super but like I said above, some beekeepers use 8-9 frames in a super.  When getting an Extractor to harvest honey make sure you don’t need to harvest 9 5/8inch frames.  You usually need to get something extra to extract these extra big frames.

Foundation

This is a wax foundation you install in the frames for the bees to build on.  There are many types to use but my favorite is wired foundation for the hive bodies.  There are Plasticell foundations which are nice to have but I feel that bees don’t take to that as easy as real wax foundation.  Other types of foundation for the hive body are Small Cell and Drone Brood.  Both are to help in removing Varroa mites and need some extra research before use.

What Goes on when the Bees are in the Hive

Brood

Brood in beekeeping is a term beekeepers use to talk about the bee eggs.  Basically all the comb that contains eggs whether in the hive body or super is called brood.  Now when you first go into a hive and inspect it you may at first having a hard time seeing the eggs.  They are small grey things at the bottom of a cell which you can barely be seen.  The Eggs take about 3 days to hatch into Larva.  This larva looks like a grey blob in the cell like a grub you would dig up in the garden, kind of.  This is much easier to see in the cell and larva grows much faster.  It has no eyes or legs yet it just simply eats and grows.  At this stage the Larva can go two different ways.  If the larva is in a queen cell the bees will feed it royal jelly thus will the larva begin to change into a queen bee.   If the larva is left in a worker cell the bees will feed it a lesser version of royal jelly and it will grow into a worker.

For Drones the Queen has the ability to lay an unfertilized egg which will grow into a drone.  The only difference between the queen and workers is that the queen bee had a better diet as a larva.  The queen also is grown in a peanut like cell which hangs upside down.

When the Larva gets too big for the cell the bees will cap the cell and the larva will go through a metamorphous and turn into an actual bee.  The entire process from egg to adult varies from bee to bee but here’s the rundown of it.

—- In some place Brood is eaten as part of a meal.