Upper entrances enhancing honey production
Rusty Burlew, director of the USA Native Bee Conservancy
A few years ago, Detective Anthony Planakis (retired) from New York, shared his secret to large honey crops: access holes with platforms. His awesome photos and impressive production records convinced me this was something I had to try.
My situation is a litle different because I produce comb honey instead of extracted honey and my bees are on the other side of the USA – Washington State. Nevertheless, I promptly drilled a hole in each of my honey supers, including the Ross Rounds, the cut- comb supers, and the Kelley section supers. Then I added a queen excluder to each hive and stacked the drilled supers above that.
The worst season ever
Aſter all the preparation, I had the worst honey season ever. But it wasn’t the fault of the holes, it was the weather. It was so bad I was forced to feed bees all fall and winter. Those years happen.
The next spring, undeterred, I put my swiss-cheese supers back on my hives and now my bees are loving them. They are acting as if the upper holes are the normal, everyday way of doing bee business. They say, “Of course supers have holes. Duh!”
Things I don’t understand
However, there are a few things I don’t understand. For example, all my hives have the access holes in the honey supers in addition to the main entrance down below. But in some of the hives, the bees are streaming through the supers with no bee – not a single bee – using the main entrance. Sometimes I have to wait many minutes to see one, while the top looks like Times Square at rush hour. What is going on?
Not only that, there is a queen excluder between the supers and the brood boxes. So, all those teeming masses of bees are either going straight to the honey supers and back out again, or they are going down into the brood area through the excluder. The ones carrying pollen are definitely going through the excluder.
I also wonder where the drones are hanging out. In a few of the hives, I see drones on the alighting board and passing through the main entrance. But in other hives, I don’t see the drones anywhere. Yet, when I look inside the hives, there are plenty of drones and drone brood, and they have easy unobstructed access to the fully open main entrance. It’s a mystery.
Puting up comb honey
Inside the honey supers, snow-white honeycomb can accumulate at an amazing rate. Although the bees had nothing but starter strips to begin with, it seems the upper entrances sped up comb building. When you think about it, the bees don’t have to carry their loads from the botom of the hive to the top. Instead, they just fly in and drop it off. Then back to the field they go.
“Bees don’t like upper entrances”
Many people say bees “don’t like” upper entrances. Have those people ever tried them or are they just repeating bee-club dogma?
Many say that bees “won’t” go through queen excluders, but that is obviously not true. In fact, my winter candy boards have a floor made from a plastic excluder. The bees have to go through the excluder to get to the candy. Every candy board on every hive is oſten cleaned out. I guess someone forgot to tell my bees what they won’t do. Go figure.
Like their keepers, all bees are different
We know for certain that different beekeepers get different results. But beekeeping is complex with a steep and never-ending learning curve. So why not try what feels right to you? Some of the best moments of beekeeping come from trying something new and watching your bees respond. For me, the upper-entrance holes have been a trip, and I’m so glad I tried.
Rusty Burlew’s blog:
honeybeesuite.com Bee Craſt April 2020 23
THE UPSTAIRS DOWNSTAIRS (UD) INTRANCE is a new product developed by beekeeper Filipe Salbany following research into hive-entrance designs from around the world. The entrances can be fited to existing hive bodies well above the entrance and, he says, will help bees to defend against wasps, wax moth and rodents while improving ventilation and foraging efficiency. Rusty Burlew will be reporting on her experience using the UD Intrance in a future issue of Bee Craſt. To find out more about the Intrance, see
www.beespace.xyz
Photos:Richard Rickit and Filipe Salbany
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48
