Feeders off bonnets on
- Thread starter 8ace
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Excellent, and a nice tidy job by the look of thing's.
charlievictorbravo
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They look very neat, Is that tape around the corners or folded metal?
CVB
CVB
OP
Thank you both. Ducktape on edges, the black stuff was cheaper at b&m bargains than the silver. Bonded together with PU glue and screwed with 70mm screws lightly wound in some people use skewrers I under stand instead.
Not a good choice of fixing, lose heat through them screws.
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small lengths of wood sharpened to a point is what I use - about 15cms long.. Cheap and easy..
Screws cost money...
linoleum bonypart
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I'm sure the screws won't effect much the overall will be positiv
OP
Well I'm really not going to worry about losing heat through screws I haveplenty of other things to worry about. The duct tape can easilly be replaced they only have to last untill spring. What they have now is better than what they had
Yeah, thats what i thought until i measured the temperatures on a hive with thick wood screws in it..
look up "thermal bridging" and buildings
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OP
And these temps were?.....
It was on a two warre hives i was testing. I can't remember the exact details, i was looking into why one Warre was giving higher conductance values despite having thicker walls and less surface area, I plonked a thermal a thermalcoupe probe on the screws and they were hot. The heat losses through the screws will increase with the higher temperature differential you will get with foam compared to the wooden Warres i was testing. If you look in building regs and building inspections docs you will get the same info on the problems of thermal bridging. As you increase the insulation the small details count for more.
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OP
Im more concerned with the omf to be honest but I know they need to be open. Ideally I'd have probably used skewers but I had none and the bonnets had to go on today during weather break screws also allowed me to pull everything up tight in one go. This year has all been a bit of a rush next year will probably be even worse if we sell the house and move
Quis Custodiet
Field Bee
Fearsome things - screws. Perhaps nuts and bolts instead? There are some interesting examples of screws in the Tower of London - thumbscrews, I am sure some prison officers can be interesting too.
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Can I Ask a stupid question or have I missed something? Do both those hives have bees in? if so have they been moved into that position for the photo or has the hive at the rear always been that close to the hive in front?
Seems a really bizarre set up to me.
Seems a really bizarre set up to me.
OP
It's been there a while yes was moved there a while ago to get more sun in the winter months. The bees have no probs being next to each other. They get in and out fine there's about 8 inches between hive bodies just looks close with covers on
kazmcc
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Nice job 8ace! All ready for winter. probably warmer in there than in my house lol
charlievictorbravo
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Couple of things 8ace, I'd be inclined to give the exterior a lick of some paint to try to give a bit more live to the tape - it deteriorates surprisingly quickly. I used left over bathroom paint on my latest one.
Secondly, In 2013, Zachary Huang of Michigan State University wrote a paper called "Varroa Mite Reproduction Biology". In it he said "If there are ways to artificially increase the hive Relative Humidity to about 80%, then the Varroa mite population will never increase to a damaging point." Nobody seems to have followed up on this as a proper study - probably no research money in it.
By increasing the temperature in the hive by insulating it, you have a chance of increasing RH to around 80% but I think you might need the OMF closed off to achieve this. My current setup is a 50mm hive cosy, reduced under floor entrance and inspection board in place. The board is not permanently in, more like in, out, check where the activity and mites are, clean, back in, etc.
All the best
CVB
Secondly, In 2013, Zachary Huang of Michigan State University wrote a paper called "Varroa Mite Reproduction Biology". In it he said "If there are ways to artificially increase the hive Relative Humidity to about 80%, then the Varroa mite population will never increase to a damaging point." Nobody seems to have followed up on this as a proper study - probably no research money in it.
By increasing the temperature in the hive by insulating it, you have a chance of increasing RH to around 80% but I think you might need the OMF closed off to achieve this. My current setup is a 50mm hive cosy, reduced under floor entrance and inspection board in place. The board is not permanently in, more like in, out, check where the activity and mites are, clean, back in, etc.
All the best
CVB
