Archive Special: Long Hives with Tina Sebestyen (S6, E12)

S6, E12 - Archive Special: Long Hives with Tina Sebestyen

Jeff Ott: Hey, everybody. Kim and I are still out in the bee yards working our bees, getting them ready for fall. For this week, we've chosen a few, an episode from May of 2021's Tina Sebestyen, about long hives. It's from our five-part series on different hive types. I chose it because, if you were thinking about doing something different next year, maybe a long hive would be something you want to look into, so I hope you enjoy this. We'll be back next week with a brand-new episode.

[bees buzzing]

[music]

Jeff: Welcome to Beekeeping Today Podcast, your source for beekeeping news, information, and entertainment presented by Betterbee. I'm Jeff Ott.

Kim Flottum: And I'm Kim Flottum.

Global Patties: Hey, Jeff and Kim. Today's sponsor is Global Patties. They're a family-operated business that manufactures protein supplement patties for honeybees. It's a good time to think about honeybee nutrition. Feeding your hives protein supplement patties will ensure that they produce strong and healthy colonies by increasing brewed production and overall honey flow.

Now is a great time to consider what type of patty is right for your area and your honeybees. Global offers a variety of standard patties as well as custom patties to meet your needs. No matter where you are, Global is ready to serve you out of their manufacturing plants in Airdrie, Alberta, and in Butte, Montana, or from distribution depots across the continent. Visit them today at www.globalpatties.com.

Jeff: Thank you, Sherry, and a quick shout-out to all of our sponsors who's support allows us to bring you this podcast each week without resorting to a fee-based subscription. We don't want that, and we know you don't either. Be sure to check out all of our content on our website. There, you can read up on all our guests, read our blog on the various aspects and observations about beekeeping, search for, download, and listen to over 200 past episodes, read episode transcripts, leave comments and feedback on each show, and check on podcast specials from our sponsors.

You can find it all at www.beekeepingtodaypodcast.com. Hey, Kim, we're right in the middle of our five-part series of hive types other than the Langstroth hive. Today, we talk with Tina Sebestyen about horizontal hives. I'm looking forward to this. You've known Tina for a while, haven't you?

Kim: Yes. She's out in Colorado, and she knows Ed Colby and she knows Tom Theobald, and I've known her for a while. She writes for the journals. It should be fun.

Jeff: Oh, great. I'm looking forward to the horizontal hives. That's something that I have an interest in and hope to get at some point. I was talking to one of the beekeepers here and he keeps horizontal hives, and it sounds like the right thing for me to investigate.

Kim: I went to eight-frame equipment because of my back. I think I may go to horizontal hives because of my back.

Jeff: [laughs]

Kim: There's some good things to be said about them.

Jeff: Well, since this five-part series started, we've had some interesting emails, and one of them is from disabled beekeepers and a beekeeper in a wheelchair. She mentioned how the horizontal hives and the top bar hives have been very useful for beekeepers in wheelchairs. I think that is really, really cool. That's something I'm embarrassed to say I hadn't considered the benefit of.

Kim: Well, you make them the right height then it should work pretty well. That's a good idea.

Jeff: Yes, I think so too. Very cool.

Kim: Well, Jeff, are you getting packages this spring?

Jeff: No packages, getting nucs. You getting packages?

Kim: I got packages. Jim too and I went and got packages this week which it was an interesting experience there. I get packages in a lot of places just to get different kinds of bees from different outlets. I've gotten the old wooden screen ones. I haven't gotten those for a while. I've been getting pretty much steady the white plastic ones. This time we had both and I know why people went to the white packages. They're just a lot easier to use. They're beekeeper friendly. They're bee friendly. They're not environmentally friendly. That's the downside of them, I think.

Jeff: Well, so that's interesting because I've received-- in the past few years when I've received packages, and I've done that in the last four or five years, they've all been in the wooden packages. I've never received a package in the plastic. What's different about the plastic packages?

Kim: Well, like I said, they're easier on the bees and they're easier on the beekeeper, but I'll tell you what. Jim and I did a whole show on packages. It's coming up in a couple of weeks, but I'll give you a sneak preview, is that instead of having to dump them out of the top, out of that hole, the hole end comes off and you just pour them into the hive. They're happy. You're happy. When you're done, there's no bees left because you've poured them all out. You don't have to worry about those 50 that are still floating around in the bottom of that box.

There's a cost for that. Like I said, they're not environmentally friendly because it's plastic. The other half of the equation is that the labor to put those together-- they come in six different pieces and you snap them together. The labor is almost zero. Whereas for the wooden packages, it's a little higher because you got to cut wood and then you're putting those pieces in on the inside and then stapling the screen on.

What you make them out of is almost free. It's a balance of cheaper construction versus expensive construction, expensive materials versus cheap materials and labor. Tune in. You'll learn a lot.

Jeff: It sounds really interesting. I've seen them advertised. Does the post office accept the plastic packages?

Kim: Yes, they do. They're happier with them because they don't leak at all.

Jeff: Oh, very nice.

Kim: They're thick enough, the plastic is thick enough that you can pick them up by the sides and the bees can't get to your hands like they can stinging through the screen.

Jeff: I remember the first time I ever got packages there in Hinckley and going down to the post office, and they were very happy to get them out of the post office.

Kim: Yes, they are. [laughs] I don't blame them.

Jeff: I got an early morning wake-up call for that one. That was good. Remember the Hinckley Post Office. Well, very cool. This year, I'm getting all nucs, no packages, and it's interesting. I've got them from a couple different sources. I just wanted to try different suppliers here locally. One group of nucs or cardboard boxes, which I have experienced in before. Then I'm picking up some nucs on Monday and they're in a plastic nuc, which is reusable and deposit. I guess they can reuse them and everything.

Kim: The cardboard is usually one way. You don't have to bring it back. The plastic, like you said, you put a deposit on. Either way, environmentally, they're friendlier than that plastic package. I've had two experiences using those, and one of them, the people didn't close them up at night, so you had to come and get them at night, the night before. You had to come and get them at night after everybody was home.

My experience with a lot of other people is you close them up the night before and people come and pick them up the next morning. That way you don't lose any of your field force, but nucs are a good thing to have, whether it's a bee supply store in your apiary. Anything and everything you need is in that nuc.

Jeff: Actually, I'm enjoying this. Last year, I wasn't happy with the nucs I received. This year so far it's been a good experience. As you're mentioning, the nucs I'm picking up Monday, I have to pick them up before 9:00 AM. Otherwise, they'll unplug and have to make arrangements for another morning. They close them up the night before, but they don't want to leave them closed up, so it will be good. Monday is looking good and I'm looking for an excuse to start my job a little bit later anyway. Working with bees is a good reason. [laughs]

Kim: There you go. Good.

Jeff: Kim, you're always reading. What have you been reading this week?

Kim: Well, believe it or not, I have five books open on my desk because I'm reading, as we speak, five books today, but I've just finished one. It's the book by Tammy Horn that I think we've mentioned before, where she found a lady who worked in AI Roots factory her whole life. Then we took AI Roots autobiography. She wrote an autobiography when she retired.

AI wrote an autobiography when he retired, so we just took the two and looked at side by side employee and employer and it turned out really well. Tammy did a really good job. It's just released. We're going to be talking to her pretty quick, aren't we?

Jeff: We're scheduled to talk to her in a couple weeks and the episode will be out later in June or later this month or in June. It's good. I like Tammy. We've talked to Tammy before about the history of bees in America. That's an earlier podcast we had out. I don't remember the episode right now, but you can do a search on our website on our convenience search function on the website and find that episode. Her understanding of knowledge and being able to communicate it is really fun. She makes it worthwhile.

Kim: There's a rumor that Bee Culture is going to have their October event this coming October. They had to cancel last year. The rumor still has it that Tammy and I are going to do some sort of discussion about the book and some period clothing and that sort of thing which is always fun. I'll let you know more as I know more.

Jeff: Very cool. Dress up in October. I think there's something that happens in October. You get dressed up in costumes too.

[laughter]

Jeff: All right. Looking forward to both those. I'm looking forward to talking to Tammy here in a couple weeks. Folks, keep an eye out on the podcast feed for our upcoming episode with Tammy Horn Potter on the-- What is that title, Kim?

Kim: The title is Work I Knew I Must which the lady that wrote the autobiography, her name is Jane Cole. Her mother had that sign on her kitchen wall, "Work I knew I must." That's where the title came because she was a single woman, and she had to support herself, so work I knew I must, and that's where the title came from, and it fits really well.

Jeff: Very cool. Is that book available now?

Kim: Yes, it is. You can get it through Bee Culture.

Jeff: Very good. Check out Bee Culture and pick up that book, and you'll be ready for the interview. Well, let's get into our interview with Tina Sebestyen on the long hives, but before then, a quick word from our good friends at Strong Microbials.

StrongMicrobials: Strong Microbials presents an exciting new product Super Fuel, the probiotic fondant that serves as nectar on demand for our honeybees. Super Fuel is powered by three remarkable bacteria known as bacilli supporting bees and breaking down complex substances for easy digestion and nutrient absorption. This special energy source provides all the essential amino acids, nutrients, polyphenols, and bioflavonoids just like natural flower nectar vital for the bees nutrition and overall health.

Super Fuel is the optimal feed for dearth periods over winter survival or whenever supplemental feeding is needed. A big plus is the patties do not get hive beetle larvae, so it offers all bioavailable nutrients without any waste. Visit StrongMicrobials.com now to discover more about Super Fuel and get your probiotic fondant today.

Jeff: While you're visiting the strong microbial site, be sure to subscribe to The Hive, their free newsletter on everything honeybee sign up by filling out the form at the bottom of the homepage. Hey everybody, welcome back. Sitting with us now across Zoom table is Southwest Colorado Master beekeeper and columnist, Tina Sebestyen. Welcome to Beekeeping Today podcast Tina.

Tina Sebestyen: Thanks for so much for having me. I'm really excited to talk about horizontal hives today.

Kim: Tina, one of the things about horizontal hives, and I'm just going to start right at-- because I've had one for a number of years, and actually, I lost it a couple of years ago because it just fell apart.

[laughter]

Kim: The thing about a horizontal hive, I'm over 70-years-old and lifting a deep super full of honey is not fun. In fact, it's not even possible for me anymore. The thing I like about a horizontal hive is the fact that there's essentially no lifting.

Tina: That is the thing that attracts people to horizontal beekeeping first is that there's no lifting, but there are a lot of other really great things about horizontal hives that make me think people would want to get into them anyway.

Jeff: When I think of horizontal hives, the first thing that comes to mind are those pictures you see on the internet and Instagram and the books where bees have gotten in between the floor joists, and you see all the comb wrapped around and all within a 6-inch space. That's what I think and I think that's perfect. That's a great-- I can see a lot of pluses for that.

Tina: That's a really good point. A lot of times when people are thinking about moving into a different style of hive, they ask, will the bees like this? The fact is that bees, evidenced by the fact that they'll move into just about anywhere, will live in just about any kind of hive. What we're talking about here is what works great for us, and the bees happen to love it too.

Kim: The kind of hives that you're talking about, Tina, are essentially, correct me if I'm wrong here, a Langstroth super that's like 30 frames long.

Tina: Exactly. It accepts Langstroth frames and it takes about 30 of them.

Kim: Okay.

Tina: We use a follower board, and that's the really neat thing about the Long Langstroth hive as compared to the Kenyan top bar hive that you can actually buy things that work in them. When you're doing top bar beekeeping, you have to figure out how to feed the bees. You have to figure out how to build whatever you need. You can buy a frame feeder for a Long Langstroth hive and easily feed your bees without figuring out anything. If you put your entrance on the end and entrance reducer works, it's just so much easier than other types of horizontal beekeeping.

Jeff: Can you just describe just for our listeners who really can't visualize just what a horizontal long hive looks like?

Tina: There are plans circulating online. They're easy to find, For the Long Langstroth hive, it has entrances on the sides. The pictures you'll find online have three entrances on the sides. Mine is made with the entrances. There's an entrance on each end, not that we're necessarily going to put more than one colony in there, but we can if we want to.

One great thing about having the entrance on the end versus entrances on the side is, if you do use your co your box for more than one colony, your bees are less likely to drift from one colony to the other. If the entrances are all on the same side, they're right there. We've learned partly from Tom Seeley and from other studies that, the more we can avoid drift from our bees, the better we are. That's why my entrance is on the end.

Also, the other great thing about having the entrance on the end is that then I can face it-- I like to face my colonies east or west, and west actually works really well because, here in Southwestern Colorado, we have pretty cool winters. My west-facing colonies get to fly more than my other facing colonies. I can face them either east or west. They get morning or afternoon sun.

Then the long side of the hive is facing the sun, so it absorbs the most amount of heat during the day. That's why I've designed it that way to make it easy to to position those hives correctly, for maximum warmth and to reduce drifting. There are also ventilation holes along both sides of the hive, and I drill those at 3/4 of an inch, so I can clog them with a cork if I need to, but that really helps the bees with ventilation.

That's something else you won't see on those online plans, is those ventilation holes. If you don't have that, the bees will curve the comb back from the entrance trying to draw air through. Just add ventilation holes along the side, and you've solved that problem too, and really made life easier for the bees, because part of their job is dehydrating honey. The more airflow they have, the better they can do that.

Kim: Tina, if you've got an entrance on the side of a long hive, one of the things that I've seen with top bar hives that do that is you end up with essentially two brood nest in that box, going out from the center going in both directions. With your entrance on the end, then you've got-- I'm going to say essentially almost like a Langstroth, you've got your brood in the front, and then you've got your honey stored behind that. Is that how that works?

Tina: Exactly. Yes, exactly right. We're helping the bees know what we want them to do.

Kim: [laughs] Yes.

Tina: [chuckles] Another problem with the entrance on the side there is the entrances aren't always exactly on the side. Then what the bees do is they want their brood right at the entrance. If there's a little bit of space between that entrance and the end, they'll put like five or six frames of honey, then the brood and then more honey. Now, you've got another division you have to deal with. The entrance right on the end, we know exactly what the bees want to do, and that helps us understand how to manage the comb better.

Kim: On your roof, so you got 30 frames. Do you have a roof that is 30 frames or do you have it in two or three sections so you can lift up the front, the middle, or the end?

Tina: I'm actually experimenting with that right now. Most of mine have a single roof, that's what I'm calling an outer roof. I have one that has three roofs so that I can put a colony in each end and run it as a two-queen system with supers just going up the middle. Both colonies work the same batch of supers which really should make supposedly a lot more honey.

So far, I've found that that three-section roof is very hard to seal properly for winter. I need to tweak that a little more, but I think that will work very nicely. Then also I have inner covers, not wooden ones like we have in regular Langstroth hives. I use burlap which is cheap and easy, and I can cut it to any size I want. The really nice thing about that burlap is that the bees fill it with propolis. Now, they're putting this wonderful healthful thing in their colony that helps keep them from getting diseases. One of the things I used to like about top bar beekeeping is that you only open a part of the colony at a time. Instead of, in regular Langstroth beekeeping, you take the roof off, and you've let all of the air out at once, all of the heat, all of the humidity. It's like, if somebody comes in the bathroom while you're taking a shower and leaves the door open, it's really shocking to the bees.

If you have a way to not disturb the entire cluster at once, they're much nicer to you. I mean, bees are docile anyway, but this makes them really nice. I just cut 6 or 8-inch strips of burlap and lay that over the frames, and that way I can remove what I want and just work that little piece of it, and it makes the bees really nice and happy.

Kim: That's pretty clever.

Jeff: Do the bees glue the burlap to the top bars, or do you have the burlap in some form of wooden frame?

Tina: They aren't quite able to stick it to the tops of the frames. Plus, it remains flexible so you can always pull it up. They do clockwise the section of the burlap that's between the bars, which is great because it's healthy for them. You can always pick it up, they can't glue it down so much that you can't get it up.

Jeff: Make sense.

Kim: The frames, Tina, in your hives if I look at a top bar hive, the top bars are touching. It's a solid surface. Yours are like Langstroth, there's a space between them.

Tina: That's exactly right. The bees could get up over the tops of those bars like in a regular Langstroth hive, except that I have that burlap laying on there, so it keeps them from being able to go up and over. Which it might be easier for them in the winter if they didn't have that but my bees seem to really like that burlap, maybe it absorbed some moisture in the winter or whatever, but they seem to do very well with the burlap there. Maybe it's just because of the propolis and how healthy that is for the bees.

Kim: Well, they do that in a tree you know. It makes sense that they do it for a reason, and they're doing it in your hives for a reason.

Betterbee: At Betterbee we know you have many options for where you choose to get your wooden hive boxes and frames. We work closely with our sister company Humble Abodes in Maine to bring you high-quality woodenware featuring tight-fit assembly available in a variety of great options to meet your needs. Whether you choose select, commercial, or budget-grade boxes or frames, you can count on quality milling of locally sourced Eastern White Pine. Shop all woodenware at Betterbee.com

Kim: I said that I had a long hive for a while, and I'll tell you, the worst thing that happened to me with that long hive was that I was working it out one day. It was a tad windy. Now, this is a hive from England. It was made of plastic, so it didn't have a lot of weight. I lifted the top, and the wind took it off like a plane. It tipped the hive over. It was an unpleasant hour, let me put it that way. That's why I was wondering about having a two or three-section roof and what you do seems to work well with that.

Tina: That's also why I don't hinge my roof onto my hive because of that seal effect, where I've had that happen to other people to. The wind catches that top that's hinged to the body and just takes the whole thing. The top, what does it weigh? 6 pounds? Just about anybody can lift a 6-pound top. I set it aside against the hive even in full piece, and it's not a problem.

Kim: The top of your hive is flat?

Tina: It is flat, but only because I've been lazy so far, that tops of all my Kenyan top bar hives are peaked like you would expect. I need to build peaked ones for my Long Langstroth too. I just haven't done it yet because I'm still working on my design.

Kim: Okay. What's the advantage of this hive other than what you've laid out in terms of-- we mentioned no lifting, and you're able to section it off so that the bees do what bees do and cavities. What else works well with a top with that long hive?

Tina: Well, one of the great advantages of it is that there isn't a shed full of equipment. Anyone who has regular Langstroth hives knows that you end up with an entire shed totally full of boxes, bottoms, tops, everything else. In a Long Langstroth hive, it's all there. I even keep a queen excluder under the cover, and there isn't anything else I need. I keep my frame feeder in place most of the time, so I don't even have to store that. It's just everything is right there.

One of the other great things about it though is that its, in my mind, so much simpler to manage because the bees are basically doing what they want to do. In regular Langstroth beekeeping, which most people that's what they're used to, you know that in the spring you have to reverse high bodies because the bees want to go up. In a Long Langstroth hive, you don't have to do that because the bees have followed the honey a little bit that they're at the back of the brood chamber, but because the honey is there, they're going to move back forward towards the door. You don't actually have to force the bees to do that.

In regular Langstroth beekeeping, you have to force the bees to fill up that deep hive body all the way to the side because what they want to do is to create a chimney. In Long Langstroth beekeeping, there's no forcing of the bees to fill something because they don't want to. They're just doing what they want to do, and it's just much easier. We don't have to try to figure out how to make them do what we want them to do.

Then another great thing about it is that, once you understand how the bees like to lay out the comb, there's nothing else to try to find. You know exactly where things are going to be. Inside the entrance, there's going to be one sheet of honey and a sheet of bee bread, and then the brood, and then the rest of the honey is behind there. That's the way the bees want to do it. We don't have to try to make them do anything else. It's just really easy.

Then the other great thing about horizontal beekeeping is the flexibility that we have with this type of hive. In a regular Langstroth hive, if I got to my outyard and discovered that they were getting ready to swarm, if I didn't have another hive body and another top, and another bottom in my truck, I wouldn't be able to handle anything. I would maybe cut out the swarm cells and hope that that bought me a week till I could get back and actually split the colony.

In a Long Langstroth hive, since everything is right there, if I find the queen, I can move her down to the other end where there's another entrance with some brood and some food, put a follower board there, and voila, my split is done. I didn't need any more equipment for that. Then, if in about 20% of the cases, the queen doesn't return from her mating flight, all I have to do is scoot that old queen back up to the back of the cluster, and I've got a queen right colony again.

I can give them another sheet of brood from the colony that's right in the other end of that hive. I'm not searching for resources for my colony because all the wooden worn type resources I need and all the resources I need are right there. It's just wonderful.

Jeff: That sounds really ideal.

Tina: I really think it is.

Kim: You don't have to remember to bring things. [chuckles]

Tina: The main problem with outyards, you never get there with everything you need.

Kim: Yes, or you've got half your stuff sitting out there all the time, and it's not at home when you want it. It works both ways. Well, how do these colonies-- if you're into honey production, are these colonies comparable to a Langstroth hive?

Tina: I haven't really compared them side by side, but I do have a friend who has a side-by-side, regular Langstroth and a horizontal. She says that her old-style Langstroth makes more honey. Then that's only one on one, you really can't compare that because what if it's just the race of the bee or whatever. I really can't say that I know the answer to that question.

Jeff: I'm going to make the assumption this is all on deep-frame equipment, right?

Tina: Well, the box holds deep frames, but that isn't a reason not to put medium frames in there. A lot of people will say-- so this is the usual progression, they started regular Langstroth deep hive bodies. Then they go to mediums because that's supposed to be lighter and stuff, and then they want to get into a horizontal Langstroth. They're like, "But now, I'm all in mediums and it takes a deep hive body, so what do I do?" Just put those medium frames in there. The bees will build the column on the bottom of that just fine without any trouble.

Yes, I mostly use deep frames in there, but I actually purposely use mediums in some places because the bees will, on the bottom of that medium, they draw drone comb, and now I can easily handle calling some drone route from that.

Kim: Well, that leads to the next question then is dealing with pests and predators and diseases and all of that. From what you said, it doesn't sound like it'd be a whole lot different, but is there some differences that I'm not aware of?

Tina: There are some differences. Part of it is because the ventilation in a Long Langstroth hive is so different than in regular Langstroth beekeeping. If you want to use Mite Away Quick Strips in there, you definitely need to open up a little more ventilation for that because it's going to be pretty tough on the bees, more difficult for them than it would be in regular Langstroth beekeeping. You can use Mite Away Quick Strips or Formic Pro or Apiguard just fine in a Long Langstroth hive just with a little extra ventilation. It works fine.

I have to mention, one of the reasons that I really was first attracted to horizontal beekeeping, well, it's what I started with. Then I got a regular Langstroth hive, and the colonies in my top bar hives and my Long Langstroth always seem to last a little bit better. There's no scientific evidence for this, so just take it for what it is.

Tina's idea that maybe bees do a little bit better because, in regular Langstroth hives when the bees groom a mite off, it has lots of other bees to fall through before it gets to the floor and to that sticky board. It can glom onto somebody else. In horizontal beekeeping, that's not very far to the floor and the mites can be groomed off and stay off much better. It's just a theory, but I really like that about it. It's just easier for the bees I think. Not that you don't have to treat for mites though, it's still very important.

Jeff: Did you fashion or integrate IPM boards to your long hives?

Tina: The plans you'll find online have a bottom that doesn't open, which means, if your colony dies or if you drop a sheet of brood in there or whatever, you have to scoop it out one bit at a time. Mine have hinged bottoms because one of the difficult things about most horizontal beekeeping is that you can't clean a dead colony out of the bottom of it, or if you drop something, it's really hard to clean it out. I've hinged the bottoms so that you can open a half at a time and clean out the detritus of winter or whatever that is.

They also have a drawer underneath that screen bottom that you can remove, and so that you could have a screen bottom that would be open to the ground. The important thing to remember about that though is that horizontal hives are on legs, and so they're standing at a really comfortable working height. If you have a screened bottom that's open at that height, it's going to really collect a lot of wind and a lot of drafts.

It's not great to have that open, which actually is a reminder anyway. I've just been doing some research that says that bees do best at mite control when they have a screen bottom with a sticky board under it. It's not very good for them to have it totally open even if it's a regular Langstroth hive that's only 4 inches off the ground.

Kim: Well, that makes perfect sense in terms of temperature control inside and probably humidity and everything else, so that they're not subject to the environment all the time. I wonder though, from the standpoint of going back to honey production again. When you harvest your honey, how well do they separate honey and brood? Do you end up with almost none, some, a lot of frames with both?

Tina: They separate the honey and brood very well, and I've never been tempted to try to remove the honey from a frame that they were using for brood, because they do this standard thing where you've got this nice rainbow of honey, and then the next layer down is a rainbow of bee bread. Then you've got a nice big brood ball right there, and that's it. They don't put honey there, except for when they're back-filling for winter, which you really need them to do that anyway. I've never been tempted to want to remove honey from those brood frames.

One of the things about the old style of top bar hive is that some of those little top bars were only 6 or 8 inches deep, and so the bees would have brood in just about every frame. In a nice Long Langstroth hive with those deep frames, the bees really only need maybe 12, at the very most 15 frames of brood, and they're not going to go any farther than that with the brood.

Kim: One of the things you just mentioned was putting a medium frame in those boxes or a couple of medium frames. I can see the advantage of that in a couple ways. One of them is making cut comb honey when they draw the bottom of that out and you can just harvest that piece of wax. The other thing is harvesting drone brood for varroa control. Have you tried that at all? Does that work?

Tina: That is exactly what I do at 4:00. We're told to harvest drone brood and put it in the freezer, but if you're in outyards, there is no freezer. Then I would have to bring it home, freeze it, take it back. This way, I can just cut that. It's about 3 inches of drone brood they've made on the bottom of that frame. I just cut it off and then I can bring it home. The bees can get started on their next batch right away. I put it in my freezer and that makes it easier for me to remove those and see how many mites are in there, but the bees don't have to wait for me to get it to the freezer and back.

Jeff: That's really cool.

Kim: Yes, that makes sense.

Jeff: That's really nice. Is this a good hive for a beginning beekeeper to start with, or should they have a year or two with a standard Langstroth first?

Tina: Well, it'll sure seem easier if they start with the standard Langstroth first. The only reason I'm hesitating on that question is because I have friends who are regular Langstroth beekeepers, and they just swear that people should start with regular Langstroth hives. I have to say there isn't that much information out there about how to manage Long Langstroth hive. There's a lot of books, a lot of videos, a lot of everything about regular Langstroth beekeeping, and you need that because it's harder.

[laughter]

Tina: I do have some friends that are transitioning into the Long Langstroth hive, and they're having difficulty because there aren't books written about it, so they don't quite know how to handle it. Here's one of the things I really would like to point out about the management of a Long Langstroth hive. This is important, and that is that, in the fall, the bees start winter where the brood chamber is, near the door. Throughout the winter, they follow the honey towards the back of the hive.

Then at the winter solstice, the queen starts laying eggs and the cluster is now anchored at wherever she started laying eggs, which is usually about in the middle of the hive or way towards what would be the back of their regular brood chamber. Now, you've got quite a distance of honey behind there. On warm days, the bees have to go get the honey and bring it back. We're talking in a horizontal way, so it's not warmer.

In regular Langstroth beekeeping, it's the same thing, but the bees are going up in this warm column of air to get the honey and bring it back to wherever the brood is, and so they're traveling in this warmth. In a horizontal hive, they're traveling through cold to get to that honey and bring it back to the cluster. This is what I'm telling you, it's really important to get in that colony in about February, and you can open it without disturbing the cluster because we've got our little inner covers over the cluster.

You take the full honey sheets and move them up to the back of the cluster, just where you start to see a bunch of bees, so the bees don't have so far to travel to bring that honey back to where the cluster is. That's important for them. It's also, to me, another really nice thing about horizontal beekeeping because I can get in there and see, do they have honey left, and what do I need to give them without disturbing it at all?

In the winter, in a regular Langstroth colony, you heft it. "I think it's heavy enough. I guess it's okay." You might pop the top and say, "Oh, there's bee candy in there," or there isn't, but in a Long Langstroth hive, you can actually get in there and see how much honey there is. You can even put bee candy in there in a frame and scoot it right up to the back of the cluster. In this way, I get to check my hive and really make myself feel better about how much food they have left over the winter.

Kim: Sounds definitely an advantage to be able to do that over the Langstroth hive in terms of safety for the bees, especially if you've got a two or three section roof. You can open the middle and look, that's where you think they should be. If they're not there, maybe they're further back.

Jeff: I like that.

Kim: That's an interesting concept.

Tina: Yes. Thanks.

Jeff: Where can people find additional information about managing and building and running a Long Langstroth hive?

Tina: Well, Bee Culture Magazine ran a series about Long Langstroth hives last year that I wrote.

Jeff: Very good.

Tina: You can get those from Bee Culture Magazine. You can email me for my plans. I keep meaning to put them on my website, and I just haven't done it yet. I've been asked to write a book, so that's actually what I'm supposed to be working on today.

Jeff: We're helping you procrastinate, in other words.

Tina: There you go. That's a good thing. It's a beautiful spring day.

Jeff: Well, if we'll be airing this, you might want to post those on the website, on your website, the plans or any kind of information. We can direct people to your website. We'll have information in the show notes pointing them to you and also about long hives.

Tina: Hey, sounds great. Well, thanks very much, guys. This was fun.

Kim: I'm glad you could be here today, Tina. I've learned a lot. Even though I've been keeping bees and long hives for a while, I've learned a lot, so thanks.

Tina: Wow, that's a huge compliment from you, Kim. Thank you.

Jeff: Well, Tina, it's been a great pleasure having you on Beekeeping Today podcast, and look forward to receiving a copy of your book and having you back to talk about that at a future date. Thanks.

Tina: Sounds good. Thank you very much, guys.

Kim: Take it easy, Tina. Thanks.

Jeff: Thank you. Hey, Kim, thanks a lot for inviting Tina in to talk about those long hives. She made it sound real fun and real accessible.

Kim: She writes a lot for the journals, and she works a lot with the Colorado Beekeepers. She's involved, I think, in their master beekeeper program. She's out front on a lot of things, and I figured when we were going to do this series on different types of hives, she would be a good one to talk to.

Jeff: Well, you thought right. That was great. I've heard people talk about using burlap as an inner cover substitute, but I never really considered it, but she really gave some great ideas for why it is a good idea.

Kim: I've used it in the past. I don't have a ready source of burlap, so most of my hives don't have it, but some of them. All the things that she said about it sticking but not are right. It makes that propolis envelope in a colony more likely. If you're trying to get a propolis envelope in a Langstroth hive, you've got to roughen the insides of all four sides, but you still don't get the top. This makes that possible.

Jeff: I was thinking you could even staple burlap to an inner cover, to the top of the hive cover. If you're running a regular Langstroth, you could just staple it in there, create that propolis envelope.

Kim: Yes. You've just opened up an idea here. What about inside of every one of your boxes?

Jeff: Yes, I wonder if any of our listeners have done that. It seems like that'd be a great thing to do. The other thing I kept thinking was, when you got tired of it or if it got corroded up or got too wet or something like that after winter, you could just pull it out, dry out and then burn it up.

Kim: Smoker fuel.

Jeff: In a smoker.

Kim: Exactly right.

Jeff: It'd smell good.

Kim: You mentioned-- it's got to be a lot easier to staple burlap to the inside of a box than it is to roughen it up.

Jeff: Oh, I've tried taking a saw to the inside of a pre-built box, and it's like a pain. It's not fun.

Kim: Yes, I took a file to some and I see a project this summer. I think we may have to consider this.

Jeff: Let us know how it goes. [chuckles] That about wraps it up for this episode. Before we go, I want to encourage our listeners to rate us five stars on Apple podcasts or wherever you download and stream the show. Even better, write a review and let other beekeepers looking for a new podcast know what you like. You can get there directly from our website by clicking on the reviews along the top of any web page.

We want to thank our regular episode sponsors, Global Patties, Strong Microbials, and especially BetterBee for their longtime support of this podcast. Thanks to Northern Bee Books for their generous support. Finally, and most importantly, we want to thank you, the Beekeeping Today podcast listener for joining us on this show. Feel free to leave us questions or comments us at leave a comment section under each episode on the website. We'd love to hear from you. Thanks a lot, everybody.

[00:44:23] [END OF AUDIO]