![]() ![]() frames or miticides, and it saves me having to slice’n’dice every outgoing cost too much. However, it’s not so many you have to buy an electric extractor or build a honey-processing room 4.įinally, some expenses are for items sold in multiples e.g. Secondly, it’s a manageable number for one beekeeper with a full time job and lots of other commitments. The small increase in work involved – the apiary visits, the inspections, extracting all that honey □ – is more than justified by the experience and resilience it brings to your beekeeping. It’s worth emphasising (again) that it is always better to have more than one colony. Most probably have just one or two, with a few having more 2. These amateur or hobby beekeepers have on average 3-5 hives each, according to relatively recent surveys. Over 98% of UK beekeepers therefore do not consider themselves as commercial. Of these, the Bee Farmers Association represent the interests of the ~400 commercial beekeeping businesses. If you want to have a lot of money when you finally lose your last hive tool you probably need to start with lots more 1.īut the vast majority of beekeepers aren’t commercial. Or any free time to enjoy them if they had □ ![]() None of them seemed to have yachts or Ferraris. There is occasionally a slight warping at some of the corner joints of both hives.I’ve met a few of the large commercial beekeepers here and abroad, operations with 500 to 1000 times the number of hives I’ve got. After three years of employment, the unpainted Flow Hive and Langstroth hive units are holding up equally well. I will confess that I do not like to paint my boxes as I personally prefer the look of natural wood in my apiary, though I know that I am sacrificing the longevity that painted boxes offer. My Classic Flow Hive boxes are crafted from cedar though I believe that there are several options for material available at this time. The key can be turned at the top of the frame, just like when harvesting honey, to aid in bringing the comb back into alignment. It does take a bit of time to realign the comb and its cells within the flow frames before use. When not in use, the comb cells can easily become misaligned from storage during the “off-season” as they are merely holding together by rubber band-like wires. The plastic honeycomb that is the Flow technology is only in use when the honey supers are in place on top of the hive. When manually taking honey with the use of an extractor we do quadruple filter our product, however, the Flow Hive honey is exceptionally clear and completely free of any debris or residue in comparison.Īs for the durability of the Flow Hive, our hive has been in use for three seasons. The honey is incredibly clear and fully filtered. When the cells do shift, though, the honey drains relatively slowly into your sterilized food-safe jar. The bees had glued the spacing within the cells together so well with propolis that the comb was difficult to crack and shift. In my experience, this plastic comb took a bit of elbow grease to unlock with a key. The center frame parts are made from a virgin food grade polypropylene which is also free from any bisphenol compounds and is widely accepted as one of the safest plastics for food contact.” Honey on Tap with the Flow Hive Third-party labs have tested this material and have found it to be free of estrogenic and androgenic activity. The Flow Hive honey super frames host plastic honeycomb cells, which the Flow Hive website states, “…it’s not only BPA-free, but it is not manufactured with bisphenol-S or any other bisphenol compounds. ![]() I’m often asked which hive system I like best and the honest answer is, at the risk of sounding acquiescent, I have no preference. Having the two hives side by side has helped me to learn to harvest honey both manually with the use of a spinner, or extractor, and by way of convenience with the Flow’s tapping system. I also purchased and assembled a Langstroth hive to house bees alongside the Flow. I found the idea of a Flow Hive to be a sensical option and decided to purchase a Classic Flow Hive kit as my first hive - you can find my Flow Hive Review here. I, myself, started beekeeping only in recent years. They can focus on gaining knowledge in the art of hive inspections, pest management, and hive behavior before tackling the manual labor of retrieving honey with an extractor. Some find that beginning their journey into beekeeping becomes more approachable when using a Flow Hive and that this system helps to reduce the steep learning curve. ![]() However, many modern backyard beekeepers love the ease with which they can harvest their honey. Some folks feel it’s a hands-off solution to harvesting honey, thus enabling laziness on the part of the beekeeper. Many experienced apiarists believe the technology to be gimmicky, expensive, and unnecessarily adding to the cost of beekeeping. ![]()
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