Natural Beekeeping Network

[Corwyn]

Part of what originally turned me away from keeping bees (in langstroth hives) was the outrageous costs involved. $300-$500 in starting equipment. Cheaper to just buy honey.

Then I discovered top bar hives...

To date, my beekeeping equipment has cost me around $43.

8- SS carriage bolts with wing nuts (to hold the legs on the hive): $34
1' of 1/8" hardware cloth: $5
Spray bottle: 2$


The rest has all been scrounge, and adaptations.

Hive - is made from leftover and scrap 1x4 and 2x4 lumber, a broken window, some spare screws (brass), and some leftover clapboards.

Mosquito head cover- (this may well be insufficient, and I may go to a fencing mask instead) I had a couple of these (we get black flies) but they only cost me $1 apiece.

Bee brush - a re-purposed architects brush from my grandfather. feathers, I am told, also work well.

Basket - to hold all my stuff.

Gloves, white shirt, etc.

Bees - Got extremely lucky and had a swarm land 50 feet from my hive, but patience will presumably make up for money, anywhere.


Some things I still might need:

Bucket for collecting honey comb, (generally I get food safe 5 gallon buckets for free from local food merchants)

Strainer - for separating honey from comb.


So, if it were not for my desire to use nothing that rusts on my hive, I could easily have gotten started with beekeeping for under $10.

It might be interesting to see if one could get a complete bee kit buying absolutely nothing.

[Brosville]

Well said Corwyn, like you I'm a "do it on a shoestring" beekeeper - but I doubt the concept is even comprehended by a spammer like "beesupplies" who obviously is what we would have called a "sad breadhead" way back when..........(who has obviously nil knowledge of the subject, but a keen desire to profit...)
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http://farmco.co.uk
Sussex Natural Beekeepers' Forum

[Daddy's Girl]

[Daddy's Girl]

I disagree with the assumption that lots of expensive equipment is required and I would like to invite beesupplies to stay in the discussion long enough to explain their suppositions, as i will cheerfully do mine.

Most 'kits' come with a Langstroth hive, a suit, smoker, and a few other odds and ends. There is very little else in the way of useful equipment in the standard kits on the market that caters to the world of Top Bar and Natural Beekeeping.

The first problem is that I cannot go out, anywhere, and buy a package that has just or maybe most of the things I want/need. Due to allergies, I have to wear a suit that I feel is secure, and many kit suits come with multi-piece affairs that are hard to wear and not secure enough to limit access by the bees to a couple places. That said, I wear the "English" beekeeper suit because it has a single potential access point to the body, and has strong elastic at the cuffs.

A smoking device is minimally useful. I use it in situations where i know that the bees are going to be a problem, because of what I am doing (like merely opening the Langstroth), but most of the time it sits unused on the shelf. A good quality water sprayer is more valuable and versatile for what we do in this forum.

Hive tools are great. Most of the hive tools included in kits are little more than pry bars akin to the ones you see in a hardware store--except they are cheap and I once broke one while in the hive. However, the 14" stainless tool with the good scraper and the hooks has been a lifesaver.

Bee brushes are absolute necessities. I really like the ones I can buy, but I've improvised with leaves, grass, and drafting brushes. The bristles need to be just firm enough to get the bees cleared from the comb and preferably soft enough to not injure them.

Comb handling is a pain. There's no good way on the market to deal with comb from a TBH. I use a cookie sheet, lay the bar on it, make one firm stroke with a knife, and put the bar away from the hives for the gang to clean up.

Crush and strain, crush and strain, crush and strain. The crushing is easy. The straining may or may not demand more 'tech'. I bought a set of the Dadant bucket filters, bucket, and honey gate. IF you have several hives and the potential for a gallon or two of honey, they are fine. At this point, buying and installing a honey gate in the side of a two gallon bucket makes more sense for a hobbiest with a couple TBH. You can use a good quality, STRONG collander, but the bucket filters let you control how many microns you're straining to, and that potentially removes more foreign matter.

One thing I have come to love is a frame grabber tool. It lets me grab the top bar securely with one hand while the other is doing something like water spray, or brushing bees from something. Not necessary, but darned useful.

The Langstroth equipment is useless to me. It is expensive, heavy, and hard to use. I built my TBH for between $35-50 each and they are far superior in every way, except honey production, which isn't my main reason for beekeeping anyway.
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Live dangerously or not at all

[DavesBees]

Daddy's Girl,
Well said. I'll just take about 99% of that with me to my KTBH class. I saved the 1% for an original thought.
_________________
Dave
http://www.davesbees.com

PM me if you are interested in beekeeping in the Wheeling WV area.
Bees in a tree are where they should be.

[biobee]

I removed the spam before I realized its relevance to the subsequent discussion, so I have edited the title of this thread accordingly.

[BP]

My local beekeeping club teaches that $1000-$1500 is your average start up cost for beekeeping. (seems most of the clubs call this their start up costs).

That includes traditional beekeeping hives and gear but not the centrifuge extractor or hot knives to cut off wax from the langstroth frame.

With top bar hives I've started with probably $500 but have a lot of different hives and still have the beekeeping suit, smoker (not using though), gloves, etc.

I don't think they beekeeping retailers like the lack of gadgets and doo hickeys to sell around the hives compared to traditional langs.


Cheers,
BP