Old Timer Beekeeper uses no ventilation

JP · August 12, 2007, 12:30:47 PM

Thought I'd mention what I saw last weekend in Brookhaven, Mississippi. A friend introduced me to a fine fellow who raises bees and performs removals. Got a chance to go to his house in the country where he lives and keeps his bees. He has about 15 hives. The bees were gentle. The craziest thing, he had boardman feeders on quite a few, but on all, including the ones with the feeders, he had entrance reducers on, and he does not use sbbs. The first thing that I immediately noticed and asked about was the lack of ventilation. His answer was, "bees in the wild don't have large entrances, they have small ones, and they do fine". He has a point there, this is true. The amazing thing is that you would expect to see heavy bearding, cause the heat index that day was 105 degrees farenheit. I didn't see any! And he says his bees don't beard, go figure. They looked like Italians to me, though I didn't ask.

Michael Bush · August 12, 2007, 02:15:12 PM

>His answer was, "bees in the wild don't have large entrances, they have small ones, and they do fine". He has a point there, this is true.

He is correct. They are also in a live tree usually, which is much cooler than a 3/4" thick wood hive in the sun. They also don't make as a well ventilated hive. Making honey requires evaporating nectar. Evaporating nectar requires a lot of ventilation.

> The amazing thing is that you would expect to see heavy bearding, cause the heat index that day was 105 degrees farenheit. I didn't see any!

Are they in the sun? I'd be pretty surprised at no bearding in full sun on a really hot day. I have very little, but I have SBB and top entrances. When I don't have them, I get a lot of bearding.

JP · August 12, 2007, 02:45:15 PM

Partial sun.

rdy-b · August 12, 2007, 07:08:35 PM

If you have a colony set up like that you can lightly puff smoke at one side of the entrance and you will see smoke entering one side and exiting out the other side they draw air in and up one side and from there own design move it through out the hive like duct work and it will exit out the front entrance opposite the side it enters they have a very complex system to maintain temp by adding water to the air flow that is one of the reasons they chink every thing up with propolise ventilation in the winter time is key factor in colony survival due to condensation when in cluster there is still a lot of old school out there . I have colonies set up with all the bells and whistles and some with old school basics fun to compare every year is different outcome RDY-B

Mici · August 12, 2007, 07:14:42 PM

no one around here uses more than one entrance (lower) except for me and maybe a few exceptions and they seem to do ok.
how's the saying? you can't teach new tricks to an old dog (most beeks around are 60+)

although the NOT bearding part is confusing, maybe they all swarmed and there aren't much bees to beard:D

JP · August 12, 2007, 07:20:46 PM

The man is in his eighties. The hives are strong with heavy traffic in most, very active bees.

Michael Bush · August 13, 2007, 07:12:12 AM

Everyone I knew kept bees with only a bottom entrance and no top entrance for years. So did I. But I'm having much better luck with better ventilation.

pembroke · August 13, 2007, 06:08:18 PM

thought I'd weigh in on this. I have sbb and bottom entrance, then 1 inch hole in every deep brood box I use [right now 3 per hive] then the inner cover has a slot cut out for more air flow. the only thing that doesn't have holes are my honey supers. My mentor says lots of ventilation is good for bees. I trust him to know. Pembroke