How to Start a Honey Bee Hive
Although there are many technical challenges in setting up a bee hive and taking all the necessary steps to ensure the hive’s success, the rewards of beekeeping are many. For one, a thriving hive can produce 20 to 30 pounds of excess honey in an average year and more than 50 pounds in an abundant year. The best way to go about setting up a bee hive is to order all of the hive parts, equipment and bees from apiary supply companies, many of which are located on the West Coast and in the Southeast.
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Things You'll Need
- Top hive cover with weights
- Inner hive cover
- Top feeder tray
- Super boxes
- Frames
- Queen excluder
- Brood chamber
- Hive bottom board with landing
- Hive stand
- 3 pounds of bees with a queen
- Smoker
- Bee hat with veil
- Gloves
- Bee brush
- Hive tool
- Ankle and wrist straps
- 5 pounds of granulated sugar
Instructions
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Assembling the Hive
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1
Choose the hive’s location, which can determine whether the bee colony succeeds or fails. Select a location close to abundant flowering trees and flowerbeds and preferably near a source of fresh, running water. The site should be sunny but shaded during the hottest part of the day and have good air circulation.
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2
Place the hive bottom board with landing strip on the hive stand. The brood chamber, where the queen will lay eggs and produce new generations of bees, will go on top of the bottom board.
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3
Place the queen excluder on top of the brood chamber. This metal frame structure allows worker bees to pass but prevents the queen from moving upward in the hive, ensuring that all upper hive levels are reserved exclusively for honey storage.
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4
Place the foundation frames into the brood box. The material inside the frame is coated with beeswax and stamped with hexagonal cell shapes, where the bees will build cells for brood and store honey.
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5
Place the inner hive cover on top of the topmost hive level. This creates an empty air space inside the hive to help with circulation.
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6
Install the top feeder tray, if desired. This is to ease the process of feeding sugar syrup to a new or overwintering bee colony without opening the hive.
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7
Place the hive cover on top of the hive complex. Most beehive covers are made of metal and have telescoping sides. Covers are necessary to protect the hive from wind and rain.
Selecting and Ordering Bees
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Decide which “race” of bees you’re interested in keeping. One of the gentlest varieties is the Caucasian honeybee (Apis mellifera var. caucasica); other popular races include Italian (Apis mellifera var. ligustica); Carniolan (Apis mellifera var. carnica); Cyprian (Apis mellifera syriaca) and European (Apis mellifera var. mellifera). Each variety is valued for different traits, such as docility, good overwintering ability or reproductive vigor.
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9
Order at least 3 pounds of bees, which usually consists of between 10,000 and 12,000 bees, including one queen. Bees come enclosed in a wire mesh cage and are shipped through the mail or can be picked up from a distributor.
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10
Begin the installation process on a warm, sunny day by donning the veiled bee hat and tightly cinching up sleeve and pant openings.
Installing the Bees
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11
Prepare the bees’ initial sugar syrup food source by dissolving 5 pounds of granulated sugar into 2 quarts of boiling water.
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12
Remove the hive covers and take out several of the frames from the brood box.
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13
Gently but forcefully tap the shipping cage on the ground, which will knock the bees to the bottom. Use smoke as needed to subdue the bees.
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14
Pry open the lid of the shipping container and remove the queen cage. Re-block the entrance of the shipping package to prevent worker bees from escaping. Place the queen cage between two frames of the brood box, candy-plug side up. Once the worker bees are released into the hive, they will find the queen and eat through the candy to free her.
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15
Carefully shake the worker bees from the main shipping container into the brood box, making sure some end up directly near the queen cage. Replace the brood frames inside the box, taking care not to crush any of the worker bees. After closing the brood box, block the hive’s entrance with a handful of grass. Install the feeder tray with the sugar syrup on the top of the hive and cap with the weighted hive top.
Following Up
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16
Remove the block to the hive’s entrance in about five to seven days. This resting period gives the bees adequate time to free the queen and begin the process of building brood cells. You might need to replenish the bees’ sugar supply during this time.
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Check on the queen. Several days after unplugging the hive entrance, open up the brood box with the hive tool, using a bit of smoke to help control the bees. Make sure the queen has been released from her shipping cage and has started laying eggs. If she is either dead or not producing eggs, you will need to order another queen immediately.
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Once the brood box begins to fill, consider adding supers with honey frames above the brooder. By adding space into which the bees can expand the colony, the worker bees will have plenty of room to raise the colony’s young and store excess honey.
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Tips & Warnings
The term "super" is used to describe the boxes for honey storage that are added to the upper levels of the hive.
For best results, use very dry materials to fuel the smoker, such as wood chips, wood shavings or pine needles.
Always work calmly and carefully around your bees. A nervous beekeeper might stimulate the bees and encourage stinging.
Anyone allergic to bee stings should exercise extreme caution when working near or around a beehive. Even with the best protection, the beginning beekeeper must expect to be stung. While many beekeepers actually become less sensitive to the effects of bee stings over time, some people become more allergic with repeated exposure to bee sting venom.
References
Resources
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