Steve Decresie would be proud…

As a master student of the Always Put Off Until Tomorrow What You Should’ve Done Three Weeks Ago school of thought, I consider it a major step forward in my evolution (I hope to actually become human before I die…) when I take full advantage of unexpected opportunities to get stuff done.  Wednesday I was handed a sunny, 80-degree afternoon with no prior obligations, so I put on some old jeans, dug up a crowbar, and turned a fence into a very lovely hive stand.  Observe:

Before… one of a bunch of unconnected fence sections that the previous owners erected as part of a privacy screen (why not install an entire fence?  I do not know.)

And after! 

boring bee talk> I’m a big fan of the open (screened) bottom, but I ran into multiple problems with it last season – most notably the issue of getting the debris board back in for mite counts.  With the solid bottom board off, the bees would congregate under the hive on the screen; when it was time to replace the solid board, the entire hive had to be lifted to get it underneath, and it was impossible to get all the bees off the screen, resulting in many being trapped between it and the solid bottom.  I also ran into problems getting the debris tray in and out, since it never quite fit properly in the slot, and would either leave too much space, allowing bees to enter, or too little space, causing the pollen/mites/etc. to be scraped off upon removal of the tray.  Adding and removing the solid bottom board also altered the location of the hive entrance, which invariably resulted in some confusion among the returning foragers.

 

This year, I hope to have solved these problems.  First, I’ve replaced my old bottom board/screen board combo with Kelley’s screened hive stand; the slot for the debris tray is in the back of the hive, not the front, so there is no interruption of the bees when the tray is inserted/removed.  There is a second slot above it, for the removable screen.  I plan to keep the tray out, except for mite counts.  To keep the bees from hanging under the screen, then, I have built a second screen (plastic window screen from Home Depot) into the big stand; this will keep the bees off the bottom of the hive entirely, so that the debris tray (which will also act as the solid bottom in winter) can be removed/replaced without worrying about trapping anybody, while still allowing all the benefits of an open bottom when the tray is out.  </boring bee talk>

Saturday was sunny again, and I  finished everything up.  I moved Iris’s house onto the new stand; she’ll be alone out there for another few weeks, but by May she will have company:  Lucy and Lucy Juniors, and Isolde and Isolde Juniors will be joining her, with room on the stand for the eventual arrival of Rekefet and Rebekah and their myriad daughters.   One significant thing or tens of thousands of significant things – it’s all the same in the beeyard.