Total newbie just about to take the plunge - HELP!

[Beer Hunter]

Guys,

I hope you can help me out; I'm just about to take the plunge and buy my first hive and don't want to make an expensive mistake :)

Can you tell me if beginners kits like these are worth the money:
http://www.bees-online.co.uk/view.asp?ID=1120
http://www.thorne.co.uk/thorne7.htm
Or should I buy items individually?

Are there retailers people would recommend above others?
Are there any retailers in the North East Scotland - the Inverbervie / Stonehaven area?

Where would I buy bees - on-line? I see from other posts on here that there is the potential for disease in bees locally. Can a beginner easily tell the difference?

Cheers,
Kev.

[Calum]

Hi Kev,

the Thorne price looks ok.. No idea about the quality though.
Maybe you will get a better price for a hive if you buy it with the bees. But whatever you do buy your bees locally with the advice of the local association.
You will need
2-3 Colonies / two really strong ones so you can create a third one this year..
# 4 Honey Pails (plastic with lids 12,5kg capacity)
# 1 Hive Tool - American long
# 1 Smoker as big as you can (burns longer between refills)
# Veil
# bee brush
that should get you started... I hope your local association has a Honeyextractor - you will want to hold off on buying that till you know if you want to carry on.

http://www.swienty.com/ is well respected here and is in english - prices are competative for over here. I think I got all that for under 80 pounds (http://www.holtermann-shop.de but in German) and my hives (with bees and 2 supers) for 150 pounds for each colony...
A good book is good, but I never bothered with the gloves. If you mow the lawn you dont need fuel for the smoker!
all the best
Calum

[rourkie]

Hi kev, look at thornes bees on a buget kits they are 2nd qaulity cedar but the bees dont care a complete national hive in the flat is £108.70+vat. or a package includes hive plus veil gloves ect£152 +vat, or look for second hand equipment on ebay, or bid4bees. make contact with you local beeks they may be able to help out with kit and bees regards rourkie

[Beer Hunter]

Great stuff guys - thanks :)

Kev.

[Beer Hunter]

rourkie,

I've just found the package you mentioned:
------------------------------------
Package 2 – The Basic Kit
Everything in Package 1
plus a smoker, hive tool, leather
gloves, jacket and veil, bee
brush, smoker cartridges,
feeder and mouseguard
– £175.00
------------------------------------

I understand I'll need a honey extractor etc later, but is there anything else I would need immediately?

You mention:

4bees. make contact with you local beeks they may be able to help out with kit and bees
Can you tell me how I would find my local "beeks"?

Cheers,
Kev.

[rourkie]

hi kev, go onto the scottish beekeepers web site and look for the local groups theres a list on the site , pick the group nearest to you contact secretary and join, regards rourkie

[gavin]

Good advice there from both (though in 2009 I didn't need any honey buckets at all!).

You asked if there was anything else? I'd say a second hive tool as I was always losing them in my early years! The second quality equipment at Thornes is usually good, and as they sold a lot in their January sale I think that they are making up more to sell which may be of better quality than usual.

There are always more bits of beekeeping equipment you can buy (best hide your credit card if you plan a trip to Thornes in Newburgh in Fife) but I think that kit would get you going.

I'll send you a PM with a good contact local to you, and maybe more besides.

[Calum]

http://www.scottishbeekeepers.org.uk/services/html/links.html

I needed 14 12,5kg buckets in 2009, from 9 colonies in June. I was in china in August so someone else harvested my summer crop for me (but they did the Folic acid treatment & fed them as payment)..
I guess it is easier here.

[gavin]

I did take off a rape harvest but put it back on in the autumn (still in the supers) as I'd not been feeding as assiduously as I should given the poor summer (too busy on other things). Of the two I took to the heather one brought in a super of honey but as the brood box was light I just left that on too. We had an exceptionally wet summer and colonies were starving in mid and late summer. Oh, I also gave away three nucs and built up from four to six.

[Calum]

Hi Gavin,

yes our summer was not great either -but not that bad. I Expanded as well, from 9 to 17 colonies + one given away. We didn't have any 'wood' honey. Do you have that in the UK at all? Thats maybe a good thema for a blog on its own..
Here it is unusual to give the honey back to the bees as it is thought that the bees winter better on sugar stores (not so many minerals to overfill the stomach) and sugar is cheaper than honey. We were lucky that is was wet but warm enough that we got constant clover crops so no starvation problems but no great crop.

[POPZ]

Hi Gavin,
Here it is unusual to give the honey back to the bees as it is thought that the bees winter better on sugar stores (not so many minerals to overfill the stomach) and sugar is cheaper than honey.

Calum, thats is an interesting idea and one I have not come across before? I thought that it was the other way round, except for the cost. Also it is said by some down south, that the ladies will not winter well on heather honey. But ours here appear to thrive on it. Guess that's what makes looking after the ladies so interesting - and challenging!

[Trog]

My lot appear to be wintering on ivy, plus a bit of heather, plus some sugar but they didn't take much of that. One colony's eaten the Christmas candy and been given more; the other had half of theirs left last time I looked. Hope this wintry weather gives up soon as it would be nice if they could get out to the snowdrops!

[gavin]

Here it is unusual to give the honey back to the bees as it is thought that the bees winter better on sugar stores (not so many minerals to overfill the stomach) and sugar is cheaper than honey. We were lucky that is was wet but warm enough that we got constant clover crops so no starvation problems but no great crop.

I used to believe that business about the bees wintering on sugar/fondant better than the late season forage, especially heather. However our native bees must be used to such diets and people have told me that they think that their better colonies in the spring have often been on heather the autumn before. Maybe the pollen and protein in heather honey helps them, and our generally mild winter lets them out when they need?

Of course my rape supers were set solid. Perhaps not the best winter feed for the bees for that reason, but also difficult for me to extract!

Here is a map showing what our summer was like:

52 (http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/anomacts/2009/7/2009_7_Rainfall_Anomaly_1971-2000.gif)

(bit hard to read, but the deep blue is 2x or more the long term average rainfall for July)
(http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/anomacts/2009/7/2009_7_Rainfall_Anomaly_1971-2000.gif)

[Calum]

and our generally mild winter lets them out when they need? - I think that might well be the case - we can have months long well into minus degrees. Then again they survived in the wild before cane sugar reached europes shores. But there were also fewer other stress factors then (apart from bears). :)

[Neils]

Guys,
Can you tell me if beginners kits like these are worth the money:
http://www.bees-online.co.uk/view.asp?ID=1120
http://www.thorne.co.uk/thorne7.htm
Or should I buy items individually?



Kev,

It might have changed, but when I visited Maisemore last year, they told me that their starter package offered no discount over buying the items individually; it was just what they considered a reasonable bundle to get going with.

Personally I didn't like anyone's starter packs so learning that was actually a bit of a relief as it let me pick and choose the things I actually wanted rather than what someone else thought I should have.

If you can find a local supplier, I'd recommend at the very least paying them a visit. However you do it, you're about to hand over a significant amount of cash to get started so being able to try on different suits, play with the smokers and so on is well worth doing if you can in my opinion.

I've bought gear from both Maisemore and Thornes and find them a bit hit and miss in some respects. They both do shocking hive assembly instructions, fortunately the SBA has one of the best Hive assembly guides I found. Considering that once you start to bang nails in you've pretty much passed the point of no return, they could really do with sorting their assembly instructions out, they make IKEA look fantastic. I might just be bitter because I built a top beespace National brood box by mistake but I maintain it was the instructions at fault.

As a New beekeeper just going into year two, and just having taken delivery of this year's extra kit I'd say that if you can afford to do it, buy two complete hives (Floor, broodbox, roof, stand if necessary) and at least 2 supers. Also get a couple of extra frames over and above what you need to fill your initial buy. Spare kit is a godsend and while you can get away with it in the first year, extra gear to hand is very handy. You will be reacting to what the bees do rather than anticipating them so you'll need that extra brood box yesterday rather than in the 2-3 days that someone can ship it to you.

Don't buy buckets though. They are bloody handy but also really expensive. Get to your local pub or Deli and ask if they've got any spare sauce buckets (with Lids). They'll be food grade plastic and come in very handy for lugging syrup around or storing bits of old wax.

Actually that goes for anything that can be labelled "Beekeeper's...." If it isn't a hive or similar, go to B&Q and you'll get it for cheaper. I'm thinking of toolboxes, nails, blowtorches all that sort of thing (you do know that it is obligatory to have a blowtorch don't you?)

[Neils]

I thought this might be of interest, I came across the invoice for the gear I picked up at Maisemore when I started out last year. A national hive might not necessarily be the best choice for your bees and/or location, but it might give some idea of what's potentially involved. I bought:

1 Roof
1 Open Mesh Floor
1 National Brood box
2 Supers
1 Framed Queen excluder
12 DN4 Hoffman frames
12 Sheets of DN foundation
20 SN1 Frames
20 SN Foundation
2 pairs of 10 frame castellated spacers
1 Smoker
100grams of Frame Nails
2 Hive tools
1 Uncapping fork
1 Miller type feeder
1 Push in Queen cage
1 Fencer Veil Smock
1 crown/clearer board

That lot set me back £368.54

In terms of what I've learned since then (and bearing in mind I inherited a complete hive and 4 spare supers to begin with)

12 Brood Frames isn't enough, I ended up buying another 10 later on in the season and I still have a bunch kicking around the place ready made, just needing foundation adding.
Putting Super frames with foundation in 10 frame castellated spacers isn't a good idea, you end up with some frames drawn very deeply, some not at all. Put in 11 or even 12 frames to start with, get those drawn and then start to cut the number down or move drawn frames into a super with the spacers fitted.

A spare hive or a nucleus, if your budget can stretch to it, makes life so much easier. In the first season, if you get a Nuc, swarming MIGHT not be an issue. if it is, having a complete spare floor, brood box and roof suddenly makes things an awful lot easier to manage.

A miller feeder is handy if you need to give a colony a lot of syrup and you dont mind spending some time investigating methods to stop bees drowning. I still struggle with contact feeders to not have syrup going everywhere, but I also inherited a smaller rapid type feeder and that's worked out fine for me, the syrup stays in the can and bees tend not to drown in it.

Buckets, toolboxes, nails, hammers, blowtorches and all that jazz can be bought much cheaper from B&Q than a beekeeping supplier but I definitely recommend splashing out on a Stanley toolbox, they're more than Squaddie proof and make a handy seat for watching the bees go about their business.

I think that is not a bad starting package, spare hive not withstanding, I picked up rubber gloves from my supermarket of choice for all of 30p and I've not felt particularly that I lacked anything in particular last year. Extra bags of nails etc always come in handy, I'm pretty sure I had to buy extra pins for the frames at some point and now I keep finding the bloody thing everywhere.

[troyca]

My first kit was from Fragil Planet. It was only reclaimed pine but not expensive and included bees. I went cheap just in case it turned out to be not the hobby for me.-Three years later I am on my third hive purchase and lots of various bits. I found Thornes expensive and rather" snotty "to deal with. Paynes quality was not all that great . My favorite suppliers has to be The crew in Oakhampton- National Bee Supplies. They always answer their phone with real people . They are always fridndly anD helpful and give great advice over the phone . I now only use them. As a newby they don't make you feel a complete idiot asking what you feel are really obvious questions. Bees are a harder one...

[Trog]

I'll put in a good word for Thorne's (or several, given the chance). I've always found them helpful, friendly, and they work very hard to meet the demand for kit 'yesterday', which is when we usually need it, having yet again failed to anticipate the number of extra frames/supers/foundation we're going to need.

[Adam]

I was told the other day by a Thornes agent that they have had a 500% increase in business so are running around like headless chickens at the moment. Deliveries are consequently not going out very promptly !

I have not had a problem with any of the suppliers I have used. The Thornes BOB (Bees on a Budget) hives are fine in my opinion, I've got a couple. The correx varroa slide-out is hopeless though!