Bee Keeping Workshop 7th June 2015 - West Cork

Press Release: Natural Beekeeping Class

Liss Ard Estate, West Cork, Ireland, 7^th June 2015

A chemical free - Natural Beekeeping Class is being offered on Sunday 7^th June 2015 to introduce people to a gentler approach to Beekeeping at Liss Ard Estate in Skibbereen.

This is a perfect venue for the beekeeping class with plenty of space to roam around in their own natural habitat.

Max Danann & Trevor Danann both certified Beekeepers, are offering training in Natural Beekeeping (chemical free) through use of Top Bar Hives and their own hybrid mixed hives. The workshop is geared toward those with no prior experience in beekeeping but Beekeepers of any level are welcome.

April Danann will also be on hand to discuss her research project on Irish honey - The Honey Project - a microbiological review of honeys from around the world and their unique healing properties. 

Top Bar Hives are an alternative type of hive to commercial or national framed style hives currently in use. These are considered to closely resemble natural bee habitat and bees thrive in them. Many long time beekeepers are switching over to using some form of top bar hive. As well, our own mixed hive featuring framed Top Bars will be discussed.

During the class, you will be introduced to some time honoured traditions in beekeeping, learn about honey, equipment needs, initial start-up, bee health; including disease, pesticides, colony collapse disorder and how to keep a bee garden.

Students will be walked through a Top Bar Hive as well as other types – how they work, how to maintain a hive, and how to provide a family with a source of honey. There will be plenty of time for questions during this discussion style workshop.

Bees are everyone’s responsibility – at one time most back gardens had a hive or two – it’s time we came back to supporting these beautiful creatures – this class is a step forward in learning how to do just that.

Date; 7th June 2015

Place; Liss Ard Estate Skibbereen

Time; 1:30 to 4:30pm 

Cost: €55.00 (includes notes, light refreshments)
Contact: Max Danann 0873284762, email info@aprildanann.com or stop by our stall to book your place. Deposit required to hold a seat.

Various types of bee hives in our garden 

Top Bar Bees busy again

Its good to see the Bees back into the swing of things again, the last few weeks of sunshine was the boost that was needed to get them flying and foraging. Unfortunately, the rain has returned and settled in for the time being. This change in weather will affect the bees ability to build stores up for the winter so lets hope that the sunshine returns very soon.

I plan to show the Top Bar Bee Hives at the Skibbereen market again due to renewed interest from a number of aspiring beekeepers that I have talked to at the market. As always, I strive to improve the hive structure with each new hive that I build. The design originates in the Kenyan style of hive with some modifications to adapt to the Irish climate, such as ventilation to deal with excess dampness in the hive. I still prefer to use Larch timber for its durability and weather resistance.

 I am looking forward to seeing some more Top Bar Hives getting out into back gardens and fields. I set up a hive last week in a garden center and I am sure the bees will be very happy with the extended range of flowers and herbs to forage from.

All for now,
Max

Natural Beekeeping for Children

Trevor Danann is instructing a Natural Beekeeping course for Children in Leap, West Cork on May 12. He is the ideal instructor as he is himself 12 years old and has been a certified Beekeeper for the last four years.

After attending and passing the FIBKA Gormanstown Beekeeping Summer School, he has participated in managing several Top Bar hives, as well as assisted in numerous hive builds, Bee installations, inspections and extractions.

Trevor has also been assisting in the previous 10 Natural Beekeeping Courses and is keen to present this course himself to an audience of children.

The course is designed to introduce children to the skills of Natural Beekeeping, covering topics such as: Bees, Honey, Commercial Beekeeping, Natural Beekeeping, Bee Health, Getting started and Research. The two hours duration of the course will include time outside observing Bees around the onsite hives.

Any younger children attending the course must be accompanied by an adult. The cost is €25 per child.

Trevor can be found at the Skibbereen Farmers Market every Saturday at our stall and ready to answer any queries on the Hives on display or Natural Beekeeping in general.

Regards,
Max

Building a Top Bar Bee Hive

One search for images of Top Bar Hives on the internet will show you how many variations that have been developed in different regions of the world. It is nice to see so many beekeepers building and using Top Bar Hives, the interest has certainly grown exponentially over the last few years.

I have found that proper ventilation is key in Ireland to deal with the excess of rain that is a year round constant. Also being able to fit National frames into the box ease the start up or transition to Top Bar Beekeeping. Most of the hives I build are made from solid Larch, which is a long lasting timber that stands up to the local weather without much need for coatings. My hives are also free of any toxins, glues, paint, sealers or preservatives to provide a toxin free environment, essential to the health of the bees.

Each hive I have built has been an improvement over the previous ones, applying what I learn from beekeeping into each new hive. I guess that I must be on the 6th or 7th generation of design adaptation resulting in a robust hive that will last for years, providing a safe, dry and clean space for the bees to live.

Beginning each new project is first spent visualizing what I what to make and then looking at the material at hand to see how it can be used efficiently. Sometimes it takes longer to plan the hive than to build it and a proper plan means less waste of material. I have added a few machines to my workshop since I first started building hives but basic hand tools are all that are really needed to build a hive from scratch.

I will be hosting a Top Bar Hive building workshop this spring and hope to see both old hands at beekeeping as well as aspiring beekeepers take part.

Regards,
Max

Thinking outside the box

The standard beehive, as most people know, is a square box. This box contains all the latest and greatest in beekeeping technology, but still just an ugly square box. No wonder then, the growing interest in a hive that does not look like a box or even a hive for that matter.

Top Bar Hives buck the trend of sticking with what everybody else is doing. They are so different from standard commercial hives that most beekeepers scoff at the very idea that they could even work. When in fact, its the Top Bar Hive that has been around for hundreds of years and the commercial hives that are the new and strange way of beekeeping.

The basis of the Top Bar Hive design lies in the simple hollowed out log, which was used by early beekeepers to create a copy of the naturally formed hives found in old hollow logs or hollow tree trunks. These are the same bees that get into your attic space and set up house. These bees are not looking for a box to move into, a box is not a natural shape. What the bees are looking for is a sheltered spot to build their hive without risk of disturbance.

Bees forced to live in a modern box are under stresses that include crowding, dampness, lack of proper ventilation, diseases, pests, toxins and removal of most of their precious winter stores. (The winter stores are then replaced with a sugar water that offers no nutrition) All these symptoms of box life result in a far weaker hive population that is easily susceptible to disease and parasites.

Its no wonder that people are looking for an alternative to the box and Top Bar Hives are the answer for a steadily growing collection of beekeepers that are looking for a better way of keeping bees healthy.

Top Bar Hives - Thinking outside the box

Natural Beekeeping is easy

Most people think Beekeeping is a lot of work, this is true for the Commercial Beekeeper but quite a different picture for the Natural beekeeper.

Commercial Beekeeping on a large scale is time consuming for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the scale of the operation requires time to be spent with each hive to monitor and intervene at specific stages of development of each individual hive. Secondly, the techniques followed by Commercial Beekeepers require a high amount of attention due to the intensive nature of the practice. Commercial hives are crowded and cramped damp boxes that are more akin to a sweatshop than a home.

Natural Beekeepers follow a different path, using a technique that is in tune with the bees natural behavior. Providing a hive that is spacious and well ventilated creates a healthy population of bees that require no interference or treatments with toxins. A healthy hive that is undisturbed until it has built up enough comb to have an excess of honey for the winter, which takes one to three years, depending on the weather. The amount of comb/honey that is extracted does not jeopardize the winter stock required by the bees, so that there is no need to feed the bees a poor diet of sugar water. The bees always have their own honey which has the best nutritional value for the bees. Feeding the bees sugar weakens them and make them susceptible to any diseases.

Providing the bees a healthy environment and leaving them to their own devices is not only the best way to a healthy hive, but also the easiest way to make the best honey you will ever taste.

Natural Beekeepers, working smarter, not harder.

Max

What is a Top Bar Hive?

This is a question that is asked most often by people who stop at our stall at the Skibbereen Farmers Market, so I thought I would explain it here.

A Top Bar Hive is an imitation of a hollowed out log with the added advantage of being able to monitor and extract honey with minimal disturbance to the hive. The hive shape and size are a more natural configuration than the common square box widely used. There is also a great amount of open space in the hive that aids in ventilation, which is a major factor in a healthy hive.

The hive stands on four legs about three feet high, which makes it very easy to work as the whole hive is at waist height. The bars that the bees use to build their comb upon are just a piece of timber with a groove, there is no foundation wax or frame. The bees are able to build the comb of varying sizes as they see fit.

The hives I build are made of local Larch, which is very weather resistant (used in boats and fencing) and assembled without toxins, glues, plywood, paint or preservatives. This creates a toxin free environment for the bees.

When you create a healthy environment for the bees to build their comb, you end up with the best honey possible. The bees are also less stressed and very easy to work without much need for smoke.

For a first hand look, stop by the market on Saturdays or even attend one of our Natural Beekeeping Courses.

Regards,
Max

Gardening with Bees in Mind...

Today was another day that was a bit of a disaster as far as weather is concerned .... wow the amount of rain that came down in the last 24 hours is unreal. But, we cope and hopefully someday will dry out! LOL

It was also a day of mucking around in the garden, the air is warm and it was nice to get out there to see what is starting to burst up through the soil. I love this time of year with it's promises of all that is to come from a healthy growing garden.

Planning the garden is something that many bee keepers take fairly seriously with a few flowers and herbs that bees love I like to plant my herbs because it strengthens them as well as us. But there are many other plants they benefit from too. 

Flowering plants such as sunflowers, lavender and marigold flower either at different times or can be staggered to have something in bloom during the entire summer season. And in early spring any of the crocus, daffodils and snowdrops can be planted to give the bees a little head start.

Fruit trees and shallow pools of clean water are also helpful to have around for the bees.... Just keeping them in mind when planning your garden can go a long way!

Top Bar Bee Hive