Equipment Episodes

You've spent lots of money on your woodenware and you want it to look good, last many years, and be safe for your the honey bees and the environment. What are your options? In today's episode, Jeff Ott (from ) …

American Foulbrood is in the news lately… and for a good, positive reason. But what does it mean if you determine or a state apiarist determines you have a case or two or more of AFB in your bee yard? …

What beekeeper hasn't nailed together a hive body and thought, "Heck, I can cut these boards myself and it'd be cheaper!" Especially if they already have a wood shop with a table saw and a few other tools. But is …

It’s winter time and sure as the sky is blue (or grey – as the case may be), there will be many dead colonies out there next spring. If not in as early as in the few weeks. Winter kills …

It's Not What You Think!

One of the first pieces of equipment a new beekeeper buys is a bee suit. If they don’t buy a bee suit, they will at least buy a veil. Stings on the face are not only painful (and memorable to …

Moving boxes full of honey is usually a lot of work. The bees aren’t happy, the boxes are heavy, it’s hot and you have all your gear on to be safe. The one sure way to make this easier is …

Harvesting your honey crop isn’t about keeping bees, in fact, it is hard work. It’s when you start questioning your spring decision to expand your number of colonies. On the other hand, it’s a good measure of how well you …

So, what’s that thing you put between two supers to give additional space between top bars below and bottom bars above so there’s room for…something you want to add to the hive. Is it a spacer, a rim, or what? …

Towards the end of the season, it’s a good idea to take a look at the equipment and other management tricks you’ve been using all summer while it’s still fresh in your mind. Today, Jim and Kim talk about how …

Have you ever thought much about the hive stands you use? On today’s episode, Jim and Kim take a long look at the hive stands they use and why they favor them. They also look at a lot of other …

On today’s episode, Jim and Jeff Ott (from Beekeeping Today Podcast), discuss the value and use of the ‘love it or hate it” piece of equipment, the Queen Excluder. Queen excluders are included in almost every “Honey Producer Starter...

So, what do you do with your old wax? For some of us, as little as possible, but for others, there’s money to be made. There are different kinds of wax based on a couple of factors, including how long …

What can you do with all that old beekeeping equipment you don’t need, don’t want and is in the way most of the time? There are several ways to look at this, and the first way, of course, is to …

Managing large observation hives is very different than working with those small observation hives that you can take to a school or county fair. Very different indeed. Especially if you are going to keep this hive in your home or …