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Author Topic: Derekm's Hive  (Read 61810 times)

Offline Finski

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #40 on: November 29, 2012, 08:08:50 am »
k tell us how you feel.

Like nun's niples. Tickling.
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Offline derekm

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #41 on: November 29, 2012, 09:03:25 am »
Where I live would there be any good reason to insulate? I believe I will have more issues with heat than cold. Very mild winters, very hot and humid summers. Just asking.

[quote author=Finski link=topic=39518.msg333648#msg333648 date=13540

Three the most vain thing in the world

1) Popes balls
2) Nun's nipples
3) English knowledge about insulation



I don't care who you are that is just funny. Finski you got a way with words, don't hold back tell us how you feel.
[/quote]if you have aircon  you insulate against the heat. bees have aircon
If they increased energy bill for your home by a factor of 4.5 would you consider that cruel? If so why are you doing that to your bees?

Offline Finski

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #42 on: November 29, 2012, 09:45:10 am »
]if you have aircon  you insulate against the heat. bees have aircon

Bees handle aircon with water. Not with insulation.

If you compare 5 members of Apis family, only mellifera have invented how to protect against cold with cavity.

wasp make a multilayer paper ball which keep the heat.

Bumblebee likes to make hive into mouse hive.


Yes, mellifera have invented how to live in cold climates. It is honey stores andf protective cavity.

If we compare Apis bees in Africa, they like top change the landscape if it is short of food or some one disturb s the hive.

Asian Apis bees make migrations and they make a big one comb in open air.

It was researched on Apis cerana japonica which live in towns. Only 10% of hives were in cavities. Others were in open air and they kept summer temperature in clusters during winter.

Mellifera is not able to live in hottest climates like in tropical zone. That is why scutellata was exported to South America. Mellifera was not able to live in jungle but scutellata exploded there.







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Offline BlueBee

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #43 on: November 29, 2012, 10:38:28 am »
Derekm, how do you feed the bees in this hive?  Do you use frame feeders, top feeders, open feeding, or what?
 
Where I live (South Carolina) would there be any good reason to insulate? I believe I will have more issues with heat than cold.  Very mild winters, very hot and humid summers. Just asking.
If I still lived in the south, I kind of doubt I would be using insulated hives.  It just doesn’t get that cold down there to warrant extra time, cost, and physical limits of foam IMO. 

I didn’t get around to opening up the vents on my hives this summer (record heat up here) and the bees did just fine.  I also had bees in wood hives this summer and they did fine.   It’s the winter up here which usually makes or breaks the bees.

Offline BlueBee

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #44 on: November 29, 2012, 10:50:40 am »
Yes the bees can use evaporative cooling in an attempt to cool a cavity, but the problem is evaporative cooling is ineffective in climates with high humidity; like tropical jungles or the South East USA.  Even people avoided Florida until condensing forms of air conditioning were invented. 

It seems to me that evaporative cooling would be hampered by only having a bottom entrance.   If you can’t exhaust the high humidity air from inside the hive (via a top entrance), the effectiveness of additional evaporative cooling surely has to be compromised. 

Offline Finski

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #45 on: November 29, 2012, 10:59:54 am »
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Regulation of beehive temperature has been researched very well. You need not invent own explanations.

http://jeb.biologists.org/content/114/1/1.full.pdf
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Offline BlueBee

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #46 on: November 29, 2012, 11:28:53 am »
But I like inventing  :)…..and your article spoke nothing about evaporative cooling inside an insulated hive in a warm HUMID climate with only a bottom entrance.  I was responding to the poster from South Carolina whom was wondering if it was worth insulating his hives in his hot humid climate.  How do you cool down an insulated box in a hot humid climate with evaportive cooling when you only have a bottom entrance?    

The paper was about energy balances of bees in flight in the Sonoran Desert in Arizona.  They have DRY heat there; it is a desert!

I did enjoy reading that paper though.  Thanks for the link.

Offline Finski

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #47 on: November 29, 2012, 11:32:05 am »
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When you look your hives cooling, you see the result  from number of ventilating bees and beariong, what is going on. Let the Arizona guys take care themselves.

The ventilation of hives is not a secret.


 
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Offline BlueBee

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #48 on: November 29, 2012, 11:35:00 am »
Now don't get Grumpy on me Finski, I did enjoy reading your paper.  Thanks for the link.

Offline Finski

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #49 on: November 29, 2012, 11:45:51 am »
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When you look your hives cooling, you see the result  from number of ventilating bees and bearing, what is going on. Let the Arizona guys take care themselves.

The ventilation of hives is not a big secret. A beekeeper must find a proper style for his bees to keep. A huge flow is difficult to handle if a hive brings 10-20  kg nectar into hive every day.

When bees do not manage in regulation, they stop working. If it continues, they swarm and move away.


When the yard is very near a good canola field, bear formulation is usual. But if the distance is over 1 km, bear formulation do not exist.

If the weather is hot, it is dry and nectar evapotares easily. It keeps the hiver cool.

A humid weather?
We had  that 2 summer ago. Day was 30C and night 20C.
 Bees did not start to forage canola before midday. Nectar had so high water content. When I came to yard 16
 a'clock, bees flew like mad. 30 hectares canola and 7 hives. In the evening bees were around hive walls.

when weather is humid for example because there are little rains, nectar has so high water content that beeds do not gather much surplus honey.



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Offline derekm

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #50 on: November 29, 2012, 12:24:11 pm »
]if you have aircon  you insulate against the heat. bees have aircon

Bees handle aircon with water. Not with insulation.

...


but the aircon (driven by water evaporation) is more effective if the cavity is insulated as it restricts the flow of heat from outside to in.
If they increased energy bill for your home by a factor of 4.5 would you consider that cruel? If so why are you doing that to your bees?

Offline Finski

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #51 on: November 29, 2012, 01:33:19 pm »

but the aircon (driven by water evaporation) is more effective if the cavity is insulated as it restricts the flow of heat from outside to in.

If you aicon your car windows open, how well it works?

Have you tried with hand, how hot is the hive wall when sun shines onto it. That is why hives use to be white.

Even  20 mm polystyrene board transfers heat to the brood room, if the hive has dark color.
I have seen when the mating nuc started to abscond from 3 frame nuc.

Not so difficult to notice. Bees react with adding ventilation and with clustering. Look from that.

If you do not see ventilatiing bees in fine warm summerday, you hive is too cold.

That seems to bee biggest problem when beginners try to build up their small colonies. Too much room, mesh floor  3 frames bees...

I have never seen advices that join small swarms. Instead of  that guys say split it. Guys believe too that mini nucs are good to start build up of colony.

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Offline BlueBee

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #52 on: November 29, 2012, 06:47:08 pm »
but the aircon (driven by water evaporation) is more effective if the cavity is insulated as it restricts the flow of heat from outside to in.
Agreed, but once the humidity inside the hive hits 100% relative humidity, any additional evaporative cooling isn’t going to work.  With only a bottom entrance, what prevents the humidity from rising to 100%?

Offline BlueBee

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #53 on: November 29, 2012, 06:51:26 pm »
Have you tried with hand, how hot is the hive wall when sun shines onto it. That is why hives use to be white.

Even  20 mm polystyrene board transfers heat to the brood room, if the hive has dark color.

Very little heat or cold passes through my 38mm of polystyrene in full Sun or full Moon.  :)

Offline BlueBee

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #54 on: November 29, 2012, 06:52:47 pm »
It was 44F/7C and Sunny here today.  The bees with top entrances are out on cleansing flights by noon.  My insulated hives with ONLY a bottom entrance are consistently much slower at responding to opportunities for cleansing flights.  Is that a concern to anybody?  If those bottom entrance hives don’t get to go poo, is anybody concerned about nosema?



Offline Finski

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #55 on: November 30, 2012, 03:06:24 am »
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At weekend our temps go into -15C.

Normally this is time when snow will stay on grouind.
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Offline derekm

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #56 on: November 30, 2012, 05:46:00 pm »
but the aircon (driven by water evaporation) is more effective if the cavity is insulated as it restricts the flow of heat from outside to in.
Agreed, but once the humidity inside the hive hits 100% relative humidity, any additional evaporative cooling isn’t going to work.  With only a bottom entrance, what prevents the humidity from rising to 100%?
bees  they move the air... theres a few papers on the net about
If they increased energy bill for your home by a factor of 4.5 would you consider that cruel? If so why are you doing that to your bees?

Offline T Beek

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #57 on: December 03, 2012, 01:44:13 pm »
It was 44F/7C and Sunny here today.  The bees with top entrances are out on cleansing flights by noon.  My insulated hives with ONLY a bottom entrance are consistently much slower at responding to opportunities for cleansing flights.  Is that a concern to anybody?  If those bottom entrance hives don’t get to go poo, is anybody concerned about nosema?




I've noticed the same, my top entrances are usually busier.
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Offline Finski

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #58 on: December 03, 2012, 05:58:45 pm »
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Top entrance is usefull to bees in early spring and in cleansing flight.
When a bee leave the hive and weather is cold, it returns and achieves  warm cluster quickly.

Via lower entrance the way to cluster may be quite long and cold.
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Offline BlueBee

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Re: Derekm's Hive
« Reply #59 on: December 03, 2012, 07:02:53 pm »
The bees did eventually come out of that hive on the left side of the photo.  It just took them a few more hours.  That has usually worked out OK for me, but you have to wonder if the early risers might attempt to rob the late risers this time of year (when we have a warm spell).

The bees in that nuc are completely in the bottom box and the top box is completely packed with stores.  That would be text book how to winter bees in a wood hive/nuc.  Lots of food for the bees to 'rise up through' during the winter. 

However I suspect the dynamics in foam hives is quite different and that the ideal setup is not the same as in wood.  I base this on my observations to date as well as physics theory.  When I pull the top off that double decker the top comb is COLD.  When I pull the top off a single decker, the comb is toasty warm.  As others here have said, it appears that the foam hives can act more like an ice cooler than a heater if you have too much volume in them.  This is where I suspect Brother Adam failed in his experiments with insulation.

 

anything