I have built hives with plywood and OSB and never noticed any problems. The OSB is nice because it doesn't warp in 3 different directions like plywood. Yes, you can smell the out gassing of the OSB glue, but the bees did rather well in those hives.
I was out checking the bees today and when I pulled the outer cover off one of the hives, I could see the bees inside were SUPER active. (I had a screened inner cover on that hive). I was thinking, oh no, they're going to come at me like crazy. :shock: I didn’t have my smoker with me either. :(
So I crack the inner cover and the bees POUR out the top of the hive like a volcano going off. Bees everywhere. However they weren’t coming after me; they were swarming. They swarmed the moment I took that inner cover off. What are the odds. :( Evidently I caught them just as the act was about to start. As BAH reports, they typically head to a nearby tree (but not always). Mine landed about 25’ up in a tree. I tried to shake them into a bucket on a stick, but didn’t get the queen this time. Lost that swarm. :(
So I gave back to mother nature today. :)