"I have an idea for an ASMR video." "Oh, what is it?" "I'm going to talk about delicious honey in an incredibly relaxing voice." "Sounds like a great idea." "While there are 2000 bees and wasps flying all over the place." "Wait, are you sure? That might put people on edge." "You haven't heard my voice, have you?"
Actually the Bee-Summing is very relaxing. What makes it "straining" is that it comes in and out aka changing distances. If it were steady in the same distance, it would be rather soothing.
Thank you so much! Well, the failure was in my jar swapping technique which has been vastly improved this year :) 2019 has been the best honey year EVER for us here in PA :)
Frederick Dunn - That’s great to hear! With so much news about bees in peril and colony collapse, it’s really encouraging to see your bees doing so well. Does the amount of honey produced indicate the overall health of the colony and bees in general?
@@EddVCR Honey production has sooo many variables but certainly does indicate a strong productive colony. BUT, you can have excellent foraging bees going out in an area that just isn't providing what they need and the result can be very low honey production. Good bees tend to rapidly adjust their brood production to increase or decrease as the environment provides more or less. Healthy bees are capable of getting more from less... if that makes sense, while challenged or sick colonies just don't have the available numbers to defend the colony, feed brood, and gather sufficient resources.
@Frederick Dunn Thank you so much for taking time away from your busy day to answer my question. I’m learning so much about these amazing insects from you and your videos. Starting next year, I’m going to start a small pollinator garden to support the local bees. It’s something I’ve been thinking about doing for a while now, but your comment helped me understand that creating resources for bees can perhaps help out some colonies that are struggling.
Sharing failures publicly is a huge treasure of information for others, so they aim not to repeat them and thrive. Thanks for this very informative video, I'm so sure the 2020 harvest will go without an itch! Cheers from France.
Hi Frederick Just letting you know due to your channel and videos on the flowhive. my flowhive 2 is now built and ready for its first bees in april or may. looking forward to your next videos. gareth
Thanks for the inspiration and motivation to revisit my abandoned interest in beekeeping. My grandfather designated me official family beekeeper in my teens, but due to issues beyond my control, I couldn't attend my duties as necessary. I'm so glad to remember so much that I learned back then, now these several decade later. Much has changed about many things except the bees. I will be so much easier now!
I always find your videos pleasantly educating and informative. I knew next to nothing about Apiary until I came across your videos; the way it is now, I'm silently nursing an urge to engage in it. If eventually I do, I will be knocking on your door first. Thank you for your bee-like dedication to this passion. Kure.
I also love your comment:. " It is epic, the amount of work these bees are doing is incredible. So, don't you dare sell your honey cheap". LOVE IT!!! It's SO true. Local honey here goes for $20/qt. I'd bee interested to know what honey sells for in other parts of the country.
nooo the yellow jackets there is another hive somewhere. you have to follow the yellow jackets to their rogue hive. put a jar of sugar water their to distract the yellow jack raiders. then find something to get rid of the jacks hive & queen for good.
Mr Dunn! We finally made the decision to go with a couple of flowhives! This is another great video and we kept waiting and worrying about all the problems others say the flowhives cause. YOU convinced us and we will have two in the spring. THANK YOU!!!! it is a lot of money but I think it's the best way for us keep up your excellent work!!!!!
Thanks Macro and welcome to the very friendly club of the FlowHive Fellowship :) it's always great to see your comments. I hope you used the discount link!
We reckon on having a "yellowjacket bloom" (we call them wasps) about every 4 years. I guess it's one of those natural cycles, dependent on weather and forage conditions.
Thank you. I just heard about these Flow Hives so I was doing some research. I also live in the Great Lakes region so I appreciate your insight and quality instruction. Can't say enough about your video and how much this will help me. We need more people like you in this world.
I’ll save you all a lot of money and time. THESE DO NOT WORK!!! These things are a gimmick. We have banned the use of these in all our club apiaries. Reason being….we want our members to have success and want to help them avoid mistakes the rest of us have made. Way too much time spent fighting these and trying to make them work. They simply don’t. We tried everything the factory told us to do over three years, and not once did bees put nectar in them. We put normal supers with standard frames above them, below them, etc. Bees filled standard frames but avoided Flow frames. We sprayed HoneyBee Healthy mixed with honey / nectar all over the frames. The bees cleaned it all off but never stuck any nectar in them. We even put them on top of single deeps and double deeps with no other supers. Bees filled their brood spaces and became honey bound. Did not touch the flow frames even when they had no other room. They ended up swarming instead. Just don’t do it. You’ll thank me later. You’re welcome!
As always a great video Fred. I got two harvests this year from my Flowframes. I absolutely love the flow frames! I am in north central British Columbia and the bees are clustered for winter.
i saw this one guy that hooked up 7 hoses to the flow hive frame set and attached them to a food grade 5 gallon bucket lid with zip ties on both sides. He drains the entire thing at same time, without a drop of honey escaping. Starts the process, walks away for half hour.. comes back and done. I guess it would make sense to do have of each frame at same time then come back for other half after a bit.
That's a great way to avoid collecting each frame separately which is one of the greatest aspects of the flowhive - each frame has its own flavor and nectar source. By combining them all into one vessel, the individuality of the frames is lost. I personally would never combine them in that way. Also, if you're draining seven frames at once, there is going to be quite a bit of honey dripping down inside for the bees to contend with and that can go bad in a short amount of time.
Hi Mr Dunn, My husband puts a container of water with 1/2 apple cider vinegar & sugar water (1 to 1) to attract the yellow jackets & moths( it seems to work ) The mixture is placed in a cut out plastic bottle hanging away from the bees. The idea is it attracts the wasps & months before it gets to the hives.
Over the past few years I have been seeing more and more yellow jackets. I don’t really mind though. I enjoy hunting their nests down and addressing the issue. Sometimes I will capture and relocate the nests and wasps far away from my property. Most of the time I will get creative in my extermination. Fun Fact: If you encapsulate a hive in spray foam with a layer of aluminum foil followed by an additional layer of spray foam they will cook themselves to death melting the internal layer of foam in the process. Fun Fact Finally: If you mix caffeine powder into sugar water then spray around the hive the wasps will fly around like mad hitting everything until one by one they randomly die mid flight and drop right to the ground.
You might want to pick up some plastic plumbing ball valves to put in line with the Flow frame piping to give you the ability to control the flow and change jars if need be.
Out of curiosity, can you turn the key and close the cells when you see the jar getting full to stop the flow or is that too unpredictable? I like the idea of the ball valves, but I'm a beginner so having any certainty is helpful. Great setup with the reCap lids! Thanks for the idea!
I was ready for all of the subsequent jars, so only one leak, but that's all it took as the bees continued to persist well after there was anything to collect.
I get that a lot! When I showed up at a bee disaster site after talking with the Dept. of Ag on the phone, the inspector was cracking up when he saw me get out of my vehicle - "man, I had you at 26 years old tops!" not the gray-bearded dude that I am... I know, it's weird.
Hello from southern Ontario! I really like your idea of removing the empty Flow Hive framed honey super and storing it empty for winter. Have you found that one medium honey super filled by fall, is enough to feed one brood box for winter? And have you found inserting 2 keys when empty a Flow frame works better than one? And how do you get the bees to clean up an emptied Flow frame? Just leave it outside the box near the hive for a few days? Thank you for your most valued advice! Marie-Louise
Those are all great questions. I'll be responding to them in full during my Friday Q&A session. Yes, a medium full of honey partnered with what they also store in the brood box is enough for our winter season here. Two keys are easier, and they move the frame leaves with less stress on the plastic. Please do not place them exposed outside, and not against the hive as this could start robbing and the plastic should not be in direct sunlight. The bees in the hive will have cleaned out the cells well in a 24 hour period after draining the frames and you can then take it straight to storage. If you think it needs a little more cleanup, you can power wash, and air dry the frames prior to storage.
Your voice is perfect for listening in bed trying to relax to go to sleep. The subject good to for putting part of the mind to harvesting in preparation slowly for a nice fall. Hard to believe we’re half way through summer. Living every day of it. Cheers from Ottawa. Night.
I noticed when the butterflies came in and laid eggs, we had a huge population of yellow jackets coming in to take away the caterpillars. Almost seems there are as many wasps as bees grabbing pollen.
The early spring in CA helped both the Bee's and wasps. Those that did not control early had an massive problem this fall. Still 80f days and 60f nights but no nectar so they are burning reserves early going to bee an interesting winter.
We have had bee hives on our off-grid homestead for a while now and people who buy our honey always asked about these types of hives. I'm torn since I don't hear good things about their longevity. Some of our hives have been in use for 8 years. I've heard these will only last a season or two because the combs get clogged or break as they are plastic. I'd still try one out if I got one for free but think I'll stick to my wooden boxes.
I've responded to your comment on another flowhive video. If what you've been told is true, I'd have made videos showing their limited life expectancy. The only thing I've had to contend with after four years of continuous use, is cleaning the "undamaged" flow-frames.
There is a video on YT regarding wasps and it involved meat suspended under a cover over a tray of water and they eat so much they can not fly and drop into the water (and there are no lifeguards.) Very efficient as I remember. Need a tap of some sort in the line from the frame bottom. Another very good video.
I find each frame is a little more than a half gallon. Also, I have to extract every time they fill it up during the season so they don’t run out of room.
Still in the 90’s where I am, it’s a dreaded feeling knowing that the cold is coming but not here for quite some time if at all. It’s Honey Bee season year round down my way. Great video as always! Sorry you lost some of the honey stock! Looks scrumptious!
Correct, and if weather cooperates you can pull from the same frame (usually the center three) just 12-14 days later while the flow continues. It's remarkable how fast they can "rework" the frames once they have been cycled at least once.
Fred, love your videos! Here in Florida, we have screened bottom boards because of varroa and SHB. Thus when we open the flow frames, the leakage does not pool on the bottom board, but leaks down on the ground, or whatever emergency tray that I stick under it.... seems like there should be some way to catch that spillover honey in the hive, rather than the mess that occurs. I also use "long box" hives, with the flow frames in the center, 2 or 3 of them, rather than the full 7, with vertical queen excluders on both sides of the flow frames. So there is no brood box under the flow frames either. I tap the flow frames more often, since the bees can fill 2 frames much faster than 7.
Thanks that was informational for me. I have flow frames and was wonder how to keep the queen from laying eggs and only get honey. New beekeeper started in June.
It's more important in the north, but when there is a dearth, it's always wise to match the hive boxes to the size and production level of the bees. So expanding and contracting based on nectar flow seasons. Thanks for watching!
Frederick Dunn ... I did ask but was not talking with a bee keeper, so did not find out. I believe the EU did a big study on herbicide impact but not sure of conclusions.
I don't have a need for a bee hive at the moment but I am interested in the future once I get a farm. Other than that, I garden and get to see all kinds of pollenator. To help visiting pollenator on their trip, I fill a bowl with rocks and water. I also raise chickens.
I am in southern Maryland and that storm you are talking about hit us last night. An old tree fell and blocked the road, but my fruit trees planted this year weathered the storm perfectly. Lots of wind.
Two cycles from an established colony is a pretty good average, sometimes 3. Six gallons of honey for the year if you don't have bad weather during the nectar flow.@@Krullfath
It's the first time i see this system! Beautiful . My father had some honey producing too but normal ones! Very interesting, i would like to see it inside! Greetings from Spain
I found with my flow frames, when I collect the honey, I was getting quite a lot of honey dripping down the outsides of the flow frames, down through the queen excluder, and then getting all over the brood frames. Even if I just cracked 1/3rd of the flow frame, it still would drip down the outside. After it dripped all over the brood frames, a large number of bees would leave the hive and cluster on the outside while other workers inside cleaned up. Not a huge deal but clearly adding more work and stress to the hive. When I collect now, I completely remove my flow box, and set it on top of a pan, keeping covers on both the flow hive box and the brood box. Then the honey that drips down the outside of the flow frames just collects in the pan. This seems to cause less stress and work for my bees. I'm only using three flow frames in 5-frame boxes, so It's not that heavy. I'd imagine it wouldn't be as easy with 6 or 7 full flow frames.
Hi Rockburn, that happened when I cycled the flow frames for the first time around, I found that with each subsequent cycle, there was less honey running down the face of the colony. Now, they no longer congregate outside the hive as they once did. Even with these overfilled frames, they didn't evacuate.
Hi Fred. Thanks for the reply. Interesting, it was indeed my first cycle of the flow frames that it had happened. I will try leaving the flow supers on during my next honey harvest.
If you watch the video of my first flow-harvest, I think you'll see the same activity you describe. You'll see an improvement the next time around as well as more honey per frame.
I realize this video is 3yos old, so hopefully you still check! But I heard you mention you pull your supers in the winter…did I hear that correctly? What is the benefit of this? Is this only done with Flow Hives, or also with traditional hives?
I pull all honey supers before going into winter, including the flow-supers. The reason for that is we don't want the queen rising into the flow-frames mid-winter and producing brood in them. For those who use queen excluders, there should be no queen excluders on during winter also as the queen would be left below. Then put flow-supers on the hives with the greatest populations the following spring.
Can you let me know what brand it is please? Dad's turning 90 soon and I'd love to get him one that can be set to celsius and sends information to a PC.
Thanks for a great video Frederick, always enjoy your flow hive videos as I have 2 in my backyard in Australia and I am currently in a Spring nectar flows with heaps of nectars rolling in right now (I am in a 3rd season of keeping bees). I did a quick conversion, your 0.5 Gallon jar is equivalent to 2.8kgs of honey. However I have read the maximum capacity of each frame is up to 3.5kgs or 0.64 gallon, it explains why you had an overflown issue there. So with 3 rounds of harvest from this particular hive, how much honey have you got in total? I estimate each round with 7 frames should yield approx 20kgs or 3.7 gallon multiplied by 3 = 11 gallon or 60kgs? I wouldn't be surprised if you hah have that much honey! Last season with my 1 overwinter hive, I yielded 40+kgs or 7.3 gallons. My climate is cold, in the south of Australia, Melbourne surburbia where I have to take off my flow super frames during winter but our season starts bit earlier than yours as we don't have snow, less than 7 days frost.
Hi ThermoBread, with the first two cycles this year, they capped the honey without extending complete cells, so this cycle caught me off guard as they took in more honey than expected. In the past, 1/2 gallon containers have been enough but obviously, I'll need to stop after they are half empty, then swap jars before continuing with the full frame. The outer most frames did not yield a complete half gallon, left about 2" on top. I know this will be frustrating, but I don't keep track of the honey yields and just pass the jars of honey on to my wife. I'm strictly interested in their health and behaviors with honey as a sweet bonus. She is sitting pretty good with the harvest this year and is certainly passing it on to personal friends and family. At $20.00/quart, our flowhives would pay for themselves in 2 years or less if the seasons and nectar sources remain average. I'm glad you are enjoying your hives and wish you a wonderful summer as we go into the long winter sleep here.
Hi Thermobread. I'm in Greensborough. Victoria. I don't have any hives or bees but looking to learn. Are you close to me? And are you up to teaching a novice. From Peter.
I know this video is 5 years old and I have no clue if you are still responding to comments but how much honey do you take from your flow hive? Do you 100% drain all the way until winter?
When late September arrives, we remove all Flow-Supers along with other hive supers and condense the hives for winter. All surplus honey is drawn off at that time. The remaining time in September, and into October is a great opportunity for the bees to reseal the joints and backfill empty space.
Always enjoyed your videos on the Flow Hives. I bought March 2017 and harvested about 15 lbs of honey May 2018. I kept checking the Flow Hive through the front and side window but there were never much activities on the outer frames, so I never knew if there was any honey or if they were capped. In desperation, I opened the middle frame and out flowed my first harvest, also from the frame to the left and right of it! The emptied Flow Hive has been on another brood since May, there is a lot of activity at that hive but I still don't see anything stored in the outer frames of the Flow Hive! How do I know if there is capped honey in the middle frames, short of removing them and checking. I thought we are not supposed to removed the plastic frames once installed.. Your response or anyone else appreciated.
HI Deward, they generally fill the frames from the center out and top down, so when you see the end cells being capped, it's a very good guess that the interior cells are also capped. I pull the back cover off and look at the ends of the flowframes to see in and note if they are capping them. On some of the 7 frame flow 10 frame Langstroth hives, they never to complete the outer most frames, so you end up with a harvest from five frames on the seven frame super. It's generally a little over 3 gallons when you do that, it's nice to have a colony that fills them all. They do better with each passing cycle. You can certainly pull the top off and look down between the frames with a flashlight, or I use a mirror to reflect the sun down inside.. do that around mid-day and you'll see more!
Thanks for reply. I will open up the cover and look down. I have a double brood boxes below the Flow Hive. I checked yesterday and discovered that the brood box right below the Flow Hive has 5 fully capped frames of honey! Why are they not going up the the Flow Hive to deposit the honey?
San Francisco can get VERY cold and wet.. the number of resources they need is partially dictated by what the environment is providing. If you are new to keeping bees, I would leave the honey on and take nothing until you have a record and idea of what they are using to get through all four seasons. Then, you can better predict when and how much honey you can reasonably remove while still providing for the bees. Longtime beekeepers in your area will also be able to help you predict their seasonal needs and when the best honeyflows are predicted.
I just had a thought. What if you tried putting a valve on your elbow as an emergency cutoff, just in case you underestimate again? It can very well reduce the amount of spillage.
That's a great idea, but you don't want to do that because it backs up inside and would spill into the hive. This has happened only once and very easy to avoid. I just shared it so others would be aware. Thanks so much for watching and commenting!
@@FrederickDunn not a problem :) but as far as backflow is concerned, (simply as a point of conversation) I thought after watching your video from long ago, about your second extraction from the flow hive that the bees sealed up all the leaky spots as you mentioned that the flow Hive people said they would. I'd imagine if that's the case it would be relatively safe from that point.
@@thenotsurechannel7630 That's if you leave the bottom gate open, once you start draining the cells, they follow that bottom leak path, BUT if you stop the flow, I speculate that it will flow out of the bottom row of cells into the hive until you get it going again. It's easy to just start with a quart and then just put the 1/2 gallon on for the remainder. You are right, I haven't had a mass interior honey issue since the first runoff.
"The reason I'm showing you this angle is because it's Epic" ...well said sir, lol. Love your channel and the epic work you put into it Mr. Dunn. I always learn something interesting with each video, thank you!
I've seen other videos where they use 5 gallon pails and a manifold to connect all the tubes into one and they can empty the whole hive in one shot. Then they just need to transfer the honey into jars of any size they need.
If you run all of the frames into a single pale, you lose all of the individual floral source flavors. One of the great benefits of single frame draining and jar filling is that you preserve and separate clover from golden rod from asters etc... It's not a method I personally want to use.
The yellow jackets are pretty easy to follow back to their nest. (I dont keep bees) but just watch where they fly when they leave. Take note of the direction when you lose them, then follow them from that spot again some other day. It only takes a few minutes each time to plot where they live, and you can destroy the nests if they are causing you problems (I presume they are a pest species where you live. If not I guess, let them be, but in Australia, they are an introduced pest, so I have no problem destroying the nest (in fact our local council will destroy the nests for you if you can identify where they are) After watching a few of your videos, I figure you probably already know this, but I thought others might benefit) Your hemisphere is always introducing pest species to ours. (although I'm pretty grateful for the bees your hemisphere sent us all those years ago, so thanks :) )
I agree Andrew, and the honey bees are just as dangerous as the wasps when it comes to robbing. I haven't had any successful wasp full-on raids this year, but I'm highly suspicious of some of the honeybee groups that seem to frequently test the landing board guards.
Fortunately I have found that the population of cow killers ( red velvet ants) we have helps to keep the yellow jackets and ground dwelling hornets and wasps in check , just can’t walk around bare footed or you will get a cow killer in your foot 😋
I had my first flow frames harvest this spring won’t another one a few weeks later. Second was higher also, not sure why. The flow site recommended leaving them for 24 hours to let the bees clean them and that timing was spot on, cleaned like new FYI with no time to start refilling! I have now had a terrible month with a swarm leavjng my largest hive and my weaker hives in robbing frenzy with Yellowjacket takeover. I spend my an hour at sunrise yesterday killing Yellowjackets and combining my last two week hives. Plenty of pollen and honey stores, very strange September for me in NJ.
Wow, that does sound like a tough situation! Yes, leave the flow-super on so the resident bees can clean up a tad before having it removed to the "clean-up" station. Thanks for sharing.
Late comment but what's the approx worth of those jars? I was looking it up and a half-gallon jar is only like $100 give or take? Seems like it should cost more it's a miraculous process that's 100% natural and unfiltered. Where else do you find that these days? Do these flow supers annoy the bees relative to other methods?
Yes, they are expensive! If you ever do decide to get one, don't forget to use the discount link in my video descriptions. You can always start with a Langstroth hive, then just add a Flow-Super on that when you decide to go that route.
I use a mix of wooden foundation-less frames and one piece pre-waxed Acorn frames. If you watch the FAQ 20 video that is going live in the next 25 minutes, I show the frames I use.
Can we get this man an award for most calm and relaxing voice
Oh! I hope it's shaped like a coffee cup and made from stoneware :) Thanks Jadon!
It must be something in the honey :) The inventors seem to have it as well...
ruclips.net/video/Z54bL6kjyOI/видео.html
Uchie Uch like a golf announcer.
If need to get my 1 year old to sleep I just put on one of Fred's videos on my phone 😁 Cheers Frederick Dunn 👍
The Bob Ross of beekeeping.
I'll be honest, "I'm running out of jars to put my honey in", is a problem I wouldn't mind having.
That's when you get yourself a food-grade 5-gallon bucket and thank God for bees! 😀
"I have an idea for an ASMR video."
"Oh, what is it?"
"I'm going to talk about delicious honey in an incredibly relaxing voice."
"Sounds like a great idea."
"While there are 2000 bees and wasps flying all over the place."
"Wait, are you sure? That might put people on edge."
"You haven't heard my voice, have you?"
Actually the Bee-Summing is very relaxing. What makes it "straining" is that it comes in and out aka changing distances. If it were steady in the same distance, it would be rather soothing.
THAT is funny!
I wouldn’t call this a failure, it’s actually an excess of success!
Also, I love the artwork on the hive boxes!
Thank you so much! Well, the failure was in my jar swapping technique which has been vastly improved this year :) 2019 has been the best honey year EVER for us here in PA :)
Frederick Dunn - That’s great to hear! With so much news about bees in peril and colony collapse, it’s really encouraging to see your bees doing so well.
Does the amount of honey produced indicate the overall health of the colony and bees in general?
@@EddVCR Honey production has sooo many variables but certainly does indicate a strong productive colony. BUT, you can have excellent foraging bees going out in an area that just isn't providing what they need and the result can be very low honey production. Good bees tend to rapidly adjust their brood production to increase or decrease as the environment provides more or less. Healthy bees are capable of getting more from less... if that makes sense, while challenged or sick colonies just don't have the available numbers to defend the colony, feed brood, and gather sufficient resources.
@Frederick Dunn Thank you so much for taking time away from your busy day to answer my question. I’m learning so much about these amazing insects from you and your videos.
Starting next year, I’m going to start a small pollinator garden to support the local bees. It’s something I’ve been thinking about doing for a while now, but your comment helped me understand that creating resources for bees can perhaps help out some colonies that are struggling.
@@FrederickDunn 😊😊
Sharing failures publicly is a huge treasure of information for others, so they aim not to repeat them and thrive. Thanks for this very informative video, I'm so sure the 2020 harvest will go without an itch! Cheers from France.
Thank you so much and yes, I completely agree :)
Fredrick gets so much honey that he runs out of jars to put them in.
- *SUFFERING FROM SUCCESS*-
Hi Frederick
Just letting you know due to your channel and videos on the flowhive. my flowhive 2 is now built and ready for its first bees in april or may. looking forward to your next videos.
gareth
Thank you! I hope your flow-experience is excellent! :)
Thanks for the inspiration and motivation to revisit my abandoned interest in beekeeping. My grandfather designated me official family beekeeper in my teens, but due to issues beyond my control, I couldn't attend my duties as necessary. I'm so glad to remember so much that I learned back then, now these several decade later. Much has changed about many things except the bees. I will be so much easier now!
I always find your videos pleasantly educating and informative. I knew next to nothing about Apiary until I came across your videos; the way it is now, I'm silently nursing an urge to engage in it. If eventually I do, I will be knocking on your door first.
Thank you for your bee-like dedication to this passion. Kure.
I'm so glad to have had a part in getting you interested in honeybees. I do hope you can keep some one of these days. Thank you for commenting!
I also love your comment:. " It is epic, the amount of work these bees are doing is incredible. So, don't you dare sell your honey cheap". LOVE IT!!! It's SO true. Local honey here goes for $20/qt. I'd bee interested to know what honey sells for in other parts of the country.
In South Jersey and eastern PA. And Delaware, honey goes for 7 to 11 bucks per pint
I can get local raw honey from my dealer :) for $225 cash for 5 gallons
I'm not even sure why but this really did entertained me. I guess it's nice to see nice people doing honest work. So wholesome
I think I would have some long tweezers picking off the yellow jackets and dunking then in soapy water. Especially the queens!
I wish I wasn’t allergic to bees. I would love to have a flowhive. I love watching the bees and the honey extraction. Beeautiful 😍 🐝
nooo
the yellow jackets there is another hive somewhere.
you have to follow the yellow jackets to their rogue hive.
put a jar of sugar water their to distract the yellow jack raiders. then find something to get rid of the jacks hive & queen for good.
Mr Dunn! We finally made the decision to go with a couple of flowhives! This is another great video and we kept waiting and worrying about all the problems others say the flowhives cause. YOU convinced us and we will have two in the spring. THANK YOU!!!! it is a lot of money but I think it's the best way for us keep up your excellent work!!!!!
Thanks Macro and welcome to the very friendly club of the FlowHive Fellowship :) it's always great to see your comments. I hope you used the discount link!
I could watch your videos all day! You’re voice is so soothing & all your videos are so well presented and informative!
We reckon on having a "yellowjacket bloom" (we call them wasps) about every 4 years. I guess it's one of those natural cycles, dependent on weather and forage conditions.
I'm convinced that the reason is that yellow jackets like to help honey bees clean up honey, if it spills.
Time to chill out and be patient. Serve you right lol
Thank you. I just heard about these Flow Hives so I was doing some research. I also live in the Great Lakes region so I appreciate your insight and quality instruction. Can't say enough about your video and how much this will help me. We need more people like you in this world.
I’ll save you all a lot of money and time. THESE DO NOT WORK!!! These things are a gimmick. We have banned the use of these in all our club apiaries. Reason being….we want our members to have success and want to help them avoid mistakes the rest of us have made. Way too much time spent fighting these and trying to make them work. They simply don’t. We tried everything the factory told us to do over three years, and not once did bees put nectar in them. We put normal supers with standard frames above them, below them, etc. Bees filled standard frames but avoided Flow frames. We sprayed HoneyBee Healthy mixed with honey / nectar all over the frames. The bees cleaned it all off but never stuck any nectar in them. We even put them on top of single deeps and double deeps with no other supers. Bees filled their brood spaces and became honey bound. Did not touch the flow frames even when they had no other room. They ended up swarming instead.
Just don’t do it. You’ll thank me later. You’re welcome!
As always a great video Fred. I got two harvests this year from my Flowframes. I absolutely love the flow frames! I am in north central British Columbia and the bees are clustered for winter.
That's great news and I'm so glad it's working so well for you!
i saw this one guy that hooked up 7 hoses to the flow hive frame set and attached them to a food grade 5 gallon bucket lid with zip ties on both sides. He drains the entire thing at same time, without a drop of honey escaping. Starts the process, walks away for half hour.. comes back and done. I guess it would make sense to do have of each frame at same time then come back for other half after a bit.
That's a great way to avoid collecting each frame separately which is one of the greatest aspects of the flowhive - each frame has its own flavor and nectar source. By combining them all into one vessel, the individuality of the frames is lost. I personally would never combine them in that way. Also, if you're draining seven frames at once, there is going to be quite a bit of honey dripping down inside for the bees to contend with and that can go bad in a short amount of time.
@@FrederickDunn Thanks for that insight. I didn't know. I'm a newbie :)
@@jenniferw8963 NO problem :)
That looks amazing! Ive had "buckwheat" honey before. Its dark colored and the taste is different than clover honey.
entertaining and informative, i.e. various colors of honey; light from clover, etc. good going, well-crafted video, as usual...
Thanks Tom!
Mr.Dunn, you are just so amazing. The knowledge shared with the amazing video is such a gift to the world. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Thank you very much!
Hi Mr Dunn,
My husband puts a container of water with 1/2 apple cider vinegar & sugar water (1 to 1) to attract the yellow jackets & moths( it seems to work )
The mixture is placed in a cut out plastic bottle hanging away from the bees. The idea is it attracts the wasps & months before it gets to the hives.
Very good 👍
Over the past few years I have been seeing more and more yellow jackets. I don’t really mind though. I enjoy hunting their nests down and addressing the issue. Sometimes I will capture and relocate the nests and wasps far away from my property. Most of the time I will get creative in my extermination. Fun Fact: If you encapsulate a hive in spray foam with a layer of aluminum foil followed by an additional layer of spray foam they will cook themselves to death melting the internal layer of foam in the process. Fun Fact Finally: If you mix caffeine powder into sugar water then spray around the hive the wasps will fly around like mad hitting everything until one by one they randomly die mid flight and drop right to the ground.
Lmao
Great videos and you are great to listen to keep it up,
CHRISTIAN from Western Australia
Hi Christian, thank you so much! When things warm up around here, I'll have several flowhive updates :)
Your still good
This video was fantastic 👍
Glad you enjoyed it
Nice pictures, thank you!
Thanks for watching!
To solve your Yellowjacket problem is to create a paper wasp colony and they will help remove the Yellowjacket problem.
I'm guessing you've also watched my paper wasp nest transfer videos and placement near the apiary. So, I agree :)
I always enjoy your vids!! Super! We are experiencing the yellow jacket invasion in South Ga as well.
Thanks Celeste and that seems to be the case all over!
THANKS Great video
You're welcome Clement, thanks for watching and taking time to comment.
You might want to pick up some plastic plumbing ball valves to put in line with the Flow frame piping to give you the ability to control the flow and change jars if need be.
Not necessary... I just have to better predict the amount of honey, thanks for that suggestion though :)
Out of curiosity, can you turn the key and close the cells when you see the jar getting full to stop the flow or is that too unpredictable? I like the idea of the ball valves, but I'm a beginner so having any certainty is helpful. Great setup with the reCap lids! Thanks for the idea!
A pain but a great return there Fred
I was ready for all of the subsequent jars, so only one leak, but that's all it took as the bees continued to persist well after there was anything to collect.
Thanks for sharing as always! Watching bees is just fascinating to me.
You're very welcome and I'm glad you enjoyed it!
Guys can you believe his voice sounds like a young mid 20 - 30 guy , i really didnt thought that was his voice .
I get that a lot! When I showed up at a bee disaster site after talking with the Dept. of Ag on the phone, the inspector was cracking up when he saw me get out of my vehicle - "man, I had you at 26 years old tops!" not the gray-bearded dude that I am... I know, it's weird.
Hello from southern Ontario! I really like your idea of removing the empty Flow Hive framed honey super and storing it empty for winter. Have you found that one medium honey super filled by fall, is enough to feed one brood box for winter? And have you found inserting 2 keys when empty a Flow frame works better than one? And how do you get the bees to clean up an emptied Flow frame? Just leave it outside the box near the hive for a few days?
Thank you for your most valued advice! Marie-Louise
Those are all great questions. I'll be responding to them in full during my Friday Q&A session. Yes, a medium full of honey partnered with what they also store in the brood box is enough for our winter season here. Two keys are easier, and they move the frame leaves with less stress on the plastic. Please do not place them exposed outside, and not against the hive as this could start robbing and the plastic should not be in direct sunlight. The bees in the hive will have cleaned out the cells well in a 24 hour period after draining the frames and you can then take it straight to storage. If you think it needs a little more cleanup, you can power wash, and air dry the frames prior to storage.
I live in Colorado and I see more yellow jackets these last 2 years. I also see an increase in little blue bees and mud wasps as well.
Your voice is perfect for listening in bed trying to relax to go to sleep. The subject good to for putting part of the mind to harvesting in preparation slowly for a nice fall. Hard to believe we’re half way through summer. Living every day of it. Cheers from Ottawa. Night.
Thank you! 😊
I noticed when the butterflies came in and laid eggs, we had a huge population of yellow jackets coming in to take away the caterpillars. Almost seems there are as many wasps as bees grabbing pollen.
The early spring in CA helped both the Bee's and wasps. Those that did not control early had an massive problem this fall. Still 80f days and 60f nights but no nectar so they are burning reserves early going to bee an interesting winter.
It's going to be an interesting winter!
We have had bee hives on our off-grid homestead for a while now and people who buy our honey always asked about these types of hives. I'm torn since I don't hear good things about their longevity. Some of our hives have been in use for 8 years. I've heard these will only last a season or two because the combs get clogged or break as they are plastic. I'd still try one out if I got one for free but think I'll stick to my wooden boxes.
I've responded to your comment on another flowhive video. If what you've been told is true, I'd have made videos showing their limited life expectancy. The only thing I've had to contend with after four years of continuous use, is cleaning the "undamaged" flow-frames.
Excellent video and tutorial Fred thank you
Thanks Shaun, I'm glad you enjoyed it!
I love you bee videos, and collections. thanks
Like the elbows. Where did you get them and what did you do to join them?
The links are in the video description. I attach them with silicone.
There is a video on YT regarding wasps and it involved meat suspended under a cover over a tray of water and they eat so much they can not fly and drop into the water (and there are no lifeguards.) Very efficient as I remember. Need a tap of some sort in the line from the frame bottom. Another very good video.
I find each frame is a little more than a half gallon. Also, I have to extract every time they fill it up during the season so they don’t run out of room.
I wanted to let the population build up a bit before adding it. Was that a mistake? I have 2, and both have about 5 frames drawn out.
No, that sounds like a well reasoned approach.
Still in the 90’s where I am, it’s a dreaded feeling knowing that the cold is coming but not here for quite some time if at all. It’s Honey Bee season year round down my way. Great video as always! Sorry you lost some of the honey stock! Looks scrumptious!
good morning my brother very handsome your work God bless you always
Love your videos! Even
when you are in a pickle, they are inspiring and beautiful! 😃
Thank you so much Melissa :)
Hi Fred, warm wishes from Tasmania! Sounds like you get two or three extractions per season?
Correct, and if weather cooperates you can pull from the same frame (usually the center three) just 12-14 days later while the flow continues. It's remarkable how fast they can "rework" the frames once they have been cycled at least once.
it was informative & "entertainment".
Great video Fred, I’m looking forward and learning from your informative videos.
Love you videos. In my part of Idaho my flow supers are pulled the last week in August. Thank you again for your videos
You're welcome Maggie, thanks so much for watching and commenting.
Fred, love your videos! Here in Florida, we have screened bottom boards because of varroa and SHB. Thus when we open the flow frames, the leakage does not pool on the bottom board, but leaks down on the ground, or whatever emergency tray that I stick under it.... seems like there should be some way to catch that spillover honey in the hive, rather than the mess that occurs. I also use "long box" hives, with the flow frames in the center, 2 or 3 of them, rather than the full 7, with vertical queen excluders on both sides of the flow frames. So there is no brood box under the flow frames either. I tap the flow frames more often, since the bees can fill 2 frames much faster than 7.
Thanks for sharing how you're managing your flow-frames.
Thanks that was informational for me. I have flow frames and was wonder how to keep the queen from laying eggs and only get honey. New beekeeper started in June.
@@cmnightfaces Just put the queen excluder under the flow-super and you'll be fine.
Do you need to condense your hive if you live in FL? We don't really have a winter but for maybe 2 days out of the year.
It's more important in the north, but when there is a dearth, it's always wise to match the hive boxes to the size and production level of the bees. So expanding and contracting based on nectar flow seasons. Thanks for watching!
Do you just set the hives outside and hope for bees or do you introduce the bees to each hive?
You have to install the bees as with any hive. There is a very tiny chance that a swarm could move in, but highly unlikely with a brand new hive.
7:16 Bee licking honey of wasps's abdomen
Fantastic Fred...saw lots of bee hives in Cretan Olive Groves. Not sure of honey taste.
Thanks John! How is the overall bee health there?
Frederick Dunn ... I did ask but was not talking with a bee keeper, so did not find out. I believe the EU did a big study on herbicide impact but not sure of conclusions.
I don't have a need for a bee hive at the moment but I am interested in the future once I get a farm. Other than that, I garden and get to see all kinds of pollenator. To help visiting pollenator on their trip, I fill a bowl with rocks and water. I also raise chickens.
I am in southern Maryland and that storm you are talking about hit us last night. An old tree fell and blocked the road, but my fruit trees planted this year weathered the storm perfectly. Lots of wind.
Hi Carlos, many years ago I went to school in Southern Maryland.. and the end of HWY 210... we had a "blast" there :)
Know that area, I am south of La Plata
You should really continue making beekeep content
Thank you :)
@@FrederickDunn How much honey can you collect from one flow hive a year on average? Or just an estimate / guess?
Two cycles from an established colony is a pretty good average, sometimes 3. Six gallons of honey for the year if you don't have bad weather during the nectar flow.@@Krullfath
@@FrederickDunn Alright, really appreciate it
It's the first time i see this system! Beautiful . My father had some honey producing too but normal ones! Very interesting, i would like to see it inside! Greetings from Spain
Thank you so much and welcome to my channel :)
I found with my flow frames, when I collect the honey, I was getting quite a lot of honey dripping down the outsides of the flow frames, down through the queen excluder, and then getting all over the brood frames. Even if I just cracked 1/3rd of the flow frame, it still would drip down the outside. After it dripped all over the brood frames, a large number of bees would leave the hive and cluster on the outside while other workers inside cleaned up. Not a huge deal but clearly adding more work and stress to the hive.
When I collect now, I completely remove my flow box, and set it on top of a pan, keeping covers on both the flow hive box and the brood box. Then the honey that drips down the outside of the flow frames just collects in the pan. This seems to cause less stress and work for my bees. I'm only using three flow frames in 5-frame boxes, so It's not that heavy. I'd imagine it wouldn't be as easy with 6 or 7 full flow frames.
Hi Rockburn, that happened when I cycled the flow frames for the first time around, I found that with each subsequent cycle, there was less honey running down the face of the colony. Now, they no longer congregate outside the hive as they once did. Even with these overfilled frames, they didn't evacuate.
Hi Fred. Thanks for the reply. Interesting, it was indeed my first cycle of the flow frames that it had happened. I will try leaving the flow supers on during my next honey harvest.
If you watch the video of my first flow-harvest, I think you'll see the same activity you describe. You'll see an improvement the next time around as well as more honey per frame.
I wanna get into this!!!
Do you add the extra super below the flow frames so the bees don’t eat from the flow frames and create the arc?
Yes, one deep, then one mediuim honey super, then the flow-super. :)
Awesome vids...
I am sooo jealous.
Hope my operation/hobby will get up to 5 hives next year.
Love to see others' success
Thank you, I'm so glad you enjoyed it and I'm sure you will enjoy success with your bees soon!
I realize this video is 3yos old, so hopefully you still check! But I heard you mention you pull your supers in the winter…did I hear that correctly? What is the benefit of this? Is this only done with Flow Hives, or also with traditional hives?
I pull all honey supers before going into winter, including the flow-supers. The reason for that is we don't want the queen rising into the flow-frames mid-winter and producing brood in them. For those who use queen excluders, there should be no queen excluders on during winter also as the queen would be left below. Then put flow-supers on the hives with the greatest populations the following spring.
I'm very impressed with your weather station!
Thanks Sally, I like it a lot!
Can you let me know what brand it is please? Dad's turning 90 soon and I'd love to get him one that can be set to celsius and sends information to a PC.
The link is in the video description :)
Thank you! :)
You're welcome Sally
Thanks for a great video Frederick, always enjoy your flow hive videos as I have 2 in my backyard in Australia and I am currently in a Spring nectar flows with heaps of nectars rolling in right now (I am in a 3rd season of keeping bees).
I did a quick conversion, your 0.5 Gallon jar is equivalent to 2.8kgs of honey. However I have read the maximum capacity of each frame is up to 3.5kgs or 0.64 gallon, it explains why you had an overflown issue there.
So with 3 rounds of harvest from this particular hive, how much honey have you got in total? I estimate each round with 7 frames should yield approx 20kgs or 3.7 gallon multiplied by 3 = 11 gallon or 60kgs? I wouldn't be surprised if you hah have that much honey! Last season with my 1 overwinter hive, I yielded 40+kgs or 7.3 gallons. My climate is cold, in the south of Australia, Melbourne surburbia where I have to take off my flow super frames during winter but our season starts bit earlier than yours as we don't have snow, less than 7 days frost.
Hi ThermoBread, with the first two cycles this year, they capped the honey without extending complete cells, so this cycle caught me off guard as they took in more honey than expected. In the past, 1/2 gallon containers have been enough but obviously, I'll need to stop after they are half empty, then swap jars before continuing with the full frame. The outer most frames did not yield a complete half gallon, left about 2" on top. I know this will be frustrating, but I don't keep track of the honey yields and just pass the jars of honey on to my wife. I'm strictly interested in their health and behaviors with honey as a sweet bonus. She is sitting pretty good with the harvest this year and is certainly passing it on to personal friends and family. At $20.00/quart, our flowhives would pay for themselves in 2 years or less if the seasons and nectar sources remain average. I'm glad you are enjoying your hives and wish you a wonderful summer as we go into the long winter sleep here.
Hi Thermobread. I'm in Greensborough. Victoria. I don't have any hives or bees but looking to learn. Are you close to me? And are you up to teaching a novice. From Peter.
I know this video is 5 years old and I have no clue if you are still responding to comments but how much honey do you take from your flow hive? Do you 100% drain all the way until winter?
When late September arrives, we remove all Flow-Supers along with other hive supers and condense the hives for winter. All surplus honey is drawn off at that time. The remaining time in September, and into October is a great opportunity for the bees to reseal the joints and backfill empty space.
Great video Fred!! :-)
Thank you :)
I actually saw a couple wasps killing the bees and the bees were not attacking the workers actually were cleaning honey off back ends of there enemy’s
Honey bees will lick honey off of anything, from other insects, to rocks if that's where the sugar is :)
The Bee version of Black Friday
Always enjoyed your videos on the Flow Hives. I bought March 2017 and harvested about 15 lbs of honey May 2018. I kept checking the Flow Hive through the front and side window but there were never much activities on the outer frames, so I never knew if there was any honey or if they were capped. In desperation, I opened the middle frame and out flowed my first harvest, also from the frame to the left and right of it! The emptied Flow Hive has been on another brood since May, there is a lot of activity at that hive but I still don't see anything stored in the outer frames of the Flow Hive! How do I know if there is capped honey in the middle frames, short of removing them and checking. I thought we are not supposed to removed the plastic frames once installed.. Your response or anyone else appreciated.
HI Deward, they generally fill the frames from the center out and top down, so when you see the end cells being capped, it's a very good guess that the interior cells are also capped. I pull the back cover off and look at the ends of the flowframes to see in and note if they are capping them. On some of the 7 frame flow 10 frame Langstroth hives, they never to complete the outer most frames, so you end up with a harvest from five frames on the seven frame super. It's generally a little over 3 gallons when you do that, it's nice to have a colony that fills them all. They do better with each passing cycle. You can certainly pull the top off and look down between the frames with a flashlight, or I use a mirror to reflect the sun down inside.. do that around mid-day and you'll see more!
Thanks for reply. I will open up the cover and look down. I have a double brood boxes below the Flow Hive. I checked yesterday and discovered that the brood box right below the Flow Hive has 5 fully capped frames of honey! Why are they not going up the the Flow Hive to deposit the honey?
I am in the San Francisco Bay area, it doesn't get very cold here, how much honey should I keep in the hive to keep the colony happy over the winter?
San Francisco can get VERY cold and wet.. the number of resources they need is partially dictated by what the environment is providing. If you are new to keeping bees, I would leave the honey on and take nothing until you have a record and idea of what they are using to get through all four seasons. Then, you can better predict when and how much honey you can reasonably remove while still providing for the bees. Longtime beekeepers in your area will also be able to help you predict their seasonal needs and when the best honeyflows are predicted.
I LOVE your video's ❤
Sticky situation...
hehehehe
One can never have too much honey
Does each hive have a Queen or is it one Queen per (for lack of a better term) lawn?
Each hive most often has a single laying queen in it.
You got this
Awesome videos as always, love the bees videos specially, not a honeybee keeper but ever since started watching your videos definitely a honeybee fan
Btw I don't know why but your videos always show on my feed from 3 to even 8 days later after upload so I'm always watching them late XD
I just had a thought. What if you tried putting a valve on your elbow as an emergency cutoff, just in case you underestimate again? It can very well reduce the amount of spillage.
That's a great idea, but you don't want to do that because it backs up inside and would spill into the hive. This has happened only once and very easy to avoid. I just shared it so others would be aware. Thanks so much for watching and commenting!
@@FrederickDunn not a problem :) but as far as backflow is concerned, (simply as a point of conversation) I thought after watching your video from long ago, about your second extraction from the flow hive that the bees sealed up all the leaky spots as you mentioned that the flow Hive people said they would. I'd imagine if that's the case it would be relatively safe from that point.
@@thenotsurechannel7630 That's if you leave the bottom gate open, once you start draining the cells, they follow that bottom leak path, BUT if you stop the flow, I speculate that it will flow out of the bottom row of cells into the hive until you get it going again. It's easy to just start with a quart and then just put the 1/2 gallon on for the remainder. You are right, I haven't had a mass interior honey issue since the first runoff.
"The reason I'm showing you this angle is because it's Epic" ...well said sir, lol. Love your channel and the epic work you put into it Mr. Dunn. I always learn something interesting with each video, thank you!
Thanks :)
I've seen other videos where they use 5 gallon pails and a manifold to connect all the tubes into one and they can empty the whole hive in one shot. Then they just need to transfer the honey into jars of any size they need.
If you run all of the frames into a single pale, you lose all of the individual floral source flavors. One of the great benefits of single frame draining and jar filling is that you preserve and separate clover from golden rod from asters etc... It's not a method I personally want to use.
I am BILL this here for Indonesia
The yellow jackets are pretty easy to follow back to their nest. (I dont keep bees) but just watch where they fly when they leave. Take note of the direction when you lose them, then follow them from that spot again some other day. It only takes a few minutes each time to plot where they live, and you can destroy the nests if they are causing you problems (I presume they are a pest species where you live. If not I guess, let them be, but in Australia, they are an introduced pest, so I have no problem destroying the nest (in fact our local council will destroy the nests for you if you can identify where they are) After watching a few of your videos, I figure you probably already know this, but I thought others might benefit) Your hemisphere is always introducing pest species to ours. (although I'm pretty grateful for the bees your hemisphere sent us all those years ago, so thanks :) )
Thank you for sharing Craig!
well with all this rain even honey bees are having a hard time foraging i think the yellow jackets are just looking to rob
I agree Andrew, and the honey bees are just as dangerous as the wasps when it comes to robbing. I haven't had any successful wasp full-on raids this year, but I'm highly suspicious of some of the honeybee groups that seem to frequently test the landing board guards.
Fortunately I have found that the population of cow killers ( red velvet ants) we have helps to keep the yellow jackets and ground dwelling hornets and wasps in check , just can’t walk around bare footed or you will get a cow killer in your foot 😋
I’m in Idaho and we’ve had a tremendous amount of yellow jackets as well.
I hope they don't increase even more next year! All of my wasp traps filled to capacity over and over...have never had the problem before.
FlowHive IT's coooooooOOOLLLLLL, and video with bees good
Thanks
I used to live in Cadillac Michigan now az
I had my first flow frames harvest this spring won’t another one a few weeks later. Second was higher also, not sure why. The flow site recommended leaving them for 24 hours to let the bees clean them and that timing was spot on, cleaned like new FYI with no time to start refilling! I have now had a terrible month with a swarm leavjng my largest hive and my weaker hives in robbing frenzy with Yellowjacket takeover. I spend my an hour at sunrise yesterday killing Yellowjackets and combining my last two week hives. Plenty of pollen and honey stores, very strange September for me in NJ.
Wow, that does sound like a tough situation! Yes, leave the flow-super on so the resident bees can clean up a tad before having it removed to the "clean-up" station. Thanks for sharing.
How many times a year do you have to do harvest the honey?
And how much does it usually produce per harvest?
Each flow super averages 3 productive cycles per year and the frames average 1/2 gallon each.
Late comment but what's the approx worth of those jars? I was looking it up and a half-gallon jar is only like $100 give or take? Seems like it should cost more it's a miraculous process that's 100% natural and unfiltered. Where else do you find that these days?
Do these flow supers annoy the bees relative to other methods?
The U.S. Market is around $20.00 per quart jar of honey. So a Half Gallon is worth $40.00, a Gallon $80.00 and so on.
I want a flow hive so bad. The cost is so high. I might have to save some money. I love your videos.
Yes, they are expensive! If you ever do decide to get one, don't forget to use the discount link in my video descriptions. You can always start with a Langstroth hive, then just add a Flow-Super on that when you decide to go that route.
What kind of frames do you have in the bottom box?
I use a mix of wooden foundation-less frames and one piece pre-waxed Acorn frames. If you watch the FAQ 20 video that is going live in the next 25 minutes, I show the frames I use.
@@FrederickDunn Awesome, thanks.
@@Unknownbrand You're very welcome!