Next job for the new table saw…
My bees tend to fill mesh floors with propolis, suggesting to me that they’re not very keen on them, so I’ve decided to move back to solid or sealed floors, and to kick things off I decided to make some new ones using timber from my “probably waste” pile. I didn’t go with the common design though, opting instead for an “under-floor entrance”. These are becoming more widespread as beekeepers find out about them and should prevent issues with mice because they don’t have an entrance large enough for one to fit through. They’re also claimed to be less attractive to wasps because there are more opportunities for them to encounter guard bees before they actually get amongst the frames. Potentially I guess they’re also less draughty because the breeze can’t blow straight in.
So here’s my first batch after being given a coat of preservative. The bees drop down onto the landing board (which doesn’t need to extend beyond the front of the hive — I just like watching them sometimes) and come up through the 8mm wide slot into the middle of the hive. In these ones, the back rail is not full depth, so the landing board of another floor can be pushed in behind for transport.
I’m thinking of modifying my mesh floors to have the same style of entrance (and a slot-in base to seal the floor from the wind and cold) and I may also add something like a 20mm high rail around the tops of these ones to make room for a hole through which I can vape oxalic acid. I’ll see how it goes.