1. Lighter Equipment & Top Entrances
Copyright 2007 by Michael Bush

2. Lighter Boxes
"Friends don't let friends lift deeps" Jim Fischer of Fischer's BeeQuick

3. Lighter Boxes Ten Frame boxes:
Deep, Langstroth Deep 9 5/8" lbs Brood & Extracting
Medium, Illinois , ¾, Western 6 5/8" lbs Brood & Extracting & Comb
Shallow 5 ¾" or 5 11/16" lbs Comb & Extracting
The hardest thing for me about beekeeping is lifting. Boxes full of honey are heavy. Deep boxes full of honey are VERY heavy. I know some will argue that the deeps should have brood in them and therefore not be full of honey, but sooner or later they WILL be full of honey. There may be some disagreement as to the exact weights of a full box of honey, but in my experience this is a pretty good synopsis of sizes of boxes and typical uses for them:

4. Lighter Boxes Eight Frame boxes:
Deep, Langstroth Deep 9 5/8" lbs Brood & Extracting
Medium, Illinois, ¾, Western 6 5/8" lbs Brood & Extracting & Comb
Shallow 5 ¾" or 5 11/16" lbs Comb and Extracting
If you want a grasp of these and don't have a hive yet, go to the hardware store and stack up two fifty pound boxes of nails or, at the feed store, two fifty pound bags of feed. This is approximately the weight of a full deep. Now take one off and lift one box. This is approximately the weight of a full eight frame medium.
I find I can lift about fifty pounds pretty well, but more is usually a strain that leaves me hurting the next few days. The most versatile size frame is a medium and a box of them that weighs about 50 pounds is an eight frame.
So, first I converted all my deeps into mediums. It was a huge improvement over the occasional deep full of honey I had to lift. I still got tired of lifting 60 pound boxes, so I cut the ten frame mediums down to eight frame mediums. I'm really liking them. They are a comfortable weight to lift all day long and not be in pain for the next week. Any lighter and I might be tempted to try to lift two. Any heavier and I'm wishing it was a shade lighter.

5. Gravity increasing?
I'm wondering how many aging beekeepers have been forced to give up bees because they hurt themselves lifting deeps and it hasn't occurred to them there are other choices?

6. Richard Taylor said:
"...no man's back is unbreakable and even beekeepers grow older. When full, a mere shallow super is heavy, weighing forty pounds or more. Deep supers, when filled, are ponderous beyond practical limit."

7. All one size frame

8. All one size frame
The frame is the basic element of a modern bee hive. Even if you have various sized boxes (as far as the number of frames they hold) if the frames are all the same depth you can put them in any of your boxes.

9. Advantages to all one size
You can:
Put brood up a box to "bait" the bees up.
Put honey combs in for food wherever you need it.
Unclog a brood nest by moving pollen or honey up a box or even a few frames of brood up a box to make room in the brood nest to prevent swarming.
Run an unlimited brood nest with no excluder and if there is brood anywhere you can move it anywhere else.

10. Cutting down to mediums
I cut all my boxes and frames down to mediums.
The boxes, are easy. Just cut 3” off the bottom of a deep or add 11/16” to a shallow.

11. Cutting down frames to mediums
Set a table saw fence to 6 ¼”.
Run the frames through the table saw to cut off the bottom.
Set a table saw fence to 3/8”.
Run the ends of the bottom through and cut off the end bars.
Put the resultant bottom bar between the two end bars and nail.

12. Cutting down frames to mediums

13. Eight or ten frame?
Eight Ten Eight

14. Transition from ten to eight
When you have a mixture of sizes

15. Cutting down ten frames to eight
Marking

16. Cutting down to eight frames
Cutting off the side

17. Cutting down to eight frames
Knocking the scraps off the side

18. Cutting down to eight frames
Pulling all the nails out of the sides

19. Cutting down to eight frames
Cutting the sides to fit

20. Cutting down to eight frames
Finishing with a hand saw

21. Cutting down to eight frames
Side reinstalled on the box

22. Cutting down a bottom board
Getting the screen out of the way

23. Cutting down a bottom board
Measure and mark

24. Cutting down a bottom board
Cleaning up the side

25. Cutting down a bottom board
Putting the side back on

26. Cutting down a bottom board
Back together

27. Top Entrances

28. Advantages to only a top entrance
Tall grass doesn’t block access
Deep snow doesn’t block access
Dead bees don't block the entrance in winter
No need for mouse guards
No skunks or opossums eating the bees
Combine with a SBB for excellent ventilation
Migratory covers are simpler and cheaper
Hive can be 8 inches lower for less lifting
When supering horizontal hives, bees have to go through the super
Less condensation in the winter
Sundance II pollen traps easy adjustment

29. Easy top entrance
You can just add shims under your inner cover or a migratory cover

30. Making a top entrance cover
Shingle shims on a simple plywood square

31. Making a top entrance cover
Nailing and gluing the shims

32. Making a top entrance cover
Finished top, upside down

33. Cover (with wire clip)

34. Making a top entrance cover
Finished top in place

35. Top entrance in use
Bees at top entrance

36. Caveats
Remember, if you have no bottom entrance and you use an excluder you will need some kind of drone escape on the bottom for them to get out. A 3/8" hole will do.

37. Bottom Feeders Classic Jay Smith bottom feeder
Made from a standard solid bottom so no extra equipment to buy
Can double as a cover and top entrance for the hive below

38. Modified Bottom Feeder
Screened fill area
No bottom entrance (less robbing issues)
Provides reduced entrance below for a top entrance on stacked nucs or hives
Allows feeding stacked hives without unstacking

39. Top View

40. Bottom view

41. With Hive

42. Apartment Nucs

43. Fill covers in place

44.
More information concerning top entrances, lighter equipment, natural cell size and varroa, horizontal hives, queen rearing, general beekeeping, observation hives and many other topics.
Many classic queen rearing books.
Huber’s New Observations on the Natural History of Bees
Picture from Jay Smith’s Better Queens

45. Contact bees at bushfarms dot com www.bushfarms.com
Book: The Practical Beekeeper