Top-Bar Beekeeping: Organic Practices for Honeybee Health Author: Les Crowder | Language: English | ISBN:
B009OJ592C | Format: EPUB
Top-Bar Beekeeping: Organic Practices for Honeybee Health Description
In recent years beekeepers have had to face tremendous challenges, from pests such as varroa and tracheal mites and from the mysterious but even more devastating phenomenon known as Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). Yet in backyards and on rooftops all over the world, bees are being raised successfully, even without antibiotics, miticides, or other chemical inputs.
More and more organically minded beekeepers are now using top-bar hives, in which the shape of the interior resembles a hollow log. Long lasting and completely biodegradable, a topbar hive made of untreated wood allows bees to build comb naturally rather than simply filling prefabricated foundation frames in a typical box hive with added supers.
Top-bar hives yield slightly less honey but produce more beeswax than a typical Langstroth box hive. Regular hive inspection and the removal of old combs helps to keep bees healthier and naturally disease-free.
Top-Bar Beekeeping provides complete information on hive management and other aspects of using these innovative hives. All home and hobbyist beekeepers who have the time and interest in keeping bees intensively should consider the natural, low-stress methods outlined in this book. It will also appeal to home orchardists, gardeners, and permaculture practitioners who look to bees for pollination as well as honey or beeswax.
- File Size: 7101 KB
- Print Length: 192 pages
- Publisher: Chelsea Green Publishing; 1 edition (October 2, 2012)
- Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
- Language: English
- ASIN: B009OJ592C
- Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #64,248 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #4
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Science > Biological Sciences > Animals > Insects & Spiders - #14
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Agricultural Sciences > Animal Husbandry - #14
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Science > Agricultural Sciences > Animal Husbandry
- #4
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Science > Biological Sciences > Animals > Insects & Spiders - #14
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Agricultural Sciences > Animal Husbandry - #14
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Science > Agricultural Sciences > Animal Husbandry
I've been a Backyard Bee Guardian using organic and ecological practices for 15 years and mentoring others to support this amazing mediterranean honeybee in their backyard havens for over 10 years! This book is ESSENTIAL for success in Top Bar Bee Guardianship for new and experienced TOP Bar enthusiasts and will aid my teaching and mentoring greatly. And... by reading this book before you choose whether to do Top Bars or Langstroths may help you decide that Top Bar Hives are the right choice for Homesteaders and Backyarders!
While I still teach how to run a Langstroth HIve like a wild or top bar hive more or less, allowing bees to draw their own comb - allowing bees to swarm (yes I believe in contributing to strong local genetic variation and acclimation by allowing some of the swarms to get away and attempt to make it in the wilds of Santa Cruz) - I have begun to initiate new Bee Guardians into the magic of Top Bars because ultimately I believe that Langstroth HIves are designed primarily for the ease of industrial monocrop and chemical based bee manipulations and that Top Bar Hives are designed more for the ease of the bees.
Yes you can get more honey with Langstroth Hives, but for Backyarders there are other inspiring goals and ultimately a TOP BAR HIVE with a viewing window supports less non essential interventions by overly manipulative humans and supports the shape of the colony's skeleton (the comb) to mimick what they do in the wild for example.
Honey production is not my driving purpose in serving Honey Bees.
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