Beekeeping Video 3

Smoking the hive, The two tools placed on the top of the hive are hive tools which are used to dislodge frames and clean off excess wax.

Once the hive is open just above the brood box is a wood and metal frame. This is known as a queen excluder. It enables the bees to move through the hive, but the queen is too large to fit through. If the queen has free run of the hive she would lay brood throughout the hive and make it more difficult o harvest the honey.

The frame which is puled out is from the brood box and we can see new wax is being drawn out by the bees on the outer edge frames of the hive. We usually inspect the frames to see the progress of the hive. make sure the queen is laying and that there are no succession activities in place such as the appearance of queen cells.