Shifting Beehives

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This article appeared under my pseudonym, Skep, in the NZ Beekeeper No 195, Spring 1987, pp 23-25.

How many of you out there remember the first time you shifted bee hives?

It's often one of the funniest stories in a beekeeper's long list of 'How I hope I have learned from my mistakes ...' For rather a complex operation, it is often forced on the beginner before they have ever had the chance to think about it or read any of the books. It often comes as a case of something you have to do immediately, as the hive has just been purchased and you need to get it home. And the hive has often been more a case of boxes and frames barely held together by the holes...

And the floorboard is rotten, as you find out as you put your hand through it lifting it off the ground...

Lifting onto the back of the car trailer, where it shifts and slides apart while on the way to its new location...

And all in all, it becomes a hilarious story of mishap. Later on, that is, after you forget about all the worry and the stings. My first experience was no different, if that makes you feel any better.

I had read 'some of the books', though, about how you should secure the hive, nailing laths, on the diagonal, to keep the floor, boxes and lid together. The bees didn't like that hammering much, I remember. And all the nail holes helped later to let in moisture to rot the boxes. I didn't have a trailer; I managed to get the hive into the boot of the car.

But all in all, that first shifting of my newly acquired hobby was better than the experience I had two weeks later, helping a sideline beekeeper shift 35 of his hives. Exciting, and still a good story fifteen years later, but a wreck with bees all over the highway, an overturned truck with diesel tanks on fire and two days to clean up the whole mess was no fun at the time. At least no one was injured.

What I'm trying to get at is that I don't think its just because of that experience that I always get an adrenaline surge when it comes time to shift bees. I think it must be a part of the process, a real life indicator that you need to think the whole job through and plan accordingly, every time, whether it's your first time to shift bees or you think you are an 'old hand'.

First of all, let's give away that idea of nailing the hive parts together. Its absolutely not needed. In the U.S. they even sell hobbyists special staples, about 60 mm wide, to use to nail into the hive parts. Utterly a waste of time and effort, and who wants to perforate all their woodware, anyway?

If you're going to have to shift one or more hives on a regular basis, even only two or three times each year, invest in some form of hive strapping. You'll wonder how you ever did without it.

At its most basic, all you really need is a piece of rope. But that means you have to actually know how to tie some 'proper knots', and I realise that is a dying art nowadays. Securely hitched up, several pieces of rope will hold your hive together very well.

Better for most beekeepers, though, will be a form of plastic, nylon fabric, galvanised iron or stainless steel belting. Which you finally decide on for yourself depends on many factors: What you might happen to have already to hand, cost, and whether you want to keep it around the hive all the time.

Keep in mind that most metal parts may rust if left on the hive. Be aware, too, that ultraviolet light from the sun will cause many plastics to perish over only one to two seasons of use. They become quite brittle and unusable.

If you keep the straps on hives that are kept in paddocks with stock, the animals will amaze you with what they will chew and destroy.

The other thing you have to decide with straps is whether you want one that will secure the hive so tightly you could roll it down the hill, or whether you simply want it fixed tightly enough that it won't come apart with the normal movements of shifting on a trailer.

I must say, as much as I curse the things at times, that the Emlock system is hard to beat. They're expensive, they're unwieldy, they're terrible to work with in the dark, they can make nasty cuts, they can be tensioned so tight you'll crush your box into small pieces -- all of these disadvantages, and still I like them. Their real advantage is that it doesn't take very long to strap a hive, you need no extra equipment, and once they are fixed, the hive is a solid unit (suitable but not recommended for rolling down hills...)

One of my other choices is the nylon cloth tape with quick fix and open fasteners, the type of buckle arrangements that are used on lifejackets. Their real advantages come with the flexibility of the strap, making them easy to handle in the dark, and extremely easy to tension up and remove. They won't, however, hold a hive together 'under extreme provocation' -- if the hive gets jolted, the boxes can still shift apart enough to let bees out.

If you're wanting cheap methods, many beekeeper use the bent wire type buckles and plastic tape arrangements. Again, they work fine, relatively quickly but won't hold the hive together if it gets dropped. They often require a bit of memory and getting 'the knack' to work.

Many beekeepers, mostly South Islanders, use variations on a type of strap first made, I think, by Sandy Richardson. Ask around with other beekeepers in your area, and you may come across a simple, cheap design that might suit you.

Another real trick when you're going to shift your hive(s) is leave them alone for a week or so before the night of the shift. If you haven't broken the propolis seal between hive parts, you're much less likely to come to grief with boxes sliding around.

Along those same lines, four fencing staple in your floorboard will sure make shifting hives easier and safer. They keep the bottom box from sliding around, probably one of the most common problems of shifting bees.

Keeping the hives in place on a truck or trailer is a point often carried out in rather a slipshod manner. With the new loading regulations, you really must secure your load properly. If you want a real fright, go down to your Ministry of Transport office and ask about the regulations; you'll be amazed at the size and strength of straps and ropes you must use. Probably the best thing for most beekeepers has been the widespread use of nylon strapping with ratchet type fasteners. Used properly, they will take the place of the rope skills that used to be such a part of fixing loads to trailers and trucks.

And assuming you think you can keep all of the equipment together and securely fixed to the truck or trailer, how are you going to keep the bees in? Talk to commercial beekeepers, and most of them will tell you they don't bother. If you're careful and experienced, that might be alright, but for you as a hobbyist, there's no real reason to try.

One of the very first 'gadgets' I ever saw in beekeeping was a piece of galvanised fly screen gauze, about 75 mm wide and as long as the hive's entrance. Fold the gauze in half across the 75 mm side, forming a wedge, jam it into the hive entrance, and voila! The bees are all trapped inside and yet they can still ventilate the hive.

Some of the beekeepers in my area actually use a piece of foam rubber for the same purpose, but I have serious doubts whether a strong hive would be able to get enough air this way.

Another potential danger of blocking in entrances is forgetting to unblock them once you get the hive to its new location. Get into the habit of counting your gauzes before and after you start the shifting; its surprisingly easy to accidently leave a hive locked in.

If you're going to have to con a non-beekeeping friend into helping you shift hives like I do ('Thank you for all those nights, Marcus!') its only fair that you prepare them adequately. This means not only having a full set of protective clothing but making sure they are able to wear it properly. You might not mind the occasional sting, go without gloves or wear your veil only slap dash, but you shouldn't expect your helper to be the same.

Prepare also for all the other eventualities that you could anticipate. Make sure you do have your smoker (seems an obvious one, doesn't it?). And matches. And a torch.

And if the hives are coming from or going to someone else's property, make sure they know you'll be moving around at night. I recently heard a real horror story of beekeepers being shot at, the landowner thinking they were intruders.

Lots of things to think about, aren't there?

If you only have to shift your hives once every few years, you'll probably never develop good routines, but many beekeepers are forced or wanting to move hives more often. Moving them to different areas for an extended honey flow, moving them in and out of a paid pollination service or moving them simply because you have to find a new place to keep them will make you conscious of how important all of the above ideas are.

For your own safety, but even more importantly, for the safety of the general public who seem to jump at the chance to find reasons to dislike bees, it is important that we all do our part. It not only makes that move safer (but still with the adenaline surge...) but also helps in the area of public relations for all beekeepers.