AU3564502A - A new design of native bee hive - Google Patents

Description

AUSTRALIA

Patents Act 1990 COMPLETE SPECIFICATION STANDARD PATENT A NEW DESIGN OF NATIVE BEE HIVE The following statement is a full description of this invention, including the best method of performing it known to me: IP Australia Documents were received on: t N W- Batch No: A NEW DESIGN OF BEE HIVE FOR AUSTRALIAN NATIVE STINGLESS BEES INCORPORATING REMOVABLE DRAINED BASE AND LID, MULTIPLE BOXES AND HIVE BODY RETAINERS.

This invention allows people to keep native stingless bees (Trigonia carbonara), which people like and can be used for pollination or as a point of interest. This design is a product of extensive experiments and requires minimal maintenance.

A native stingless bee hive housed in a hollow log does not readily allow harvesting of honey, propopolis and pollen or easy multiplication of the colony.

Theory:- The hive consists of three or more boxes to allow manipulation of the colony to multiply the colonies and harvest honey, propopolis and pollen. A removable lid and base also allow inspection of the hive and harvesting.

A division retainer prevents the hive structure collapsing when dividing and multiplying the hive.

The lower hive retainer and honey superstructure retainer allow the harvesting of honey without the collapse of the hive structure.

The lower hive retainer, division retainer and honey superstructure retainer also allow the native bees to build up in numbers within a single box until the bee colony is strong enough to move into another box. During this time the bee colony will build a membrane across either the lower hive retainer or division retainer or the honey superstructure retainer.

The lower bee entry allows the hive to drain and can be removed to harvest honey, clear entrance of propopolis and remove any build up of faeces on the bottom board.

The size of the hive is somewhat critical, this size according to the formulae prevents the bees overheating and the propopolis melting and drowning the bees, and yet still allows for a fast build up.

No other fastenings are needed in the hive as the bees will fasten it together with propopolis.

Adhesive tape can be used to seal it externally, except the entrance, to make it perform as designed, or when originally assembling.

Honey and pollen may be harvested by removing any box and piercing the honey pots and draining.

Practice:- Ideally this little hive should be placed in full shade with a north easterly aspect for a bit of early morning sun, in Australia. The bottom board should be removed at regular intervals to clean and remove faeces.

The honey pots may be pierced to remove honey and the boxes placed over a container to drain. A hive design copy may be built and the hive split between the lower hive body and upper hive body.

New components may be added and the new hive created with the lower hive body taken to a new bee site at least 2 km away to prevent the bees returning to one box. Minimum distance unknown.

As the bee colony increases in strength the bees will chew through the membrane they have created on the division retainer, the honey superstructure retainer or the lower hive retainer to fill another box.

The boxes, base, lid and spacers may be formed from suitable weatherproof material such as wood or moulded plastic. The lower hive retainer, division retainer and honey superstructure retainer may be formed of metal or plastic or even wood.

Externally the little bee hive resembles a European honey bee hive for aesthetic reasons and may be painted white which also facilitates cooling.

An upper or central entrance may be added but the lower entrance allows faster build-up in weak colonies.

By using a standard of a primary lower bee entrance, a weak hive may be swapped for a strong one on the same site to incorporate more worker bees into the weak hive.

By using a very small mesh size the honey superstructure retainer may function as a queen excluder to ensure a product free of eggs. A honey superstructure may be placed in a centrifuge to extract the honey and returned to a hive to facilitate mass production by not destroying the bees, honey pots and propopolis.

One single box with removable base and lid may be used to grow a colony, and other boxes and division retainers added as the colony grows in size. As the colony gets larger, additional honey superstructures may be added.

By placing another hive immediately in front of an existing one using spacers, it is possible to make the worker bees travel through this hive and so start a new colony with a queen without harming the original hive after a period of time, normally 2 to 14 days.

By taping the outer surfaces and blocking the entrance with a porous substance, the hives can be moved without special equipment using a normal car.

This design of native bee hive may be managed for either colony or honey, pollen and propopolis production.

A hive retainer, entrance board, queen excluder or hive body may be interchanged with any other hive for a particular district.

While the entrance at the bottom stretches across the full width of the hive, the native stingless bees will block three-quarters or more of it with propopolis and collected seeds to use in effect a much smaller entrance.

To colonise or re-colonise a hive, the rear spacer may be removed and the side spacers and box assembly may be placed in front of another hive to force a colony into the new hive.

Additional boxes may be added as the colony grows, or taken away if the colony is split or weakens.

The claims defining the invention are as follows: 1. A native stingless bee hive of a particular size for a district, consisting of bottom loading entrance with movable spacers and drainage, a brood box in two parts with hive division structure retainers, without frames and having a queen excluder with 3.5mm bee space to allow for addition of extractable honey, pollen and propopolis superstructures.

2. The square arrangement of boxes for the hive corresponds to the maximum temperature in a district where the internal size of boxes 95mm x 220mm corresponds to a maximum temperature of 38'C. Where the maximum temperature is greater, the internal diameter should increase by 20mm for every 1 C. The hive should ideally reflect light and heat.

3. The hive retainers allow the bee hive to seal itself against other insect predators and prevent the collapse and drowning of the bees by the hive structure in hot weather or after manipulation, which corresponds typically to a 20mm mesh.

4. An entrance system that allows one hive to be placed in front of another for colonising and drainage of the hive as illustrated.

A brood box consisting of two compartments with a hive body retainer to facilitate division and harvesting.

6. A queen excluder placed above the double brood box with a 3.5mm mesh to allow the free passage of worker bees only.

7. Removable whole honey superstructures for processing may be added as the colony builds in strength.

8. A colony may be started with a minimum of one box and additional boxes and hive retainers added as it gets stronger to eventually perform as designed.

DAVID HENRY GREAVES 13 MARCH 2002.

Guide to drawings Figure 1 Drawing of native stingless bee hive.

1 Lid 2 Honey superstructure hive retainer 3 Honey, pollen and propopolis hive superstructure 4 Queen excluder Upper brood box 6 Brood box retainer 7 Lower brood box 8 Lower brood box retainer 9 Movable spacers Bottom board.

Figure 2. Vertical cross section of a hive with schematic diagram of a native bee colony.

11 Labyrinth like structure of honey pots, pollen pots and propopolis 12 Spiral brood nest.

Figure 3. Bottom board with movable entrance spacers and drainage holes.

9 Movable entrance spacers 13 Drainage hole 14 Entrance spacer location hole.

Figure 4. Hive retainer.

Figure 5. Hive box.

Figure 6. Queen excluder with 3.5mm bee space.