In that location'southward a lot to consider when purchasing your starting time beehive. We know y'all want to choose the best hive for your beekeeping mode and needs—and we are here to help! One of the most mutual questions we hear from beekeepers is whether a solid or a screened lesser board is a better choice for their hive. The main purpose of a bottom board is to seal the bottom of your hive from the elements, while the main purpose of a screened bottom board is to assist with proper ventilation in particularly warm climates. Choosing between a solid or screen bottom board can exist a tough choice, and y'all'll desire to take into account your hive type, your local climate, and your pest management strategies.

HIVE TYPE

Langstroth screened lesser board comes with removable insert

Different hives are designed for different purposes, so your lesser board choice will largely depend on what type of hive you are working with. Ane of the advantages of Langstroth hives is that the bottom boards tin can hands exist switched out at any time, even when you take an active colony inside. Because of this, many Langstroth beekeepers have both bottom boards on manus, using the ventilated one during warmer months and swapping in the solid bottom board as part of their overwintering training.


Warre hive screened bottom board comes standard and with a removable insert

Our Warre hives, on the other hand, come standard with screened bottom boards. Warre hives are designed to have incredible insulation—then incredible, in fact, that y'all run the risk of too much condensation building up in the hive as a event. For that reason, we normally recommend screened bottom boards to assist weigh information technology.

Top Bar Screened Bottom Board
Superlative bar screened bottom board comes with a removable insert

Finally, nosotros recommend solid bottom boards for top bar hives unless your climate is very hot and humid (such as the deep south of the United States). Even Southwest climates, while very hot, are dry out enough that screened bottoms practice not take much benefit. Lesser boards can just be changed in an empty tiptop bar hive, so it's important to make your year-long decision on bottom boards before installing your bees.

CLIMATE

Beekeeping is local and very dependent on climate, making it very difficult to make many full general proclamations for beekeepers nationwide (let alone worldwide!). Bee Thinking prefers solid bottom boards for our Pacific Northwest climate, and by and large simply recommend using screened lesser boards in parts of the earth where there are extremely loftier temperatures and humidity. In these climates, bees practise benefit from the additional ventilation that a screened lesser board provides.

The proficient news is that honeybees are extremely adaptive and will work their hardest to survive no matter which bottom board you lot choose. To cool their hive, bees will bring water back to the hive, depositing it on comb and fanning their wings for evaporative cooling. Retrieve of it every bit bee air conditioning. On the other hand, bees are splendid at warming up their hive during the colder months. They do this past forming a cluster around their honey stores and vibrating their flight muscles to generate heat. This move requires a lot of energy, which is why information technology is paramount to ensure that your bees have plenty of love stores to fuel their heating endeavors.

PEST Management

Finally, some beekeepers utilise bottom boards to assist with their pest management strategies. Screened bottom boards tin be used as a natural fashion to control small hive beetles and Varroa mites by putting a sticky substance on the screen to take hold of them every bit they autumn through. This strategy also allows beekeepers to monitor how dense pest populations are throughout the year. Screened bottom boards can also assist with the "saccharide-shake method," which encourages bees to groom the hive of Varroa while too preparation the powdered sugar off. Simply grit the bees with powdered carbohydrate and they will offset preparation each other and themselves. This groomed textile, including the mites, will fall through screened bottoms.

Hither at Bee Thinking, we choose to fight mites by disrupting their life wheel using foundationless frames. Mites reproduce within developing brood cells; the larger the cell size of a developing bee, the longer the incubation time, allowing breeding Varroa more time to multiply. Conversely, natural comb (without foundation) has a smaller cell size, shorter incubation time, and therefore less time for varroa to breed in developing brood cells.


THE CLIFF NOTES:

PROS: Screened Bottom Board

• Allows adequate ventilation in hot climates and prevents the buildup of condensation in the hive.

• Can help with pest prevention and monitoring strategies.

CONS: Screened Bottom Board

• Also much ventilation in a hive can result in the scent of pheromones (which bees use to communicate) escaping through the screened bottom board, making communication difficult.

• May crave bees to work harder to proceed their hive warm, depending on climate.

PROS: Solid Bottom Board

• Honeybees will coat a solid bottom lath (just not a screened bottom board) with propolis, a sticky plant resin that bees use to coat the within of the hive. Propolis has been found to greatly increase the immune response of European Honeybees, giving you healthier bees!

• Pheromones released for communication stay within the hive.

• Solid lesser boards are more than like to natural hive enclosures, if that is what you lot are looking to replicate as a natural beekeeper.

CONS: Solid Bottom Board

• In hot and boiling climates, a solid bottom board will restrict ventilation and require bees to spend time and energy cooling down the hive.

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