Is the wooden hive dead?
- nick92620
- Mar 14, 2024
- 5 min read
So what do you all use? There are so many options of hive type out there and very few people can say they have used them all. Read on to hear my thoughts!
As a new beekeeper I bought from a local-ish beekeeper an traditional wooden hive. It was painted and came with bees, two supers and drawn comb. Like many people who start this was a National set up. As I got more into beekeeping and my designs to get more bees and become a "sideliner" I started to look at hive types and made my decision. Was my decision right? Well it was definitely right at the time as no one purposely makes a bad decision in life no matter how bad it seems in hindsight.
So the majority of beekeepers in the UK use National hives. It was what I bought, what the guy used I got mine off, and most hobbiest beekeepers use them. This is definitely currently the category I currently fall into although those of you who have read my previous ramblings on here will know I have grand plans in the next 5 years. To be honest until I sat to start to write this I realised I don't actually know if the hive I bought on my starter set up is cedar or just painted soft wood. Some of it was homemade but it does the job.
My first hives with home made roofs
Even 3 years ago when I started to keep bees, being relatively alone in making my decision, I wasn't aware of all the hives that are now available. I honestly think some of them weren't available! Wood has a massive benefits, it has been used for years, it's easy to make your own parts if you're handy, easy to clean (well scorch), it's very traditional and looks amazing if you buy one of the lovely cedar examples from Thorn or similar manufacturer. I think if you want a couple of hives at the bottom of the garden then the traditional WBC is definitely the way to go they look amazing.
As you can see they are a thing of beauty. I'm lucky, or unlucky for my wallet, not to live far from Thorn Headquarters and have seen these in the shop. They look every bit as amazing in the flesh as they do on the picture. The workmanship quality and beauty is like nothing I've seen before. As with anything beautiful it comes with an eyewatering price tag currently of around £950 for the one pictured! Now for someone like me who wants to be somewhere around 100 hives obviously this is well out of my price range. Also how suitable are they for larger scale beekeepers? I don't know as I, for price reasons alone discounted these, but I suspect there is far too many parts for a larger scale operation.
Poly National hives are a popular choice. I know my unofficial mentor and many other peoples unofficial mentor by way of his YouTube videos, Laurence, favors these. Again there are numerous makes, Abelo, Swienty, Paynes and Maisemore all make them to name a few. Listed against the benefits are great insultation properties, readily available parts, easy cleaning using bleach and good packages to buy the hives with feeders, queen excluders and every option you could possibly want.
https://www.abelo.co.uk/shop/national-hive/poly-hives-national/national-poly-hive-with-2-supers-new/
The option above is around £200 and I know that Laurence and Abelo offer some discounts on the prices currently. Now this is much more obtainable for someone looking to buy a number of hives. Also did I mention they're already assembled?
Wooden National Hives don't actually look so appealing when bought as a package when you compare them to the Abelo's offering and I am sure other Poly hives are around the same price. Currently a Cedar hive is £205 from Simon the Beekeeper but you have to assemble this yourself. Now I'm sure I know where my money would be and it's not with wood!
We haven't really mentioned the other option to National format, there are numerous all with pros and cons. I think the one I really want to mention here is the Langstroth and the reason for this will become clear.
Most people agree that for the more prolific queens the National box is only just large enough and you may even need to double brood, perform splits or Demaree Split to given them enough space. Langstroth or Commercial set ups do give much more space and maybe reduce swarming but I'll leave the swarming debate to the experts!
So, I went down the National route, most people have done, I thought maybe in the future I could sell a few Nucs to people so I need to have National. Well how about Langstroth? My observation are that they seem to be gaining in popularity, there are many options now in the Langstroth and let me bring this one to your attention.
The Anel beehive currently available from Gwenyn Gruffydd for £115 in the set up pictured. I believe Melo bees sell similar too.
Yes £115 for everything pictured! That is a brood box, 2 supers and queen excluder and floor. Now does that look like a bargain? Oh and they're ready made, no assembly required!
To prove this point lets look at what I've been doing in my national set up. I buy "seconds". These are cedar products, all flat packed that have knots in the wood, maybe need a little TLC as you put it together to make it fit correctly but are generally structurally sound. Now to keep things simple, and because I'm ok lifting, I have kept all my boxes, on the National deep format. That is brood boxes and supers, all deeps. This means less supers are needed, no issues with not having the right size frames and means I can use last years super frames in my brood box if need be.
The only downside so far is I need to keep track of the ones which have had Varroa treatment applied which I do my sticking a drawing pin in the frame. I make my own floors either based up Laurence underfloor designs, which Adam has written a blog about, or solid floors dependant on what I have available so the cost of these is minimal. The crown boards I make myself and the rooves are again seconds. The cost to me for 3 boxes, a floor, crown board, roof and queen excluder making these is about £90. Now that takes me a lot of time in the closed season when I'm out doing other things.
Pictured are some of my "seconds" hives and home made wooden floors. As above I have purposely kept to one format of frame, one format of hive, and tried to keep the cost down to the minimum with my limited skills, tools and time. When you look at the benefits of doing this is it really worth it for saving the money? I would argue saving the money if staying on the National format is worth it at over £100 a hive but when saving only £25 a hive I struggle to justify this to myself.
I think the only decision now is do you keep Nationals or Langstroth? When you factor in more time spend making Nationals, less space for prolific queens, less insulation, and then minor increase in cost of the new Langstroth hives it look like a no brainer to me. I'd be really interested to hear others options on them.
Lets be clear here though unless something changes the wooden hive is dead!
I went with Abelo Langstroth hives, really like them, I thought about the Anel ones, but liked the slightly softer look of the Abelo. My first year in, two hives nearly threw winter and planning to double for 2026, I have not looked back. Great option for a new beekeeper and something I’ll stick with for years to come I hope