Should I Buy A Flow Hive?
In this blog, I am going to provide everything you need to know about Flow Hives. Are you wondering what is a Flow Hive or are you thinking, do Flow Hives work in the UK? I have been using my Flow Hive for over 2 years now and I am going to give you as much detail as I possibly can, coupled with links to a few Flow Hive videos, so you can see what these hives are capable of.
What Is A Flow Hive?
The Flow Hive is an ingenious invention which allows plastic injection moulded, honey comb frames to be extracted of honey without the use of a centrifugal honey extractor.
How Is A Flow Hive Different From A Normal Hive?
In a normal beehive, honey frames are stored in supers which are shallow boxes that are stored above the brood box. The shallow frames are generally filled with wooden frames and wax foundation and this is where the bees store their honey. In order to get the honey from the frame to the jar, the beekeeper takes the frames of honey and removes a thin wax capping. The frames are then placed into a centrifugal honey extractor and the honey is then spun out, filtered and left to stand before being poured into jars.
How Do Flow Hives Work?
Flow Hives go about honey extraction in a completely different process with a number of benefits over standard honey extraction. Instead of regular wooden frames and wax foundation, Flow Hives replace these with injection moulded plastic hexagonal split cell frames, which are used by the bees to store honey.
Instead of manual extraction using a centrifuge, the Flow Hive design allows a long metal key to access the Flow Hive frames and when its turned, runny honey will flow out from the spout into a receptacle below. It’s a beautifully simple design and a very popular type of beehive.
Do Flow Hives work in the UK?
Flow Hives work very well in the UK but there are a few things to watch out for to ensure you get the very best from your Flow Hive.
Oil Seed Rape: If you are near fields of Oil Seed Rape (big fields of yellow) you cannot let the bees place any OSR nectar into the supers. It will cause them to set and then it’s VERY difficult to remove it! However, this is easy to mitigate. Just don’t place the Flow Supers on the hive until the middle of June, when the OSR will have completely finished and you can then collect the summer nectar flows.
It’s Too Cold: The UK can get very cold but as long as you don’t leave the supers on over winter and ensure the super frames are always covered in bees, the honey remains warm and runny enough to extract. Choose a warm, sunny day for extraction and leave it until the afternoon as the sun helps warm up the hives.
Bees start robbing the honey: Now they certainly don't show you this in the marketing but I have found every single time that I have tried to extract honey the way they show in the adverts, I end up with LOADS of bees in the honey. Its REALLY annoying.
However, there is an easy hack to make it work so the bees can not get into the jars!
What Frame Sizes Work in Flow Hives?
Flow Hives throughout the world use Langstroth frames instead of the more commonly used National frames in the UK. The Langstroth frame is far more commonplace throughout the world, the UK just likes to be different. I have used both and I personally prefer the Langstroth frame for keeping any type of beehive. Keep this in mind when you buy bees that you need your nucs to arrive on Langstroth frames, as opposed to National frames.
To learn more about Flow Hives, check out our Flow Hive guide page on our main website.
We sell both types at BMH – HERE is the link to the Langstroth nucs that will fit perfectly in your Flow Hives.
How To Manage Bees In Flow Hives?
Swarm Management: Swarm management in a Flow Hive can be tricky as you can’t add additional space in the supers, but you can in the brood box. My recommendation for ALL Flow Hives is to run them on a double brood as it significantly reduces the chances of swarming throughout the season. Also, regularly removing the honey from the supers can help the bees reduce congestion in the brood box, if they are beginning to backfill the brood frames with nectar. You can also use a cool swarm management technique called a Demaree on a Flow Hive which really helps with swarm management and all you need is one additional brood box. Check out the video BELOW
How To Extract Honey in Flow Hives?
Extracting honey in a Flow Hive is really simple and it’s the greatest benefit of using the Flow Hive system over a more conventional beehive.
Once the bees have filled the supers of honey and capped them over, you simply insert the drain tubes, get your jars set up, insert the extraction key, turn it around and watch the honey flow. It starts off slow and then really starts to drain quickly. Make sure you have plenty of jars at the ready as there is a quite a lot of honey in a single frame.
They Are Expensive! Is There A Cheaper Option?
Flow Hives are not cheap but you do get the benefit of not having to buy and store a big honey extractor; however, there are some cheaper alternatives on the market.
The first option is a copy version of the Flow Hive that is available on Amazon in the UK. I have tried one of these and it worked just as well as the original Flow Hive. Check out the video below to see it in action and you can buy them HERE. https://amzn.to/3vEDWU4
The next option is a bit more expensive from a company called Paradise Honey. It’s called the Smart Bee Box and works on a very similar principal to the Flow Hive. Not as cheap as the Flow Hive copies but does come with the added benefit of it being made from poly and also being able to extract all frames at once, an option that isn’t available on the Flow Hive. You can buy the Paradise Smart Bee Box HERE.
Do I Recommend Flow Hives?
A resounding YES. If I could only have one hive in my back garden it would be a Flow Hive. It produces more than enough honey for me and my family and means I don’t have to mess around with honey extraction. It’s an ingenious product with a very loyal following and just about the most fun you can have with a beehive. The taste of warm, runny honey directly from your beehive will live with you forever.
You can buy Flow Hives HERE
If you have any questions, drop them in the comments and I will do my best to answer them.
