I Installed Windows in my Bee-Hives, The results are going to be extraordinary. My Quest in Becoming a Top South African Honey Producer, Part 5!

Hey everyone, WOW what a cool plan this is? Bee-keepers, are you out there? I would love to know your thoughts on this idea? We recently visited a bee-hive factory check out my blog here https://steemit.com/ghsc/@craigcryptoking/beehive-factory-visit-beehives-feeders-supers-brood-boxes-swarm-catchers-and-more I have always loved nature and bees my Mom and sister @buckaroo keep bees and finally I have also realized this dream.

My initial thinking was, how can I make or improve a system in order for the bees to be less disrupted as well as making life easier for myself in knowing whether the honey is ready for harvest or not! Well what better way than to actually be able to peer in to the hive any time of night or day with a bee window or two? So, that is exactly what I made.

Here we have the final result, it just made for a nice index pic, still needed to be done here are hinged window closer's, just to make sure the bees are not disrupted at all whilst we are not inspecting their activity!

Interesting right? Be sure to read on for the process..

THE STARTING POINT

I had to firstly ascertain where I wanted these windows, I decided on, in the Super Boxes. The thinking behind this would be to be able to see when to harvest the honey. The brooder boxes are never harvested so looking in there would be pointless in terms of knowing when to harvest, HOWEVER, be really nice at some point for interest sake and learning purposes. The Queen Bee resides in the brooder box and I would just love to get footage of her laying eggs and generally doing what she does! I am sure in time I will install windows into the brooder boxes as well so be sure to stay tuned for that!

Here we have the first super box for me to modify. For a starting point I did two, to test, will take it from there after the initial experiment's goals are achieved!

Firstly I decided on a window size, I then measured and marked it out with a tape measure and square!

The tools I used where a Portable Electric Drill, Router, Jigsaw, Pencil, Tape Measure and a Sandpaper.

Can you just imagine the footage I am going to get, been able to film and photograph the bees in their very home, building combs, offloading nectar, capping combs, interacting with each other and more!

Below after measuring the window size and marking it off, I drilled two holes in each corner of the window and then with a jigsaw cut two rectangular holes per super!

I now had to install the 3mm glass. I used a 5mm router bit to recess a groove around the edge of the window to fit the glass. With silicone I then installed the glass, a good idea would be to leave this for a few days to get rid of the smell of the silicone, I can't imagine the bees would enjoy this too much!

Here is the view looking in after I put a super frame in with full wax foundation. This is the view we will get before the bees start to work on the wax foundation, but as they progress this should get far more interesting indeed, naturally there are no bees in here yet, when we put these supers on an already harvested hive I shall be posting pics and video's of those for sure, it really promises to be incredibly interesting indeed!

If you look closely, you will notice thin wires on the super frames, these are just to add support for the combs as the bees build them and fill them with honey naturally these would get heavier with time and as they build and fill combs!

This still needs to be installed. I am going to put 'covers' over the glass windows to close off light as not to disturb bees whilst we are not looking into observe their activity! Maybe I should install some nice silk curtains for them too, so they can close them at night when they settle in for bed? ;)

This is a view from the front of the super. I installed two windows per super one for the side comb view and one of the front the frames running 90 degrees to this window. The thinking was I would like to get a full overview of their activity and progress to get a better idea as to when the next harvest would be ready. Generally bees start working from the middle out, these two windows should give me more than enough info to achieve this!

Here we have the glass in as well as the super frames in, to give you a good general idea as to what I plan to achieve as well as what the inside of a beehive looks like. The ten super frames as well as wax foundations all installed in this picture!

I had a couple of super cute helpers too (my landlords dogs) all his dogs are named after coffee names, The Boerbul on the left is Lungo and the Ridgeback on the right is a new addition to the pack (very naughty but cute) and his name is Lavazza, other dogs here include Douwie (Douwe Egberts) Keano and Espresso, all very cute indeed, I am not too sure I agree with all their respective 'coffee names'

Whalla we are done, or just about, all I need to do is install the glass covers, put these supers on top of the brooder box give a day or three and take some awesome photo's.

Be sure to stay tuned for those in a couple of days or less, I hope you enjoy this incredible journey with me of my dream in becoming a top South African Honey Producer. I really plan to do things BETTER than it currently is, in total synergy with nature and producing only the finest top quality raw, unfiltered honey.

Cheer$;)