One of our members, Keith Gower, has progressed his bee keeping hobby from just keeping native Australian sting-less bees and has decided to try his hand at keeping honey bees. As his interest is in natural and sustainable bee keeping he thought it would be appropriate to build a Kenyan Top Bar hive. This type of hive allows the bees to manage the way they want to build comb and distribute their resources within the hive, whilst still conforming with current DPI regulations for hive inspection and management. The emphasis being that the hive is about the welfare of the bees and the environment, not just a means to harvest their honey.
With the help of Richard Harris the hive was built, a swarm was captured, and is now in place where the bees can forage and do what bees do best. The hive has been inspected recently; the queen is busy laying eggs, there is a healthy brood, and the bees are already storing honey.
