Basic Hive building question

[kyfarmer]

I am just getting involved in beekeeping. Woodworking is a great hobby for me so I am marring the two.

Should I paint the insides of the hives? Putting white barn paint on the outsides.

Should I caulk the inside seams of the hives, if so with what? Silicone, wook puddy etc. I dovetailed them together with my dovetail jig and they are rather tight; however, I understand that the tighter they are the less the bees have to work to glue them up.

I followed the plans on this site and have tried hard to hold tight to the measurements so that I have the right bee space.

Thanks, wasnt sure if this was a 101 question or equipment question...

[Dan Williamson]

No need to paint the inside...

No need to try to seal the corners.

The bees will work their magic.

As long as you assemble securely, protect the outside, and have built to the proper dimensions your work is done. (Well, other than putting bees and frames inside! )

[bluegrass]

Don't paint the insides, you can silicone the corners if you want, but don't need to. Wood glue the corners though if its not too late.

Oh yeah.....almost forgot the most important step...... When they are done, post pictures

[Tim Hall]

As someone who is currently building his first hives too, it occurred to me that this might need a little explaining (since it was recently explained to me)...

The bees will work their magic.

Translation: the bees will coat the inside of the hive with propolis in short order just by crawling around in there. And they'll fill any cracks.

[kenpkr]

You may have already seen these but here there are anyway-
Beesource plans-
http://www.beesource.com/plans/index.htm

[kyfarmer]

Thanks for the information, and I will be glad to post pics. But, you guys will have to tell me where to post them on here or I can post to a web page of my own. In my home, we go to great lengths to recycle all we can, and my bee hive project is mostly recycled too. The wood used is old pine that was once in the kitchen of an old farm house we tore down a while back. I cut out any nail holes and turned the unfinished sides inward. The outside of some of this pine has varnish on it but no paint or stain. I will paint the outsides white. I have lots of red cedar lumber and first considered using it but decided that cedar might harm the bees. Outside of the foaming glue I used the hive didn't cost me a thing.

[bluegrass]

You can upload the pictures to photo bucket and then paste a link to this thread.

[Bucks Bees]

I'm also new at this and building my own boxes. I also built slotted racks and am building a screened bottomboard. I made my base out of ceder but now not sure if I can use the base and a screened bottom board at the same time. Any thought's?

[Michael Bush]

You can easily combine a slatted rack and a screened bottom by simply putting a screen on the slatted rack, but you can also put a slatted rack on top of a screened bottom board.

[Bucks Bees]

OK, Thanks Michael. Just trying to get this all figured out before the "girls" get here. What's your thought's on a fully ventillated top cover. I read some posts about using them and it sounded reasonable, but then, I haven't experienced any of this yet.

[Michael Bush]

>What's your thought's on a fully ventillated top cover.

I built a lot of vent boxes before I went to top entrances. The top entrances eliminated the need for them, but if you're going to have a bottom entrance, then I think they help a lot.