I meant to put this up last year, but I decided to wait and see if it worked out well, and then I kind of forgot. Anyways, right after hiving my first two packages, I was headed out of town for a weekend of camping, and since I couldn't convince anyone to come over and feed my bees for me, I had to come up with a solution that would keep them fed from Thursday morning to Monday afternoon/evening. I had tried the baggie feeder, but that only lasted about two days. My solution? Chicken waterers!
They hold a gallon of syrup, they have shallow trays which I fill with small/medium sized rocks to give the girls something to land on/hold on to/crawl out of the syrup if they fall in, and the best part is that sitting them on the top bars with an empty deep above they fit perfectly inside the hive. I had zero bees drown in them, and they last much longer than the baggie feeder, they don't leak, they're plastic (so, durable). I have not yet figured out any downside to using them, and they cost around 5 dollars if you can catch them on sale. Maybe it's not an original idea at all, maybe lots of people do it, but I'm putting it out there anyways.
They hold a gallon of syrup, they have shallow trays which I fill with small/medium sized rocks to give the girls something to land on/hold on to/crawl out of the syrup if they fall in, and the best part is that sitting them on the top bars with an empty deep above they fit perfectly inside the hive. I had zero bees drown in them, and they last much longer than the baggie feeder, they don't leak, they're plastic (so, durable). I have not yet figured out any downside to using them, and they cost around 5 dollars if you can catch them on sale. Maybe it's not an original idea at all, maybe lots of people do it, but I'm putting it out there anyways.