WHAT AN INVENTION! FATHER AND SON DESIGN A BEEHIVE WITH A WAY OF COLLECTING HONEY WITHOUT DISTURBING THE BEES - JUST TURN A TAP ON AND AWAY YOU GO. COLLECTING HONEY IS NOW A PIECE OF CAKE, SHALL WE SAY?
I LIKE TO COVER STORIES LIKE THIS, EVEN IF IT ISN'T CURRENT NEWS - IT'S NICE TO SHARE GOOD NEWS! HEY? SEE THE PICTURE AND YOUTUBE LINK. THIS IS GOING WORLDWIDE AND IT COMMENCED WHEN BEEKEEPERS IN NSW CROWD FUNDED THEM. WHAT A MARVELOUS BUNCH OF PEOPLE - WELL DONE AUSSIES!!!
Since Father-Son Duo Designed Revolutionary ‘Honey on Tap’ Beehive, There Are 51,000 New Bee Colonies
By McKinley Corbley
Back in 2015, a father-son duo changed the beekeeping game simply by redesigning the traditional beehive – and now, honeybees are benefitting from their profits.
Stuart and Cedar Anderson are the co-creators of the Flow Hive: a brilliantly designed beehive that saves beekeepers hours of work simply by channeling all of its honey into a tap that can be turned on and off at will.
The Flow Hive allows honey to flow out of the hive straight into a jar without crushing or disrupting the bees inside. It can also fit in a small backyard or on a rooftop or balcony.
Cedar, who is a third-generation beekeeper from the rural community of Nimbin, Australia, says that he was inspired to try and design a simpler beehive after his brother was stung during one of their honey extraction missions.
The young inventor knew that there must be an easier way to collect honey without having to wear protective suits, crack open the hive, and disturb the tiny pollinators.
“Ten years ago, Cedar had this idea: ‘come on, we must be able to get honey from a beehive without opening it, extracting and stressing the bees’,” his father Stuart recalled to ABC News.
After several years of tinkering, the Andersons finally perfected their Flow Hive prototype. Upon raising money for the hive’s manufacturing on Indiegogo, their campaign became the most successful crowdfunding page in the platform’s history by raising over $12 million in 8 weeks.
Four years after their initial success, the Flow Hive has had a dramatic impact on honeybee populations around the world.
The Andersons say that they have successfully shipped over 51,000 hives to 150 different countries. Since they launched the hive in 2015, the number of beekeepers in the U.S. alone has increased by over 10%.
Their success is particularly notable since honeybee populations have been steadily dwindling as a result of habitat loss and pesticides.
That’s why now – in celebration of National Pollinator Week – the Andersons are donating their hive proceeds to international honeybee advocacy groups.
“We’re proud to have donated 100% of profits from the sale of our Flow Pollinator House to nine local grassroots pollinator projects in Australia and the United States that are at work protecting wild habitats all around the world,” said Cedar in a statement.
“Pollinators need large areas of habitat to flourish—the more we can do to protect and conserve native habitats, the more opportunities these tiny environmental champions will have to do their important work.”
If you want to learn more about how the hive works or order one for yourself, you can visit the Flow Hive website.
Revolutionary Australian Beehive Invention Raises Millions
By Jeremy Story Carter ABC
A revolutionary Australian-designed beehive invention could change the face of beekeeping the world over.
Stuart Anderson and his son Cedar's method of collecting honey does not disturb the hive, but allows the honey to flow out through a channel system straight out of a tap.
The New South Wales duo launched a crowdfunding campaign project today with the aim of raising $70,000.
At the time of writing, they had smashed that mark by more than 20 times, reaching a total of more than $1,400,000.
'I can't quite believe it myself,' chuckles Stuart.
The system is based around a plastic, moveable frame, which the bees use to build up their wax honeycomb on.
A lever is slotted into the hive and twisted to flex the honeycomb slightly.
'That changes the honeycomb from being a cell shape to a channel shape,' says Anderson.
'The cells sort of split, the honey falls down that channel to the bottom of the frame and out through a pipe to the back of the hive.'
Once the honey is drained out of the hive, the lever is twisted back and the cells are returned to their fully-formed position.
'You can see slight fissures occur in the capping of the honeycomb, but basically it stays intact,' he says.
'The bees don't seem to start scurrying, they just keep going about business as usual.'
After the honey has been drained, the bees begin to repair the cells and fill the hive with honey once again.
Anderson says the design appeals to those who find the process of beekeeping too difficult.
'Suddenly the world of bees is open to them again and they're really, really excited.
'If you know your bees, you can sit there in shorts and a t-shirt and it's safe, because you're not opening the hive and you're not banging around disturbing the bees.'
The father and son team sent the structure for testing to beekeepers around the world.
One of the design's benefits, which hadn't occurred to the Andersons until it was raised by a tester in the US, was the appeal of the hive to urban beekeepers.
'I hadn't thought about the neighbour aspect,' says Stuart.
'So many people are keeping bees in urban situations where if you go and pull the beehive apart and the bees get pissed off, well it's your neighbours who are also likely to get stung.'
HOW GOOD IS THAT?
NEW RELEASE! Flow Hive 2 - Best ever Beehive
YouTube Video HERE Cheers!
They have old 100s of these Honey Tap Beehives Australia and Worldwide collectively. Hey!?
I love the bees! Another post you may enjoy reading also is:
Kuitpo Forest In SA About To Thrive With Colonies Of Bees – Let The Bees Sing!