The Different Types of Commercial Beehives for Sale

Whenever you are looking for commercial beehives for sale, it’s important to know that there are many different types that each serve a different purpose. Therefore, the beehive you choose will determine the kind of results you get. That’s why extensive research is necessary before jumping in and paying for one.

Why Is Choosing the Right Commercial Beehive Important?

To understand how important your beehive choice is all you have to do is imagine yourself house hunting. There are certain qualities that the house you choose must have otherwise you simply won’t be satisfied living in – it if you live in it at all.

It’s more or less the same thing when it comes to attracting a swarm of honey bees. These creatures tend to be quite picky when it comes to finding the right beehive for their colony. It’s important to note that honey bees don’t really need beekeepers as much as you may think. Left to their own devices, they are very good at finding suitable homes in hollowed out trees, abandoned structures and cracks in the walls.

The only reason bees ever really go for commercial beehives is because these structures are designed to provide them with “prime real estate.” When a colony chooses a hollowed out tree to make their nest, they have to work around the tree’s natural parameters which can be limiting to the expansion or growth of the colony.

When bees find the perfect commercial beehive, they find a structure that is designed to adequately shelter them and spacious enough to allow for the exponential growth of the colony.

The beehive you choose is therefore extremely important to how successful a beekeeper you will be. Provide the colony with the best possible home, and they may stay for years, providing you with an almost unlimited amount of honey and wax for your convenience.

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The Different Types of Commercial Beehives for Sale

These are the different types of commercial beehives for sale that you can choose. We have touched on their features, pros, and cons as well.

1. The Langstroth Hive

Named after its inventor, Reverend L.L. Langstroth, the Langstroth bee hive is perhaps the most common and simplest commercial beehive for sale. This beehive looks like a narrow chest of drawers and can remain functional for well over 100 years. The thing about the Langstroth bee hive is that it’s like a story apartment building that you can keep adding floors to as your tenants grow in number.

The tenants here happen to be the bees, and as the queen bee lays more eggs, the worker bees make more wax and honey to feed the growing population. You can simply add more boxes on top of one another to accommodate the growing colony and as a consequence, your growing commercial honey production.

Features and Pros of the Langstroth Bee Hive:

• It’s readily available and quite affordable
• It comes with interchangeable parts, which makes it easier to replace parts
• It’s easy to maintain
• It easy to assemble, but it also comes as a complete and assembled product
• Perfect for honey production
• You can keep adding more parts to make it bigger

Cons:

• It calls for heavy lifting: the bigger your colony grows the more boxes you will have to add. When it comes to inspection, you will have to lift all these boxes to get to the brood box. The same goes for when it comes to honey harvesting, where the honey can weigh close to 50 pounds.

This is one of the best and most convenient bee hives, especially for beginner beekeepers.

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2. The Warre Hive

The Warre Hive is designed to mimic a hollow tree. Much like the Langstroth hive, you can increase the size of this hive by adding boxes. In this case, however, the boxes are added at the bottom (below the brood boxes). One stand out feature about this kind of hive is that it has a “quilt box” which is used for ventilation as well as regulating the humidity and temperature.

Features and Pros of the Warre Hive:

• It requires very little maintenance
• It’s as natural as a bee hive can get since it’s designed to mimic a hollowed out tree
• It’s very affordable because it’s a simple structure
• You don’t need to add a queen excluder since the colony can build downwards, meaning the queen can lay her eggs downwards and leave the top boxes for the purpose of honey storage

Cons:

• Inspecting the hive can be cumbersome and, in some cases, may cause damage to the structure

If you are a “naturalist” beekeeper, then the Warre Hive is the perfect choice for you.

3. The Long/Horizontal Hive

The Long/Horizontal Hive is another version of the Langstroth beehive only this one doesn’t call for much heavy lifting. It very much has all the qualities of a Langstroth beehive but without the cumbersome maintenance issues.

Features and Pros of the Long/Horizontal Hive:

• There is no heavy lifting involved, which makes it perfect for beekeepers who are past their prime or have back issues
• You can interchangeably use frames from the Langstroth beehive on this version
• You can get modified versions that allow you to add additional honey supers
• There is a version called the Valkyrie hive that allows you to open up the top like a treasure chest. This means that you can easily inspect the bee hive without much hassle

Cons:

• It’s a bit more expensive than the Langstroth bee hive, but considering the convenience it brings, that price difference is well worth it.

This is a simple beehive that allows you to commercially keep bees at a leisurely pace without necessary exerting yourself. It’s perfect for older beekeepers.

Conclusion

When looking for the right commercial beehive for sale, you need to first think of the kind of beekeeper you want to be as well as the number of bees you want to attract. That should guide you towards choosing the right commercial beehive to buy. These options are all excellent but serve different purposes.