First Workday

On one of only a few cold days this winter, we started work on building our hives.
8 boys, 3 assistant Scoutmasters,  two parents and two Bee Keeping Mentors from the local club got together at the barn and split up into teams of two boys each. Some of the adults stayed real close to the heater in the corner of the barn.......LOL.

We did a quick revision of equipment, and gave each boy a handout. Not all took the handouts home, but all the info is on the Blog tab, and once the proof reading is complete, we will publish the full Beekeeping book and give one to each boy and adult taking part.

Each team had adults supervising , but the boys did the almost all the work. Two boys starting assembling Medium frames using a 10 frame assembly jig, two worked on Medium Super boxes glueing all the finger joints and putting the box into the squaring jig, two more then nailed the boxes together, and when we had a bunch of boxes ready , the last two sanded them ready for painting.

One thing I had not thought of,  was that my workbenches have been designed for my height, so we had the boys working at too high a level and moved some of the work onto the wooden floors, both inside and outside the barn.

Another oversight was 11-13 year old boys with paint brushes....... yep paint everywhere......

Joe helping Conner and Jack sand a box

Wesley, Dylan and James

But we assembled, sanded and painted all 6 hive components -3x 8Frame Medium Supers, 2x 10 Frame Medium Supers and one 10 frame Deep, we also did one Bottom board, and I started cleaning, sanding and  repairing a second hand Super and an Inner Cover.

A Great first workday and all who participated gave good feedback and I believe a great success.

Next time we will continue with Frames and also wire the frames and insert Wax Foundation into them. I will setup a better workbench for the boys next time too.

email me if any questions...... or ideas...

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