Beehive components Beekeepers often refer to the components of a beehive as woodenware. Not all hives are made of wood, but most still are. The basic design has not changed dramatically (excepting for dimensions) since Langstroth developed his beehive in the 1850s.
A hive consists of a bottom board, hive body, frames, foundation, inner cover, and outer cover (telescoping lid). The frames with foundation are placed in the body for the bees to store honey, pollen and for the queen to lay eggs. Supers with frames and foundation are added for the bees to store surplus honey and pollen. The honey from the supers may be extracted from the frames or left in the beeswax comb to harvest as Cut Comb.
Back Forty Bees Combo Kits - Bees and the Woodenware This combination starter set includes all the woodenware you need for your first year of beekeeping and the honey bees. You selecte weather to start with a package of honey bees or with a nuc colony. All honey bee packages and nucs purchased as part of our starter kit include the queen marked for free!
Our kit is made up of 8-frame, medium hive bodies, allowing you to interchange between brood hive bodies and supers seamlessly. In addition, these 8-frame hive body is lighter than the 10-frame or deep hive bodies, making it much more beekeeper friendly (a full box of honey weighs a lot)!
This starter set includes:
1 package or nuc of honey bees with a marked queen
Assembled:
Telescoping outer cover
Inner cover
Solid bottom board
3 medium boxes (supers/brood boxes)
24 plastic frames (including foundation)
Delivery of your hive and bees We strongly encourage new beekeepers to get their hives in place before the bees arrive if you are ordering the kit with a package of bees. For those who opt to start with a nuc combo, you will pick up your woodenware and bees together. We will contact you to arrange transfer of the starter hive to you. Please note, we do not ship the starter hives.
