Bucket Feed Question

[Caashenb]

I have enough colonies now that doorman feeders are becoming a pain to deal with. I made some one gallon bucket feeders and used one on a nuc a few weeks ago. The nuc I placed it on had a migratory cover and all seemed to be going well till one night we had a nine inch rain. When I made it by to check on it all bees were soaking wet and dead.

This is the first time I had used either the migratory cover or bucket feeder, it seems that water just poured in under the bucket thru the hole in the lid, I would not think this is normal but do not see a reason for it. the bucket was full so plenty of weight to keep it tight to cover. Am I missing something in placing bucket on box?

[Ben Framed]

Is your hive level? What size Nuc?

[Caashenb]

Hive was level and it is a 5 frame NUC.

[Ben Framed]

Caashenb,

Sorry you lost your hive. Tim Durham uses gallon jars with a regular size, mason jar opening for top feeding.

He told he got them from the Coca Cola Bottling Company many years ago. Back in the day these large jars were used for concentrated flavoring. Coke gave them to Tim for free.

With the right size hole for the jar top to fit into, the leakage should a minimum, if any. At least Tim never expressed experiencing problems with rain water drenching his hives. Nor have I had that experience using simple quart jars in the same method. (Which should be the equivalency in rain water leakage opportunity)

I use to call on Coka Cola and still had contacts there. I was saddened to find they no longer use the one gallon glass jars for this purpose. Bummer! 

No one gallon jars for me....

Someone here at Beemaster mentioned deli's use the same type jars for pickles. (sorry I wish I could remember who gave this good report),  Anyone here know more about this ???

Thanks,

Phillip

[Kathyp]

two things.  1. they are not dead until warm and dead/dry and dead.  2. bucket feeders are great, but you need to put an empty body and lid over them to protect from just what happened to you.

If your nuc is that strong, probably time to move it into whatever you are going to use for your hive body.  If you don't, you'll find them swarming with spring flow. 

I like the gallon jars with small holes in the lid too.  They hold up for years. The plastic buckets can degrade if left in the weather.  I have some jar feeders that I have had for probably 15 years.  Lids are a little rusty, but the bees don't care.