Bees get stressed by many things, and stressed colonies often collapse or leave. For the last year we’ve been working on creating a single product that, with one change to your setup will reduce the most stressors. The result is the Beebuilt Premium Langstroth Roof.

First, let’s talk about the stressors:

Heat in the Summer: Bees spend a lot of energy in the summer keeping the colony cool. During the warmest hours of the day, they will coordinate fanning their wings to move air through the hive and provide ventilation. They will spend a lot of time and energy on this, reducing honey stores as well as stressing the bees.
Cold in the Winter: Over winter, bees will spend a lot of time and energy with uncoordinated fanning to heat up the colony and keep it healthy. This stresses the bees, causes them to eat much more of their honey stores, and results in a high percentage of colonies not making it through the winter.
Water and Wind: Ever notice where bees make their colonies in the wild? Always in place with plenty of protection from wind and water. The wind makes it hard for them to regulate temperature and the water [does what?] and they will spend time and energy damming up the holes that allow water in.
Invaders: Other insects like ants and [what?] can find their ways into hives. They can eat larvae, kill bees, and [what?].
Lack of food: At multiple times in the year, but especially in late summer and through Fall there are times when there just isn’t enough forage for bees in some regions.

The roof is waterproof, watertight, resistant to the harsh weather thanks to custom aluminum clad roofing material that we’ve developed.

There is also new and improved insulation and ventilation to keep your bees warm and dry in the winter and cooler with less effort in the summer.

The entire assembly is made with a fit, finish, and hardware that make it resistant to all common insects that would try to get in your hive and set up a colony.

Finally, there’s an optional integrated feeder to allow you to feed your bees in the lean months, but is designed to prevent any other insects from feeding.

Details:

First, we believe helping the bees keep the hive at that perfect 91* - 97* Fahrenheit (33*-36* Celcius) range means they can spend their energy collecting pollen and nectar instead of heating or cooling the hive. Because of that, we’ve stepped up our insulation game! We chose a natural hemp product manufactured in Idaho that achieves an R8 rating.

Next, we’ve paired this with our new and improved ventilation system! On each end we’ve added aluminum louvers to improve air flow to prevent mold and mildew, while not allowing any insects to invade the roof. Keeping the colony dry, mold, and pest-free free is essential for the bees to survive the winter. This reduces the possibility of disease and of absconding.

The wooden assembly is made from beautiful, sustainably-sourced, high quality, thick, western red cedar. This wood is naturally rot-resistant, hand-selected for beauty, and to be long lasting. We’re careful to use wood with knots in non-structural locations as this cuts wood use up to 70% compared with using “clear” cedar.

Accompanying this stunning wood comes the truly special part of this roof. The top. Our customer-designed aluminum-clad roof has anodized copper on one side and sparkly bright white on the other. It’s reversible (dark for Winter, light for Summer), watertight, and 100% rot-proof. Providing supreme protection against the elements, our composite won’t show age, corrode, crack or leak. Keep your bees dry, well-insulated, and safe from rain and snow, all while looking handsome under this roof.

We've made the aluminum composite easily-removable to allow servicing of the insulation and the compartment has been sized to accommodate a large feeder should you choose to feed your bees.

Finally, we’ve included a piece of durable canvas to use as a gasket between the roof and top box to prevent the bees from gluing the two parts together with propolis.

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