a few months ago I put a post on to Facebook I had a couple of stacks of
these tabs there are 20 liter plant pots now they made a plastic and in that post
I said I asked you guys what we were gonna do with them
and it was only one person got it right so in this episode I'm going to show you
exactly what we're gonna do with these plant pots and that's coming right up
after this so over the last few years I've been making swarm traps and I've
been making them out of play wood as you can see I've still got some brood boxes
you're the time in the middle of finishing up and I've got a stack over
there I'm in the middle of finishing up but there is one issue with the typical
five frame nuke made of the play box and that's very heavy especially when it's
got a few pounds of bees in it as well and as you've seen I last year I had him
up in trees up quite high and everything else so this year I was looking for
something that was much later it was going to be cheap to produce it could
potentially still catch swarms and was also very very cheap because it's a 5
frame new get stolen that's a few quid gone down the drain so
I've gone to these plant pots now this is a 20 litre plant pot and the reason
that I'm using a 20 leader plant pot is because it's been established that
swarms prefer a space of between 35 and 40 liters so two of these plant pots
together will actually make a 42 cavity there's a couple of things that we need
to do for this though plastic gets really hot now we're all know the
plastics of damage in our environment and everything else and before I was
baking about the wood and now I've got the plastic and yes I'm using plastic
again but I have a few things about plastic gazers I think he's addressing
okay a lot of the plastics in the oceans and
that are damaging marine life and and our wildlife and everything else they
tend to come from one-time use plastics okay that's an issue we need to deal
with that problem but plastic as itself is still a valuable resource something
that we can still utilize for the benefit of people very needs to be
limited in how we use them for something that's gonna be used time and time and
time again and then once you've finished using it what you want can be recycled
rather than disposed of then there is no issue using plastics as far as I can see
so that's what we've done okay as you can see this product here has a
recycling logo on it and this plastic can be fully 100% be recycled into new
products whether that be car dashboards or new bottles whatever the case being
okay but I plan on using these for the next few years the secret of course is
catching swarms and if I don't catch any swarms of them they can end up in the
recycling bin but I'm hoping that we will catch some swarms anyway let's get
on to it so I've done for quite some time now the issue with plastic when
it's in the Sun it's gonna get really really hot so we need to create some
sort of vents in these and the first job that we need to do is obviously tape up
all of the holes so as you can see here I'm just taping up the holes in the
bottom just using some duct tape and that can be pretty much anything I have
got some that they produced my first earlier ones with these and I used
expanding foam but I found that duct tape works just as well and shouldn't
have the piece especially if we put a piece
on the inside as well to cover it so that's not tacky on the inside but for
most part I leave these long enough that that tack sort of ways off anyway so
it's not an issue okay so the next thing we need to do is to create event in
these and to do that all we need to do is find our handle which is here and we
need to drill four holes in that happy in in the bucket for that and all you
need for that it's a little screwdriver we also need one of these a jig saw this
bit might get loud but now we need to join those four holes so just stick the
jigsaw in one of those holes and run it to the neck before the health and safety
people sort of jump in yes they should be wearing a protection but I prefer to
see what's going on here I take that chance but if you are doing this where I
detect some guys
so we have our hole here in the bucket as you can see okay we need to do the
same thing now on this one now as you can see when I taped I left that one
single hole here this is going to be the entrance for the beasts so we need to
make sure the vent is right below this hole okay that's the important venture
okay so we now have our tools next step we no need to make them screen for those
I just have some master cure and all we're gonna do is put a bead of mastic
around there but before we do we need to cut some math this is number eight
hardware cloth as Americans would call it to us it's just a very fine mesh or
wind scoot window screen mesh it's a lightweight aluminium and it's very good
for stuff like this nothing can get through it but it allows the air to come
through so all I'm gonna do now is literally just measure it over it cut a
piece that's big enough hasn't got to be too square but I will cream it up just
to make it a bit neater there we go just
lay a bead of silicone right around
there I don't know if you can see that be the silicone there guys it's a bit
dark in here let me see if I can angle it to the leg picks it up but there's a
little bit of silicone just around that hole there okay and we take this mesh
and we're just gonna arc it in the shape of the bucket now this next bit you're
gonna need a cloth for which I'm going to get over here just to wipe your hand
down if you wet your finger a little bit of saliva and I'll stop it sticking and
you literally just place the mesh over it and push it down smearing the
silicone through the mesh which will then hold it in place and wipe your
fingers off and then you just need to allow that to dry we need to do the same
thing and that's what it creates there look
so we now have a mesh ventilation hole which will help with this now when we
are setting these buckets we do not put them in direct sunlight they need to go
in the shade and typically we're gonna put them up a tree or within a tree so
that the Sun is never directly on them anyway and the bees prefer them so they
gain the same with this one put hater silicon
bend the mesh to suit lay him on and push him down
and there we have it with this one as well which is the other side okay so the
next thing we need to do is change out a little bit so nice turning on a little
bit we need to line up the handles of the two pots together so that they're in
line and the next thing we need to do now is drill holes for the lip of the
two pots and this is how we're going to attach them together so all we're doing
here three holes right around
if you get him up the flying guys just laying them back up and drill another
hole
the one thing about plastic is it's quite forgiving so there you have it our
pot and nearly done so we need to join these pots together now the first thing
we need to do before we worry about that is we are going to support this using
some old comb now this is an old frame out of a honey super it was actually
used out of one of the old swarm traps and what I'm gonna do I'm gonna take
some wire and here I've just got some thin wire we're just gonna straighten it
out and we're gonna double it over guys now what this will be is our fastening
way to the you know to fasten it to a tree so I've made I've left it quite
long we need to pocus roughly through the center of the frame and we need to
take it halfway and when we get it halfway we then need to just get it and
twist it a few times in a loop so it doesn't move from there just like that
guys okay all right we now put this in pot we can roll this
back up into a circle just to keep it out of our way for the moment put that
in the pot above there there's a couple of other things that need to go in this
pot and ask namely some old comb because this attracts bees okay so we're going
to just check that in the pot as well and I'll just drop all over the floor as
we're ready we will also bake these house with a cotton bed or q-tip
whatever you want to call them with some lemongrass oil on and we will push that
through this hole when we go to set the trap so remember now we need just at the
moment that's just hanging there with the way out over the top we no need to
entrap that wire by adding this one so essentially you'll have two pots with
a frame that's dangling right across the top of it and we're going to use these
which cable ties we line up the holes feed it through and we're going to pull
the cable tight and pull it tight but not too tight because we still need it
just take the knife like this for the moment because we still need a bit of
movement movement within the bucket itself just to make sure everything
lines up later so we've taken them all and
okay now we've got all six days in we just need to pull it tape like this and
cut these off
that goes is essentially a swarm trap now hanging right across the center of
Europe is a frame of comb which means the Queen can start laying straight away
and you can just take that comb out and set that into a hive there's one other
thing we need to do is there's an added precaution I'm going to take some
insulation tape and across the top joint and just down the top quarter so over
half of the over half of the box I'm actually gonna just seal off just to
help prevent any rain from getting in there nor they would probably go in it
anyway but it will make life much easier for the bees we're never gonna get this
perfect but all we're doing is just trying to prevent some rain getting in
there it will drip straight out the bottom if it does anyway
it's not gonna be a problem but what it will do is just keep up the majority now
if we catch anything in these traps it means that we're going to have to do
what's known as a cutout and I mean literally cut it open open it up like
that but most of them should be hanging hanging around the frame itself if it's
been a while since I've been there and they've been established they've built
some other frame you know whether sort of calm across the whole thing I will
get a knife and slice down quite a long knife and slice down the joint once I've
cut the straps and that will allow me to separate them we can then remove the
bees into a new home what this does though guys like I said now this can be
hanging from a tree as you can see eyeball there were two fingers it's very
light so I could even climb a tree if I needed to we have an entrance hole here
right there look so and we will bait that with a cotton
but with some lemongrass oil or a q-tip with lemongrass oil we've got some vents
in the bottom which will help them to be able to control temperatures we've got a
hanging system from the top and there's a frame right across that bottom there
so it is really really in my opinion a really good system whether it works is
another thing and that's what we're going to try I already have ten of these
out and I've put them in locations where I've known there are bees also they're
in a location where they're out to the Sun directly but they're looking onto
open areas and bees don't like obstacles in their way in a flight path if it can
open the other thing you need to look at these things like landmarks so if the
you know a tree in the middle of a feat is ideal because they they can find out
easily or if you got him around the the edge of a field in a hedge or something
like that then find something like a landmark like a telegraph pole or
something like that that will help them be able to find where they're going and
it's just a case now we'll get it out there and we've got nine more of these
to make and I mean we'll have 20 of these out this year and hopefully we'll
catch a few more swarms and the reason I like catching swarms is because buying
colonies is really really expensive they usually colonies that aren't doing
so well where someone is made up a colony and it has me performing from and
they sell it on so there are unscrupulous dealers up there but by
getting swarms you get a lot of different genetics so it helps your
genetic pool for your colonies as well so guys that's what I need to do now I
need to go in hang this one like the rest nice and easy
I hope this was of interest on how to build a swarm trap using plant pots
I know it's been a while since we spoke about this in the Facebook groups but
it's you know and hopefully you'll enjoy it anyway guys that's it for myself that
this episode if you haven't already don't forget to click the subscribe
button question of the day if you keep bees how do you make your soil traps put
are the answers in the comments below and I will be seeing you in the next