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About
Top Bar Beekeeping Store
Bee Thinking is the world's first beekeeping supplier specializing in foundationless top bar hives and Warre hives. We are focused on providing our customers with the high-quality, sustainably built products at reasonable prices.
All of our horizontal top bar hives and Warre hives are constructed from kiln dried Western Red Cedar from the Pacific Northwest at our mill with precision tools in Portland, Oregon.
We use these horizontal top bar and Warre hives in our own apiary, and we love to pass on our own knowledge of top bar beekeeping to beekeepers new and old.
We take pride in the top bar hives that we build and we are absolutely dedicated to our customer's needs. If you need something special done with your order, or if you have questions about foundationless, top bar or Warre beekeeping, please let us know by phone, e-mail or in person at our shop in Portland!
Services
In addition to top bar and Warré hive products, we also provide a number of services to our community, including: Swarm removal, classes, public speaking and one-on-one training. If you are interested in any of our services, please use the contact us link on this page.
Our Philosophy
The chief end of beekeeping should be to provide the bees with the ideal environment in which to thrive. To do this, the beekeeper must engross his or her mind with a wide range of bee-related information detailing the bee lifecycle, history, hive design, management and innumerable other topics of importance. Without this knowledge, it is unlikely that the bees or the keeper will have success in their endeavors.
In addition to book knowledge, it is of utmost importance that beekeepers spend time watching their bees. Not dousing them with chemicals, moving them around, splitting them, marking them or otherwise incessantly pestering them, but simply watching them. One can learn a tremendous amount about the health and strength of the colony simply by watching the entrance.
We don’t use or endorse the use of chemicals in the hive whatsoever. We are focused on giving the bees a healthy environment, and promoting healthy genes. Colonies that succumb to Varroa or other pests and diseases are not increased the next season. Those that survive we split from and increase our stock.
If you have questions or comments about our philosophy, please feel free to contact us!
Who We Are
Bee Thinking was created 2008 by Matthew and Jill Reed as an internet resource for beekeepers throughout the world. At the same time we began mass-producing foundationless top bar and Warre hives for our own apiary. Soon we had a great deal of interest from those around us and abroad in getting involved in foundationless beekeeping, and we began selling the same hives we use to those in our community. After that we began selling them on our website to customers throughout North America. Today we sell thousands of hives to beekeepers throughout North America and many countries abroad.
When not reading about beekeeping, building hives or talking the ear off anyone who will listen, Matthew spends his days ensuring operations at Bee Thinking run smoothly. Jill left the wine industry in May 2011 and is currently pursuing her Master's Degree in Poetry.
