Advantages of the Jackson Horizontal Hive

Tim and Crispin Jackson developed the Jackson Horizontal Hive (J.H.H.) in 1994. We developed it for rural tropical apiculture with specific reference to Mozambique.

There are three separate forms of beehive that are used in tropical Africa. The first is the traditional log hive, the second the Top Bar hive (either of Kenyan or Tanzanian design) and thirdly, the western Langstroth hive. Each has advantages and disadvantages. We combined the advantages of the three hives and overcame many disadvantages. The advantages of two hives are often the disadvantage of the other form of hive.

Rural Africa is underdeveloped and generally educated. This means we required a simple hive. The traditional Log Hive and to a lesser degree the Top Bar hive are very simple to use, but are not the ideal home for bees. The Langstroth Hive has proved too complicated, and requires sustained training over a reasonable period of time.
Image 1. A traditional bark hive beeing constructed. This will later be placed securly in the fork of a tree high above the ground.
The major advantage that the Langstroth system has over any other, and indeed why it is the most widely used hive worldwide, is the use of a removable frame. A Top Bar has a movable bar but without support for the comb. The bars cannot be easily removed and cropped on a sustainable

Image2: A Jackson frame with a supported sheet of foundation. This shows how a "top bar" style of frame has been adapted so quick and easy inspection can occure.

yield basis, due to a lack of support for the comb. A log hive does not have any hive furniture. Thus we designed a simple, strong frame . We found that dowelling made the insertion into the top bar easy and gave a very strong frame. This movable frame allows cropping of honey in a sustainable yield on a commercial basis,
a major improvement on the Log hive and Top bar hive. The frame is identical to the Langstroth brood frame. To crop honey only one frame is removed at a time. In the Langstroth system, the normal practice is to remove the whole box containing 10 honey frames. This fact amongst others makes this hive ideal for beekeeping by women and disabled people due to the lighter single unit. This also aleviates much of the heavy work load in cropping large amounts of stored honey.

The biggest advantage on the Log hive is being able to secure it to a fork of a tree. This is possible due to the horizontal alignment of the hive. The Top Bar hive is also horizontally aligned but too heavy to attach to trees, as the body of the hive is often wooden or of a similarly heavy material. The Langstroth is both too heavy and not horizontally aligned. We thus found a suitable material that would have the same insulation properties as wood, and better, whilst remaining light and thus suspendable. The equivalent Langstroth made of wood weighs 28.1kg. A Jackson Horizontal Hive weighs just 6.5kg.

This lightweight allows the suspension of the J.H.H to the lateral branches of trees. If this is not possible a pole fastened to two nearby trees can be used. The main advantage of traditional log and bark hives is the suspension in trees out of reach from honey badgers, two legged vandals and other dangers.

The J.H.H. hive, with its handles, is easier to suspend, and easier to crop on a sustainable yield basis, and it can be suspended at an ergonomic height by the handles from any lateral branch. The J.H.H is suspended and thus not in direct contact with the tree. Grease placed on the suspension wires is a very effective barrier to insects.

Image3: This shows how the horizontal alignmant and light weight plastic allows the hive to be suspended from tress, or other structures and greatly adds to the versatilty of this hive.

Of importance is being able to suspend a hive too high off the ground for a standing person to reach. The beekeeper may need to carry a crate or ladder to work the hive, but vandals are greatly deterred by not being able to access the hive.