BeeHive Cozy Cover

Please choose the number of layers of wool from the drop down menu.

Scroll down to see the Zone chart for your climate. And add in the notes your type of hive: Top Bar, Langstroth, Cathedral or Warre'


Winterize your bee hive with the Beehive Cozy Cover, the perfect solution to winter colony survival. The Beehive Cozy Cover is constructed from durable, double weave, 100% watertight, breathable cotton canvas. There are four insulation pockets that securely hold 100% natural wool batts.

The Cozy Cover researched at Cornell University and written up in American Bee Journal! 
"Everyday we are learning how important it is for us to consider the inner workings of wild honey bees in the management of the bees in our apiaries.  We now know that the insulation provided by a living tree is essential to honey bees in many ways.  The Cozy Cover does a wonderful job of mimicking the insulation found in the cavity of a living bee tree and thereby helps buffer the bee's home against abrupt changes in temperature.  The Cozy Cover fits nicely over a Langstroth hive with 1 Deep, 1 Super and a hive dry box.  This setup provides the ideal environment in which to overwinter your bees in the northeast."
Robin W. Radcliffe, DVM, Diplomate American College of Zoological Medicine
Cornell University Master Beekeeper

 
You have put time, money, energy and love into your bees, now lets get them through the winter. It's so devastating to have a healthy, productive hive going into the fall, only to lose it all because of cold winter temperatures.

Corwin at BackYardHive is passionate about protecting the bees in the winter from sudden temperature drops and he has put a huge amount of energy into understanding the colony deaths occurring across the US during this season. After studying hives for multiple winter seasons, we designed the ideal insulating solution, the Beehive Cozy Cover ! It is the ultimate protection for overwintering your bees. The only thing you could do better is to keep your bees in a big tree.

* 100 % natural materials for the bees
* Watertight, Breathable, UV resistant Cotton Canvas
* Natural Wool from New Zealand is breathable and superior R values
* Wool inherently manages moisture and eliminates condensation
* Four insulation pockets that securely hold insulation
* Wrap around wind and draft flaps
* The front has a sewn in drip edge
* Bungees included for a secure fit to your hive
* Each Cozy has hand silk screened design by Corwin Bell
* Made in Colorado
* See wool layer R value options below
* Quick and Easy to install
* Insulates the Golden Mean, Cathedral Hive, Original BackYardHive, AND most popular top bar hive designs - If you have a side entrance or longer than 42" top bar hive email us for fitting details
* Insulates upper boxes of Langstroth Hives
* Insulates beethinking hive with hinged roof removed


Cozy Cover fits Langstroth, Warre, Cathedral and Top Bar Beehives!

The Cozy Cover does not need to envelope the entire hive to keep your bees warm over the winter. It has been designed to insulate the hive where the brood nest and the cluster of bees are overwintering. In a langstroth hive the bees will migrate to the top of the hive because warm air rises, so the cozy cover will be fitted to insulate this top section. In a long topbar hive, the bees should be situated towards the front of the hive, so the cozy cover will only need to be fitted to insulate this front section.

More details of our canvas fabric and why we use wool below

"My husband and I keep hives in Minnesota and it's COLD here, -55F isn't uncommon in the worst parts of winter with intense cold snaps and sharp drops in temperature. The cozy covers were easy to put on and our bees made it through the winter." M Lynn Herold, Minnesota

Why you should insulate your Bee Hive

Bees have lived in well-insulated natural cavities for thousands of years.

We have created an insulating solution that is as close as possible to what the bees experience in nature when living inside a hollow of a tree.

After seeing the massive losses over the last several winters all over the country we were determined to find a solution and give bees a chance to make it over the winter. In the process of trying to understand what was happening and with many days of research, talking to experts about insulation, breath-ability, humidity and condensation, we discovered some very important concepts about weatherization. After several prototypes, testing and then more prototypes, we now have in production a very effective winterizing solution to protect your bees, the “Beehive Cozy Cover”. In creating the Cozy Cover we sought to understand the bees in context to their original nest enclosure, the tree.

What is important is that you act on behalf of your bees now.

If you only read one thing this fall about overwintering your bees, this article should be it. Winterizing Beehives Research article.  We have put a huge amount of energy into understanding what happened to thousands of beehives across the US over the past several winters and we have come up with a solution.

What I'm saying is “act now”, understand the problem and use this solution so your bees make it. The whole backyard hive movement to help the bees is in jeopardy of utterly failing in just a few years if we realize too late what is happening and don't have a tested solution. Sorry to sound so alarmist, but the climate events sometimes termed a Polar Vortex or Flash Freezes are killing bee colonies and we can do something about it.

Why breathable canvas ?

Breathability is essential because it eliminates condensation. The quality weave allows the moisture to escape through the cover keeping the bees warm and dry. Some humidity in the hive is important, but having a hive wrapped in plastic or a non breathable cover causes to much moisture to collect in the hive.

These images shot with an inferred camera show the heat signatures of hives after a snow and a couple of very cold days.

The hive on the left is covered with a Cozy Cover. You can see the cold snow on the top and the smooth color of a breathable surface. It also shows the superior retention of warmth from the wool insulation.
The hive in the middle is wrapped in plastic and R19.
Here you can see it loosing a lot of heat around the bottom of the hive where the insulation is not secure and also the cold blue blotches where moisture has been trapped in the plastic and has condensed, causing cold spots.
Finally the hive on the right is just wrapped over the top with R30 insulation in a plastic bag. It demonstrates a lot of heat escaping around the hive, especially at the front of the hive.

Cozy Cover winter insulation langstroth bee hive

Think about this!

The economic justification is simple if you paid $120-150 for a package of bees, you want to insure they make it through the winter, so you don't have to buy another package next spring. Your investment will pay off each spring as you minimize your losses.

Using all natural wool is only about $30 more than using fiberglass insulation for the 3 layer option plus you give your bees an all natural protection !