The Flow Hive is a hive form in which honey frames are designed to, at the turn of a crank, release their honey which then flows out a tap.

They were invented by a father-son team in Australia and have had relative success, prompted by the appeal of tapping honey directly from a hive.

While Cedar (the son) and Stuart (the father) Anderson have had success with their invention, it wasn’t the first to try for this outcome.

A 1940 American patent¹⁾U.S. Patent no. 2,223,561, https://patents.google.com/patent/US2223561A/en was issued for a hive technology that did almost exactly the same thing. The U.S. patent award went to Juan Bizcarro Garriga of Barcelona, Spain. Bizcarro Garriga’s design never saw commercial production, however.

The user would turn a lever to shift the movable parts vertically. This would opening the cells, capped with bees wax, and allowed honey to flow out. This is almost exactly how the Flow Hive works. The 1940 patent hive had aluminum cells. The Flow Hive uses plastic cells.

Beekeeping will forever chase easy, instant, and automated methods. It’s worth the case, but progress is often slow. Honey Flow, the makers of the Flow Hive, say that 130,000 customers worldwide are using their technology.