What Color Is Best for Bee Hives?

Most people have a mental picture of an apiary as a tidy row of white boxes out in a field. This has been the traditional set-up for a bee yard since the middle of the 19th century when wood boxes became the standard hive design. While it’s the traditional color, bee hives don’t have to be white. Learn more about painting bee hives and which colors are best, including inspiration to guide your own painted bee hive designs.

Benefits of painting a bee hive

There are many reasons to paint bee hives, from practical to aesthetic. Bee equipment, which is not inexpensive, lasts longer when coated with good-quality paint. The wood is protected against degradation by sunlight, and from alternately getting saturated and dried out, which can lead to warping. Plus, it’s more satisfying to have an attractive bee yard to work in, particularly if the hives are near your home.

Why are bee hives white?

White boxes keep the hives a little cooler in the summer sun but are also a holdover from 19th-century paint technology. Originally whitewash, and later, white paint (with lead!) were commonly used on farms, making them the logical choices for bee equipment.

What is the best color for a bee hive?

Today, paint comes in a range of vibrant colors, so there is no reason that hives must be painted plain white. Scientific advances in understanding bee vision and social behavior provide evidence that painting hives in varying colors — and even using different patterns — offers some advantages to the bees.

From a practical standpoint, painting all your hives the same color allows for the maximum interchangeability of your equipment. That’s why the all-white color scheme has stood the test of time, particularly with commercial operations. But, there’s no rule that says bee hives have to be painted white.

The science of bees’ vision

When it comes to colors, bees and humans are simply not on the same wavelengths.

The colors we see:

The colors bees see (UV color range bees can see that we can't):

You’ll note that on the red end of the spectrum, the bees can't see the colors — deep reds and pinks that we can perceive look to bees like variations on a black to gray scale. On the other hand, at the far end of the spectrum, bees are now known to be able to see colors with wavelengths in the ultraviolet range that are invisible to humans.

If you've ever played around with a blacklight flashlight, you've seen how some colors look different when exposed to different wavelengths of light. In a similar manner, bees’ vision, which can perceive a wider range of UV wavelengths than we can, allows other colors, even in the shared range that both humans and bees use, to be perceived in different ways. This helps them locate nectar and pollen resources more efficiently. Flowers that appear plain to us, may have vibrant UV colors that the bees can detect from a distance. And there are likely to be pattern markings on the flower itself which direct the bee to the location of nectar.

Color helps bees spot their hive

When returning to their hive, bees rely on both color and pattern to get themselves back to the correct colony in a bee yard. This helps ensure their foraging investment benefits their own colony, and it helps to prevent drift, which is implicated in the horizontal (hive-to-hive) spread of diseases in an apiary and the dispersion of varroa mites with the viral diseases they can bring along.

Drift is the movement of bees among colonies. Each colony has a unique pheromone “odor,” which is shared by every bee in that colony. Guard bees are on duty at the entrances to inspect incomers and challenge any from other colonies. Foragers laden with resources can often beg their way into strange colonies, and lordly drones can come and go as they please. But from a biological sense, it’s better for bees to go back to their own colony and not drift away to another.

Preventing drift by painting hives

One thing that beekeepers can do to help prevent drift is to provide visual cues so returning bees can easily locate their own colony. Different hive colors or blocks of color help bees hone in on the right hive. Patterns painted near the entrances also provide cues. For bees, a square and a circle of about the same size wouldn’t be noticeably different. But a solid square and an overall pattern of thin diagonal lines would look profoundly different to a bee. As you’re painting your boxes, consider painting each colony’s entrance with a distinctive pattern.

Ideas for painting bee hives

You can paint your boxes in any way that pleases you. And it’s not a permanent choice, either. A little sanding and a new top coat or two, and you can try another idea. Here are some of our favorite options:

Embrace the mix-and-match look and use a variety of different colors for your hive boxes. Because swapping boxes around among hives is a common practice, let the hives acquire random color combinations as boxes are moved among the colonies. The different colors make for a cheerful look and help the bees identify their home colony.

Mix and Match Hives.
Photo credit: Zoonar GmbH, Alamy Stock Photo

Paint all the hive boxes and equipment for each individual hive one color. Dedicating beekeeping equipment to a single colony helps prevent cross-contamination from diseases, but it requires more of a backstock of resources for each colony.

One-color hives basking in the sun on a winter day.

Give your hives a subtle, camouflage-style paint job that will allow them to blend in and avoid attracting notice from curious neighbors or visitors.

Camouflage pattern swarm traps
Photo credit: Mark Minzlaff, Copyright 2019 Used with permission

Decorate each hive by painting unique, multi-box designs that become the focal point of your garden. Beekeepers have produced custom-painted hive designs that are works of art — let their projects inspire your own.

Colorful hives at the New Brunswick Botanical Garden in Edmundston, NB, Canada.
www.jardinnbgarden.com and www.facebook.com/jardinNBgarden.
Photo Credit: Jardin Botanique du Nouveau-Brunswick, Used with permission.

Your hives are your palette, so feel free to express yourself, but remember that it’s best not to paint the boxes very dark colors — this will add to the heat stress inside the colony on hot summer days. Whether just for your own pleasure or to help the bees navigate, painting your hives offers a chance to combine practicality and whimsy. Get a quick primer on how to paint bee boxes, then explore more beekeeping tips in our Beekeeper’s Guide.