The simplest way to fill is by gravity from a tank (pickup bed etc.)with a garden hose and shutoff. An upgrade is a trash pump which will not blow lines when not in use.The one I use, Bell Hill Honey uses and Sleeping Bear farms I ordered over the net several years ago for around $200 which included shipping. The ladder feeders are a pain and few (if any) commercial beeks use those as hard to fill with a gas type end. If they use inside feeders most use a folded wire for the bees to climb on. You can use a tank, tote or 55 gallon drum with a lower bung or welded in fitting in the back of a pickup and 1 or 2 gallon plant water cans. This is the way Kona Queen puts syrup in its feeders. Really a primitive method in my opinion but no worries about breaking down ( I did have to replace the spark plug on my pump after three years!) I could go on and on as I have seen many labor saving ways invented by beekeepers to save the back breaking work of feeding lots of hives. If you plan on building up to a large number of hives I would go ahead and make a tank & trash pump combination. Many of us use a 275 gallon tote with a 2 inch suction line to a trash pump and a 1 inch ag hose to the fill fitting. or You can pay a thousand bucks for a factory made pump for syrup. bob *********************************************** The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html Guidelines for posting to BEE-L can be found at: http://honeybeeworld.com/bee-l/guidelines.htm