Processing heather honey

[Kate Atchley]

I've just spent nearly two days processing this year's harvest. The season is short up here and the harvest usually modest so I take the honey off only once, unless I change the supers to unwired frames for the heather. Some years the heather crop is so small this seems a considerable effort for little benefit. Besides, the mixed floral honey including heather is much sought after up here. Truly delicious!

Last year I was able to extract successfully having rolled the combs fairly vigorously with a metal honey loosener. Heather honey probably made up about 25% of the total.

This year the supers were light before the heather, which bloomed magnificently in glorious weather, and ling honey probably constitutes about 75% of the total. The combs were thoroughly rolled, the boxes were pre-warmed and the room hot, but still we had to leave lots of honey in the frames to feed back to the bees. (Reluctant as I am to crush them into the press.)

So I'm wondering about equipment. Has anyone experience of using:

• Thorne's Smith cutter/scraper to cut the comb off the foundation
• or the Honey loosener available from, for instance Abelo at £95 http://www.abelo.co.uk/shop/heather-loosener/

Do they work well and how slow are they to use?

[Jimbo]

I was on another forum that somebody was talking about selling the whole frame of honey. They were talking about £50 - £60 per national frame. There was also another interesting site that will do packaging for the frame http://www.honeyframepackaging.co.uk...?pageid=262386.
I was thinking of trying this next year with a couple of frames to see if there is a market for this method of selling your honey. It saves all the bother of extraction etc.

[Feckless Drone]

Kate - my bees brought in some heather honey this year and put it on wired foundation. The apiary is within reach of the Sidlaws and last year there was a bit I could not spin out which I left and the bees got it in the spring. This year has been better so I had to deal with it. I used a small but wide bladed knife and stripped down to foundation by dragging it over the comb, putting everything into a nylon mesh then pressing the honey out. It worked a treat and the press was easy to clean and tidy up, the frames survived and are ready to go again. I've also got lovely cappings to use and proper heather honey in jars - you know with that lovely dispersion of bubbles. So, I'm sold on the use of a press. I looked at the Smith cutter and thought it looked ideal for this job and plan to get one, but I have not talked to anyone who uses it. I did consult a well known honey producer in the Tayside area, Ian Lilley, and he said he finds the heather rollers messy and has his own rig to spin out the heather honey from the comb - it sounds like a really dangerous centrifuge he rigged up from an old washing machine. He just cuts the comb away, bags it and spins. Ian uses lots of wax as well so I guess this suits him.

[Kate Atchley]

Thanks FD
Yes, pressed honey almost twinkles with all the bubbles! I have a few jars of pressed this year but I think I'll try the Thorne's cutter next year if the ling delivers a good harvest. Or do I go back to unwired from mid-August? Meanwhile I have lots of cappings as several of us have done our extracting here using my kit. So I'll be dipping candles for Christmas!

Most of the cappings are almost white which is apparently true of Amm bees, though surely it must also depend on the nectar they're feeding on? Our local bees are 45-80% Amm.

Anyone tried the Swienty hand-held honey loosener? http://www.swienty.com/shop/vare.asp...&vareid=107380. Abelo sell it more cheaply.

[Apiarist]

I haven't used the cutter scraper from Thornes but made one myself years ago. Scraped heather honey is OK but it does end up containing a lot of wax and doesn't look particularly appealing! You can of course strain the honey / wax mix through a wide mesh strainer although it's messy. But probably no more messy than operating a honey press. I still use a press for heatherr honey now after over forty years of beekeeping. Yes it destroys the shallow combs but if you operate a system of wax salvage and making your own foundation, the gain in wax is I feel worth the loss of the combs. Bees always draw home-made foundation much better. If you make it thick enough, then in warm weather and a honey flow the bees will draw the foundation into wax without having to add any new wax at all. So everybody's happy, including the bees.

[greengumbo]

Hi Kate and others. I'm new to this heather honey production but a few of my hives went on holiday this year and have come back stuffed with the stuff. The smell alone is overpowering

A few questions of my own. I am planning to use a honey press on most of the frames but I want to keep a few for cut comb. I did not use thin foundation though (cant source it for langstroth)....is that a big issue ? Secondly if I do want to get cut comb do people recommend the thornes 8oz containers ? Any other suppliers that might be worth considering ?

[mbc]

Heather honey plays a small, but delicious and important, part of my crop, and in keeping with my cardy beekeeping practices of doing everything on the cheap, I use a hand held heather loosener as sold by Abelo and others. It works very well in that you get to harvest the majority of the honey while preserving the combs for future use, but the downsides make me wish I had a fairy godmother who would get me one of these http://www.swienty.com/shop/vare.asp...&vareid=107350 and one of these http://shop.safnatura.com/eng/extrac...available/308/

It takes ages to extract a stack of boxes and even with pre planning, trays, damp cloths, bowls of water, honey scrapers and special forks with widened tines for clearing muck from between the needles of the loosener periodically, I struggle to stay sane getting the honey into buckets while my whole life has turned sticky.

[Bumble]

I did not use thin foundation though (cant source it for langstroth)....is that a big issue ?

You can buy thin foundation for Langstroth from Peter Kemble at KBS, or you can use starter strips and let them build their own.

[Kate Atchley]

Hi Kate and others .... I want to keep a few for cut comb. I did not use thin foundation though (cant source it for langstroth)....is that a big issue ? Secondly if I do want to get cut comb do people recommend the thornes 8oz containers ? Any other suppliers that might be worth considering ?

Personally, I'm not keen on eating wax and especially not commercially-supplied foundation, even the thin sheets. So it may be an issue for those who receive your cut-comb. The Thorne's plastic containers with lids attached are better than the earlier versions.

As for "life turned sticky": try covering the floor of the area used for processing with a double layer of newspaper; ask everyone to work in bare feet; and lay more paper down the minute anyone notices they have sticky feet! Same applies to rinsing hands before moving away to do anything else. It works!

[Tim1606]

Kate,
I have processed 14 supers this year from the heather and have used the Smith cutter/scraper. Found it easy going to get down to the foundation and then pressed it all out. Much better than last year as i cut all the foundation and pressed the lot. I did find that taking the cappings off first was great as there was not so much wax to press and it makes good candles as well. The supers went back onto hives for cleaning and hopefully next year with that added smell of the heather the bees will draw it out again quicker.