Honey

[gwizzie]

Hi everyone, some of you will know that I am new to beekeeping and this being my 1st year I have a lot of unanswered questions that I will need some kind of answers to If I can from time to time. Now the one that is bothering me at the moment is this, I have my bees at the heather or should I say were I keep my bees there is lots of heather!!.

question is this if I take the supers off at the end of this month and they are not capped can I still use it ? (not selling) I know it has to be below or about 17% water content the thing I would like to know is this what to do with it ? can I still press it out and jar it.

Thanks again in advance for your kind comments.

[Kate Atchley]

I'd recommend you clear the supers early in the morning, so the bees have had overnight to work on evaporating off moisture and no fresh nectar has been added that day. You may not want to leave it until the very end of September though as the bees may start moving honey down into the brood box for winter if they are light on stores.

If you shake a less-than-fully-capped frame vigorously, one side then the other side facing downwards, and no nectar flies out (do this outside away from the bees or over a sink!) you're probably okay to process the honey and bottle it. But borrow a refractometer or buy one. This will measure the water content which, for heather honey, can be higher than for other honeys but no higher than 20%. Enjoy!

[gwizzie]

I'd recommend you clear the supers early in the morning, so the bees have had overnight to work on evaporating off moisture and no fresh nectar has been added that day. You may not want to leave it until the very end of September though as the bees may start moving honey down into the brood box for winter if they are light on stores.

If you shake a less-than-fully-capped frame vigorously, one side then the other side facing downwards, and no nectar flies out (do this outside away from the bees or over a sink!) you're probably okay to process the honey and bottle it. But borrow a refractometer or buy one. This will measure the water content which, for heather honey, can be higher than for other honeys but no higher than 20%. Enjoy!

Hi Kate, once again thank you for your informative answer that makes sense and have read about shaking it to see if it runs out or not. I had not heard about removing the comb in the morning (nice tip) I plan to leave the supers on until about the 3rd week in september as weather forecast for up here is supposed to be ok, if they move some down stairs for their toast then thats ok with me as this is my 1st year and 1st attempt at getting honey.

I believe that some of my bees are Italian bees and they do not store honey in the brood box that well? so I will need to feed them and prob some of my others for a bit to build them up.

anyone know good place to get cheap refractometer link ? thank you

[Bridget]

I'd recommend you clear the supers early in the morning, so the bees have had overnight to work on evaporating off moisture and no fresh nectar has been added that day. You may not want to leave it until the very end of September though as the bees may start moving honey down into the brood box for winter if they are light on stores.!

So do you shake and/ or brush the bees off Kate rather than use a porter bee escape to allow them the leave the supers overnight?


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[Kate Atchley]

So do you shake and/ or brush the bees off Kate rather than use a porter bee escape to allow them the leave the supers overnight?

I add the porter bee escapes, or shake/brush the bees off, in the morning before foraging has begun. This allows the bees all night to fan the latest batch of nectar to drive off water. This usually leaves the honey at about the right water content to process.

If I'm using unwired foundation, and the outer areas of a frame of honey seem too liquid, I'll harvest the capped/concentrated honey and feed the rest back to the bees above the crown board.

[gwizzie]

I add the porter bee escapes, or shake/brush the bees off, in the morning before foraging has begun. This allows the bees all night to fan the latest batch of nectar to drive off water. This usually leaves the honey at about the right water content to process.

If I'm using unwired foundation, and the outer areas of a frame of honey seem too liquid, I'll harvest the capped/concentrated honey and feed the rest back to the bees above the crown board.

Hi Kate, it's all unwired comb that I am using as hives are at the heather, so I would just use the capped stuff and the rest feed back the the bees?

[Kate Atchley]

Do the testing explained above and feed back anything looking too runny, would be my advice.

[gwizzie]

Do the testing explained above and feed back anything looking too runny, would be my advice.

Thanks Kate, just checked them yesterday and one of the hives is now starting to cap the honey off and the smell of warm honey when I open the hives up well that I will never forget YUM YUM......

here is a video I did last week showing the differences i'm getting between the poly hives and the wooden ones.

[gwizzie]

Small update for those that watched the video above! the only hive that I think I will get a few teaspoons full of honey from is the swarm hive this year as the other ones have used most of their honey due to weather turning bad and the ling heather at its end now

O well there is always next year, I hope to be better prepared for the heather next year

[gwizzie]

Hi everyone sorry not been around much last few weeks but been away on holiday to Crete for 10 nights. Well got back Saturday morning after being up for 28hr with no sleep went to go back out to the car and the wife said were you going ? I replied to going to check on my bees, which I did and they looked all ok.
I checked on them today and put some sugar syrup on them but didn't take of the suppers as they did not look caped, but after conferring with a very knowledgeable member on here he advised me to take them of and the honey would be ok as they stop capping it when the flow of nectar stops, so tomorrow I will raid the suppers to see what I get?. One of the hives was very aggressive today when I had a wee look at its supper "humm not surprised" it's all there hard work i'm thinking of taking.