what to do with frames of crystallized honey in spring
Ross Conrad
Past: Ross Conrad
West hen is the best fourth dimension to harvest honey from the hive? . . . It's a question that crosses the mind of almost every beekeeper eventually. Equally with many beekeeping questions, the answer is "it depends."
The honey bee is one of the but creatures on earth, other than humans, that will take more than they demand from the surroundings around them. This is due to their powerful hoarding instinct. As long as there is room in the hive to shop nectar and ripen it into dearest, and in that location are nectar sources attainable due to favorable weather, a hive of bees will keep collecting nectar and storing it in the hive as honey fifty-fifty though they may already accept far more dearest stored than is necessary in lodge to survive a long common cold Winter.
The Spikenard Top Bar Hive is billed equally the first
commercial superlative bar hive to include a Varroa screen and arrange 10-frame standard supers. A portion of the proceeds from all sales go to supportingGunther Hauk's honey bee sanctuary at Spikenard Farm in Virginia.
Beekeepers have advantage of this hoarding instinct past increasing the capacity of the hive to concur honey whenever the combs in the hive are shut to beingness fully utilized by adding another honey super to our Langstroth hives or additional frames to the top bar hives. Some beekeepers take even designed top bar hives so that standard Langstroth style honey supers with frames can exist added on top later on all the top confined accept been filled below (encounter photo).
There are numerous factors that go into the decision when to harvest honey from hives. To begin with, one must exist patient. The bees must be given adequate time to collect nectar and process information technology into love by reducing the wet content of the nectar below about 18%. Rush the process and harvest before it is fully ripened by the bees and you may end upwardly with fermented beloved. Not the stop of the globe since it is yet edible and makes peachy mead, merely if loftier quality honey that stores well or is for auction is your goal, low moisture is what you want. A skillful rule of pollex is to not excerpt unless at least 75% of the cells in the honey combs are capped. By extracting one uncapped dearest frame for every three capped frames of honey, the overall wet content will tend to exist beneath the level where fermentation will occur.
The other farthermost is to look until all the blossoming plants have finished blooming in club to maximize the dearest ingather by harvesting every bit late in the flavour equally possible. Unfortunately, in the Northeast the final of the major nectar flows ends in late September when temperatures typically are getting quite dank at night. The cold temperatures make honey in the combs thick and much more difficult to extract. Robbing force per unit area is also very potent at this time of year. With no other sources of nectar to forage on and Winter correct around the corner, honey supers must be kept covered and protected from marauding bees every bit they are being taken off hives. The extra effort involved in defending your crop from robbing bees greatly reduces the joy of the love harvest.
Another reason why it is non usually preferable to put off the honey harvest until late in the flavour is because some of the treatments used for pests and diseases are temperature sensitive. Wait as well long and average daytime temperatures may not be favorable for effective treatments.
Since well-nigh pest and disease treatments should not exist used when honey supers to be harvested are on the hive due to contamination concerns, all harvesting may need to exist completed earlier whatever treatments tin can begin. Given the importance of "taking care of the bees that volition heighten the bees that will live through the wintertime" (to paraphrase Bee Culture editor Kim Flottum) treatments for Varroa and disease must take identify early enough to ensure healthy Winter bees. Every bit a outcome, the temperature requirements of treatments may serve to dictate when the honey harvest should happen.
When a colony has stored far more beloved than they can reasonably exist expected to consume during a long Winter, I believe information technology is all-time to harvest the backlog rather than leave information technology on the hive for the Winter. While some well-significant beekeepers will wait to harvest their honey in Spring rather than Autumn in an effort to exist sure the bees have enough honey for Wintertime, in that location are a number of reasons why I don't believe this is a good thought.
Harvest dearest too late in the flavour and the dear in the comb may become crystalized, making it difficult to remove from the comb.
Winter dear that does not get used and is still in the hive come spring will often become crystallized (at least in the Northeast). Thus, each Spring the bees can be seen uncapping honey that was unused during the Wintertime and sucking up what picayune liquid remains of the honey, while the numerous saccharide crystals will be establish on the bottom board or on the basis every bit they are removed from the hive equally droppings by the bees. In improver, crystalized beloved is hard to extract. This makes life for the apiculturist much more hard both due to the longer time it takes to extract crystalized honey and the extra wear and tear on the extracting equipment. Information technology too increases the potential for comb blowouts during the extracting process and additional energy volition be required to run the extractor since the crystalized honey will require it to run for a longer period of time.
The combs property the dear left over in spring may also go moldy depending on weather atmospheric condition and the forcefulness of the colony, and this may impact the quality of the honey harvested. In improver, leaving more space on the hive than necessary (in the grade of extra dearest supers that the bees don't need), which must be maintained and patrolled by the colony is commonly a bad idea during these days of weak hives, small hive beetles, wax moths, etc.
The Bee Escape Board which acts as a one-way door to remove bees from supers, works all-time when the honey harvest is timed to occur when days are warm and nights are on the cool side. Cool nights provide bees with an extra incentive to go out the honey supers when they pass through the Bee Escape on their manner to help warm the breed nest.
Perhaps the near important reason why I don't similar the idea of waiting to harvest honey from hives until Spring is because the bees may demand whatsoever beloved that is plant left over in the hive in Bound to become themselves prepare for the upcoming Winter. Life for the beloved bee in the Northeast is primarily well-nigh reproducing and surviving Winter. Although colonies of bees may historically build up and shop plenty honey for Wintertime in your location, what if this is the year that a drought or some other weather abnormality prevents the bees from storing enough dear to survive the coming Winter? Any love left over from the previous Wintertime and found in the hive in
Spring may just exist what is needed to ensure the colony will be well provisioned for next Winter. At minimum, it can help reduce the amount of feeding that may be required by the beekeeper during Winter preparations. Since I can't predict the weather and know with any certainty what the flavour will be like, I prefer to only harvest all excess honey in late Summertime hither in Vermont. This is because this is the only fourth dimension of year when I can exist pretty sure only how much dearest the colony is likely to accept going into Winter and I am able to determine if the corporeality of honey in the hive is going to exist enough for the colony to survive the cold season dearth.
There are a few exceptions to the general rule of a unmarried late summer harvest that must be acknowledged. For example, a beekeeper that wants to offer honey varietals in order to serve novelty markets or to compete with other beekeepers by specializing their product line will take to take the chance that the love varietals that are harvested in Spring or early on Summertime volition not be needed in order for the colony to get through Wintertime. Certain, such a situation may exist remedied by feeding sugar syrup to the bees later in the season, but given the mounting testify that indicates that bees are much healthier when raised and maintained on natural honey and pollen rather than substitutes, the wisdom of harvesting early and potentially leaving the hive brusk on naturally derived food stores becomes questionable.
Another potential reason a beekeeper may determine to harvest dear before tardily Summer or early on Autumn in the Northeast is due to poor planning (or limited finances) that results in the beekeeper not having enough equipment to super hives in a timely manner and take advantage of the area's major nectar flows. Full supers of honey can be harvested, quickly extracted and put dorsum on hives to fill up again, making up for the lack of extra honey supers. Such a scenario is a lot more work than simply harvesting all at once at the stop of the flavor, simply on some occasions this may be the best that one tin can do.
Whenever i chooses to harvest their honey, it is disquisitional these days that the harvest is timed so that extracting can be done within two-to-iii days of removing the bees from the frames of beloved and taking the beloved from the hive. The sooner extracting and processing takes identify later harvesting the improve in guild to prevent wax moths, or small hive beetles from getting established on the unprotected combs and ruining all the hard work washed by both bee and beekeeper.
The love harvest is often i of the about enjoyable and rewarding parts of keeping bees. In a sense it is the culmination of all the difficult work that has come earlier. When timed correctly, information technology tin go fairly smoothly and efficiently while at the same fourth dimension helping to set the colony up for a successful Winter and high productivity in the post-obit season. May your harvest be fruitful and timely this year.
Ross Conrad is the writer of Natural Beekeeping 2nd Edition published 2013 past Chelsea Green Publishers.
Source: https://www.beeculture.com/timing-honey-harvet/
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