Croesus' Gold

There's so much of it and it's all mine, mine, mine! .... Well no. It's ours... all ours.

I felt like Croesus with his gold and I wanted to keep it all. Our precious bees had worked so hard to make all the honey that I didn't want to part with it.

Then Dad reminds me once more that we have so much honey we should be selling it. "We need labels," he said. He has not given up on his label making campaign.

Actually our jars do have labels. That is if a piece of masking tape with the year and a couple initials written on it counts. I think it should.

Our honey has three flavours. The first batch has a distinctive taste of a vegetable nature but it's quite nice and the vegetable part is very subtle.

The second batch has primarily a clover flavour with a floral trace and the third, my favourite which we extracted today, is pure summer flowers. It's pretty wonderful.

This is really our first time at this since last year was literally a wash out with all the rain we had.

As well, the hives had started from nucs so they didn't produce much honey.

I've learned that honey has it's strongest flavour and smell when it comes fresh from the combs right after the caps are cut off. Later, it's still great but there's something special about eating honey from still-warm combs. The vegetable honey I mentioned before was quite strong that first day we extracted it. I wasn't so sure about that honey. But two days later it had mellowed considerably.

We did an extraction yesterday and again today on hives #1 and #2. The bees have been great both days. Yesterday a pop-up storm came in and we had claps of thunder and dark clouds which showed up just after we took the hive apart. Figures.

I tried not to rush and keep being gentle with the bees. The storm just passed us to the east and we had another hour of clear weather. Then a second storm came in with wind, etc., just as we were finishing. During all this the bees remained calm and gentle with no stings. They're so amazing. I thought they'd start to panic with a storm approaching and the hive opened up but they didn't. They were more calm than I was.

103 lbs our first extract a couple weeks ago, 60 lbs on our second (yesterday) and 65 lbs on our third--this is 2 hives and we've still left 1 full super on each hive which we'll extract in the fall once I'm certain the bees have enough for themselves for winter.

I'm pretty certain Hive #2 swarmed because of low numbers. They still had lots of honey filled frames but it wasn't all capped. We left half of it for them to finish capping. Our honey is very thick and dry this year (moisture at 16%) so a little uncapped honey added shouldn't be a problem.

We stacked our jars on the counter. Dad said, "We can't eat all this. We need to sell some."

I looked over the rows and rows of jars, thinking about the giant pails we'd filled that day that still needed bottling. "This is more than we can eat," I said.
"Yes," said Dad.

I think I'm going to have to get to work on that label.

Oh, it's been hot!

It's been quite the heat wave over all of North America.

The Weather Network channel shows a map of our country all lit up in red and yellow... the hot colours.

And for good reason. Our temperatures have remained in the mid 30's.

This wouldn't bee so bad except for the humidex which made the temperature feel more like 40 degrees Celsius.

And the bees, were hot too. They were bearding all over the outside of the hive trying to stay cool.

They were even hanging in a cluster that looked like a swarm cluster, but it wasn't.

I worried about how the bees pile up on each other when outside the hive. To me it looked the the beginning of a swarm cluster.

If they were hot why would they pile up onto each other like that? An experienced beekeeper pointed that it's not the bees that are hot, it's the inside of the hive. That's why they came out.

Here's some video of bees ventilating the hive when I took the cover off.

You can actually see the oscillation of their wings in different directions.

I've Created a Monster

It always starts small and innocent doesn't it?

Dad would help out here and there, picking up heavy supers and holding frames as I pulled them from the hives. Then he started working on the second hive. Eventually he announced that he too was a beekeeper and my partner for our honey business.

Next thing I knew the second hive became "his" hive.

But that was just the tip of the iceberg...

"What are we going to call the company", he asked. "We need a company name for when we sell the honey."

"I've already registered the hives under my business name," I said, "before you came on board."

"We need a label then for our jars too."

"I know and I will make one."

"We need a label now."

"I will make one but in the fall when I have more time. For now if we have extra honey we'll sell only to family and friends."

That seemed to placate him.

Then we extracted honey from my hive. Dad declared that he was going to keep all the honey from "his" hive.

"You're not going to share it with me?" I asked.

Long pause.

"You have your own hive," he said.

But when we finished extracting 30 lbs of honey from my hive Dad looked at that pail filled with the fragrant amber liquid and asked, "Could I have some?"

"But you said you were keeping all your honey for yourself. That means this is my honey."

He'd caught himself on that one. Decision time. "His" or "Ours". He opted to call all the honey ours and he got his jar filled to take home.

Then I informed Dad that the honey from both hives would be blended once we started extracting the supers from his hive.

"Would that be okay?" I asked.

Long pause.

"I guess so."

We ended up with 103 lbs of honey from the two hives (3 1/2 medium supers) and we were tired.

The honey is delicious. I'm glad the bees didn't mind sharing. We didn't get a single sting or act of aggression while we took the supers.

"We have lots of honey to sell," Dad said.

I sat there feeling like Croesus with all his precious gold. I was appreciating all the hard work the bees had done. I didn't want to part with the honey. Not just yet. "I don't think there's enough to sell. We can eat all this honey."

"Oh no, this is more than we can eat. We just need a label for our jars."

Yes, I've created a monster.

Extraction Action

I'm so proud of our bees.

They've been working their butts off. Dad and I pulled off about 3 1/2 honey supers of capped honey, leaving both hives with one super each which we'll wait until fall to extract.

Back home in our newly put together honey room (aka corner area in the basement) we set about cutting the caps off the combs.

We'd started without a cappings tank but I can tell you it's so much easier to work with one. The cappings tank (this one made by Mann Lake) is a double plastic tank with a grill bottom where the honey can drip through to the bottom. Later we'll open the spigot at the bottom to empty the tank. There's a wooden bar across the top that the frame sits on while cutting off the cappings.

While working I remembered my friend Henry mentioning to go slowly and so as to let the electric knife melt the caps. Also it warms up the honey so that it'll flow out easier.

Then into the honey extractor they went for a spin.

The first super of honey had a strong vegetable smell. To me it smelled like tomatoes or sweet chilli peppers. Right after uncapping the smell was strong and it did have a taste of sweet chilli peppers, but without the hot spice. Two days later the smell and flavour had mellowed quite a bit. There's still a little distinct taste that I wonder what the source was...maybe apple blossum nectar considering they had over 500 apple trees to forage from.

The next supers tasted like clover honey with a lovely amber colour. And... there's 73 lbs of it!

First Swarm Collection

Sometimes the paparazzi can't find you so there's no photos. That's what happened in this event. Well, sort of.

I got home from work and was supposed to have a couple hours free before leaving for a meeting. Then the phone rang and I answered. There was a small swarm a couple streets over in a neighbour's backyard bush. The neighbour explained that they'd even built a little honeycomb. This was a good sign that they really were bees and not wasps or hornets. Would I be interested in collecting it?

Sure I thought, why not since I happen to have an empty hive. I called Dad. My first words were "Get your camera", my second were "Meet me at..."

So there was a camera on hand the whole time we collected the swarm.


The swarm collection went like the textbooks describe: Simple and straightforward.


I was amazed to see three small pancake size combs attached to a thick bush. We'd had rain the night before with more storms predicted so it wasn't the wisest place for bees to make a nest. There was capped brood so this indicated that they must have a queen and also that they'd probably been there for at least 15 days--3 days as an egg, 8 days as a larva, and approximately 3 days to build the comb.


Luckily the bush wasn't too tall and a small stepladder was sufficient to reach them. But it is hard to crawl into a bush and maneuver around without dropping combs. Dad held a frame under me like a plate as I worked to catch he bees and comb.


We cut the branches and comb and laid them in the hive and then put the lid on. Many bees began to collect on the outside of the box and move inside.


It was fascinating to watch the air filled with bees flying into the bush. Then in confusion for a half hour or so flying in the air trying to find their home. You could literally watch the bees flying lower and lower in circles while they located their home.


By 6:00 p.m. they were mostly clustered outside the box. By 9:00 p.m. they were all inside. We taped the entrance closed, loaded the box in the truck and I drove 2 streets to my home.


I wondered if the bees would orient back to their old location so I deliberately tried to cause a "forced re-orientation". This is shown very nicely in Mistress Beek's Blog - The Lazy Way to Move a Hive.


You need to totally change the exit so that in the morning as the bees go to leave the hive they will notice things are different. Then they'll do reorientation flights in front of the hive before they leave to forage. That way when they return they'll come back to their new location and not the old.


Small swarms are predicted to be a waste of time. Time will tell, or so I thought. The bees were there in the morning when I gave them a hive feeder. They were still there after 9:00 a.m., when dad dropped by the check on them.

But when I got home at 5:00 p.m. they'd left. Maybe they saved me the effort of trying to nurse a tiny swarm through winter. The experience though was something I wouldn't miss for anything.

And sorry about no photos. Let's blame dad. He brought the camera and didn't use it.

Update:

This is a list of beekeepers in southwestern Ontario who will collect swarms.

If you have bees in an attic, garage, etc., or have a swarm you can find beekeepers who will collect them by checking with the bee clubs/associations for that province or state. I have a few of them listed on my web site Associations page.

Sometimes people will sign up to the beekeeping Yahoo group and post a message for help as well. They're also listed on the Associations web page.

Honey Extractors - Which one to get?

There are a couple kinds of extractors available to the beekeeper that I'm aware of made by two excellent companies: Maxant and Dadant.

These brands are reputed to be well made, sturdy and dependable.

There is a plastic two frame extractor that's available but I heard that it doesn't work well (not sure who makes it but I believe Dadant sells it). The advice from beekeepers is to not waste money getting that one. Two beginner beekeepers I know who purchased the plastic one were selling it the next year and buying a stainless steel one instead.

Things to consider with your purchase of an extractor is the size of your operation. This is hard for the hobbyist to guesstimate. Will I stay small with one or two hives or grow more? And if so, by how many?

It appears the 6 frame extractor fits in the middle price-wise and work-wise and is the most popular with beginners and hobbyists. There's a considerable price jump between a 6 frame extractor and a 10 frame.

[This is our shiny new Maxant 9 frame Extractor.]

Good luck if you're trying to get a 6 frame extractor second hand. If they become available they sell so fast you don't usually hear about it. I think they sell from one beekeeper friend to another without a classified ad most of the time. The good news is that extractors' resell value remains very high and they maintain their value over time. If you ever quit beekeeping you'd have no trouble selling it.

They are usually labelled like this: 6/9 and 10/20. The two numbers represent the number of frames it can do, depending on the size of the frame. The Maxant 6/9 extractor holds 6 shallow frames in the radial position plus 3 shallow in a tangential position, equalling nine. Or it can hold 3 deep frames (but don't put deeps and shallows in at the same time).

The honey is spun out of the combs in two ways: Tangentially or Radially. If the extractor is a tangential one, the price might be a little lower - and every frame will need to be removed and flipped--essentially spun twice, once per side, to remove the honey from both sides. (Bear this in mind if buying a hand crank tangential extractor - that's a lot of cranking).

The Radial extraction flings the honey out of both sides of the frame at the same time so frames only need to be loaded once. This is the most popular type of extractor.

Other considerations are whether to have power or crank by hand? How are your joints and hands? Can you take hand cranking for long periods of time? I opted for power for mine since I'm prone to carpel tunnel, and shoulder issues.

A motor that also has speed control allows you to start the frames spinning slowly at first so as not to damage the combs when they are very heavy with honey and then speed up their rotation as they begin to empty. Also it allows you to slow down the rotation prior to stopping.

Extractors should be made of stainless steel and not galvanized metal. The old galvanized versions were made with lead seals and are now discontinued and not recommended for use.

What tips or suggestions do you have about extractors?

First Honey Harvest of 2010

It was harvest day today.

I think I woke up around 5:00 a.m., and my first thoughts were that today we'd be taking the honey, essentially robbing our bees.

But we'd do it very nicely if I had anything to say about it.

I was far more concerned about the queen excluder that I was convinced to put in last week. You see, I needed to go through all my frames above the excluder looking for larvae to determine if the queen was above or below. This was stressing me all week. At least until I decided to remove it. If the queen had laid eggs in with the honey, I'd leave those frames until they'd hatched. She hadn't though, except a few drone cells underneath the frame - you know that space between the bottom of one frame and the top of the next where the bees love to put drone comb. Those can be easily scraped off.

Last year I noticed when brushing bees from the frames that I injured a few bees' feet. I believe I brushed too hard. So this year I focused on flicking the brush up under the bees, brushing from the bottom up, but doing it very lightly. The results were much better.

We didn't put in a bee escape first because of the queen excluder being in place so we did this with frames full of bees. Lots of glowing black eyes greeted Dad and I as we opened the hive.

The plan was to start and see how we did, knowing we had lots of bees and hadn't used the escape board. If it didn't go well, we'd put the escape in and try again in 2 days. But it went amazingly well. The bees were incredibly gentle. Not a single threatening bump or sting attempts. They are gentle bees indeed. I'm very proud of them. (I must say this queen breeder, Bill Ferguson from Ferguson Apiaries raises incredible queens. He's been participating with our provincial bee association to develop hygienic gentle queens with a tendency not to swarm. They're Buckfast queens and I really like them).

Three supers were full of honey. We took one which was fully capped, left one that they're working on capping and I also left their first honey box that's above the brood. I did that for a couple reasons. One being that it'll create a honey barrier for the queen, another that I want to wait to extract that box until I know the bees have enough honey for themselves.

Last year I felt I took too much honey from one of the new nucs. They survived just fine but it was a really mild winter. I'd rather have extra honey to extract later than reach fall and not have enough to see the bees through.

You might think that I could feed the bees in fall to put weight back on the hive and I did. But last year the summer/fall weather was so cold that the bees wouldn't take the sugar syrup. I did the candy as well just to be sure.

Sorry for the lack of photos. We were pretty busy and didn't get much time to stop for them.

We did two things which made the process much easier. Dad suggested we put an empty super with frames on top of the hive and then brush the bees off into the super. This worked marvelously. Before that the bees were piling up on top of the hive and overflowing (see the photo above with bees piled on the top frames). This gave them somewhere to go.

Next we used a card table. It's portable and light weight enough, yet it could hold two full supers. We set the table beside the hive and when lifting the 40+ pound super we could turn and set it down at table height--no back breaking bending. It worked very well.

We'll be back at it tomorrow, harvesting Dad's hive#2. Let's hope his bees are gentle too.