The Honey Factory

[itsasmallfarm]

did my first harvest of honey a few weeks back, got about 150 lbs am guessing, from 4 hives. 5th hive is struggling and has very little honey in it.

got about 1 more harvest in the next week or so.

 

[duluthralphie]

I know I am late, but I finally got my first oxalic treatment done. The weather has not been cooperating with me.

Now that I have done one treatment, I find I might have been over cautious looking for the perfect day.

I have not been in my hives for a while. They are amazing this again this year. I have 4 supers full (mediums) and 1 super over half full.

I only have 3 sides free on the the one hive. The other has a half super free. When I treat them in a few days I will trade some empties for some fulls. I am not going to pull the supers and spin the out until mid-September or so. I don’t want to miss the fall bloom.

We are lucky in some ways here, when the bloom starts in the spring it keeps going until we get a killing frost. We have no dearth.

Here is a photo of the bees today and a couple short videos. The WW took them, complain to her about quality.


I had a lot of wax clean up in the supers. I almost needed a crow bar to get into the hives. They were really stuck together.

 

[duluthralphie]

I went to the neighbors to treat her bees. I didn’t treat them.

She has no brood, not one little cell with one little baby.

This is her second loss of a queen this year. It’s too late to do anything this year. This is her first year with bees, all her frames are new.

She had terrible luck, but her brood frames look brand new. I told her if they were mine I would keep a couple frames for next years package and spin the rest out. She might as well get something for the year.

 

[Apis mellifera]

She has no brood, not one little cell with one little baby.

It's possible that a new queen isn't laying yet, I would check every week for eggs. The best time to treat a hive with OAV is when there is no capped brood.

 

[jerryse]

Well I was gone for a month so it has been about 5 weeks since I worked the bees . Each hive had a fully capped super for a total of 4 . Really gentle and brood boxes are heavy . Really sealed with propolis . So extracting tomorrow .

 

[R2elk]

Turned out the multiple swarms were all from the Saskatraz hive. The hive is completely empty with lots of empty queen cells. i put the supers away and closed up the hive. At least I will have a place to put bees if the others swarm next year.

The hive that I got 4 full supers off of last year has two supers nearly full but with about half the honey not yet capped.

The miracle hive had two completely full supers of honey. I took both of those and left the hive with one empty super.

The new Russian hive also had two completely full supers of honey. I left that hive with one empty super.

 

[Apis mellifera]

Im thawing out full frames of spring honey from the freezer this weekend. I take out the frames of comb honey and replace them with the thawed frames so they have enough food for winter.

 

[jerryse]

I think I made creamed honey in the extractor . Nearly impossible to strain . I heated some and it helped the straining . Never had this happen before .

 

[BirdsBeesTrees]

I think I made creamed honey in the extractor . Nearly impossible to strain . I heated some and it helped the straining . Never had this happen before .

I set mine in the warmest spot possible before extracting and straining. Right next to the dehumidifier, warm and helpful.

 

[KentuckyRooster]

Guess I'm following this, I inherited an established hive.
For winter I figured just leave the girls alone- they have tons of honey (no one has been here to collect any and I think the entire hive is probably loaded). Do I need to do anything else for them?