Cut comb - how to please

[milkermel]

Ok so this may well be a silly question, Feel free to have a giggle! over the past 3 years all i have done is extracted honey, this suits me fine, however the lady who i look after a couple of hives for has mentioned how her son loves comb honey, and could I do some of that this year as well.

I have entered cut comb on the search bar thinking that there must be someone on here already that has asked the question, but got no relavant replies.

I realise that I cant use wired foundation - do I need foundation at all, or will the bees draw it themselves??

Also would i need to allocate a whole super to this or could i just use a couple of frames.

Cheers folks

 

[BKF Admin]

Poly hive is a big cut comb man.
I do some myself but will let him explain and show a few pics.

 

[RoofTops]

It is not really difficult. You can buy extra thin unwired foundation or you can simply use a strip of foundation about half an inch wide, normally called a starter strip. The latter will normally give the thinnest central wax - the septum

You could indeed just do a few frames and unless you have other outlets for the cut comb this might be wise. Round here there is no real sale for it except at country shows when there are always a few customers who will ask for it.

Most customers will expect runny honey in the comb so you need to know your forage and at what time of year you are likely to get runny honey. This is likely to be after the OSR season. I have heard of people selling set OSR comb but I wonder if they got much repeat business?

What you want are bees which make nice white cappings, not all bees do this so again you need to select your colonies. Ideally the comb should be drawn and filled quickly and then removed as soon as it is capped. The aim of this is if you leave it in too long it can get dirty from all the little feet walking over it to reach supers above.

You can then buy purpose made cutters which will cut out the comb to the correct size for the purpose made packaging you can also buy. None of these are essential but probably worth starting with so there are fewer variables.

Cut comb is usually priced according to weight as you are unlikely to have sections all the same size and weight due to the different depths the bees will draw the comb.

There will be waste and you can either try and sell the small chunks left over or add it to runny honey in a jar - called chunk honey.

 

[milkermel]

Thanks rooftops, I was hoping it was going to be that straightforward, but have learnt early not to presume!

I am not intending to sell any just litterally enough for the owners son. tbh its probably just a whim but as i get paid for hours spent, a cut of the honey and also experience working on more hives then i try and oblige where possible.

 

[Poly Hive]

I use Manley frames with CC foundation and but the one bottom bar.

I would suggest you put two or three in a normal super and to aid the little grey cells mark the CC frames with err... CC in indelible marker.

Let the bees get on with it.

PH

 

[RoofTops]

It attracts a good price if you can sell it, off the top of my head you could expect twice the price you would get for an equivalent amount of extracted honey.

If you do want to go for it on a larger scale you need to consider heather honey. I don't know about Bodmin, but Dartmoor will give heather honey although the number of good sites is limited in my experience and the crop very dependent on the weather.

 

[premo]

Section Frames

Ok so this may well be a silly question, Feel free to have a giggle! over the past 3 years all i have done is extracted honey, this suits me fine, however the lady who i look after a couple of hives for has mentioned how her son loves comb honey, and could I do some of that this year as well.

I have entered cut comb on the search bar thinking that there must be someone on here already that has asked the question, but got no relavant replies.

I realise that I cant use wired foundation - do I need foundation at all, or will the bees draw it themselves??

Also would i need to allocate a whole super to this or could i just use a couple of frames.





Cheers folks

I have an old beekeeping book that shows something called section frames each frame measure about 41/2 x 41/2 inch, in the picture the frames fit into what looks like a super box there are twenty one frames in each super.
According to the book these are used at honey shows and for selling comb honey to the public, when I was a young lad about 14/15 I can remember going to a beekeeping show with my uncle and seeing these frames on display.
Don’t know if they still use this system today but it looks a good idea for giving or selling small pieces of comb honey.

 

[Poly Hive]

Hmm. I suggest you do some up to date reading.

Circular sections came in on the basis that there were unacceptable "losses" from square sections as bees prefer circular combs.

I worked those sections on heather and if the flow was iffy as it was so often they were very unreliable. Mind you they were invented in the States and their flows are a lot stronger than ours.

The simplest way for the small unit manager is to work a few frames of CC in amongst the extraction fames. Preferably Manley frames.

Take a Nat super. 11 frames. Take out five, and intersperce your cc ones with the drawn frames. Side of box and drawn frame, CC, DF, DF, CC, DF, CC, DF, CC. YOu may or may not get another DF in, and if not replan the two Df's, numbers 3&4. Again if you are not so keen reduce it to three.

On the Heather in my Langstroth supers I had 50% cc. worked very well.

As it stands my blossom CC sells at £9-50 per pound. People buy it often in multiples, best so far was 7 packs to one customer.

PH



PH

 

[gavin]

LOL! 'Small unit manager' - do you mean the hobbyist?

Definitely wise to mark the top bars as it isn't easy to tell once the bees are finished with them. No doubt it helps to intersperse with drawn comb but it isn't essential. If you are using drawn comb it has to be free of OSR honey or any other type that would cause granulation. I had good supers of cut comb from thin foundation on the heather this year. Starter strips were mixed in and were drawn more slowly so I'll go with thin foundation in future.

Watch the frame spacing too. Not too narrow, not too wide if you'd like the cut comb boxes filled well.

A question: what types of honey, apart from the two heathers, do people try for when seeking cut comb? I had a little lime honey this year, but it is hard to keep separate from clover which sets. I'm told that mid-summer suburban honey does well as cut comb. Any crop around OSR, clover or ivy wouldn't work well, so what does?

Gavin

 

[victor meldrew]

I've done cut comb for the first time this year .
Casuals have bought same (thinking "you can't get better than straight from the hive" ) only to ask later , "Er! what do I do with this cut comb?" They have then bought jarred honey. I am left will cut comb because what seemed like a good idea at the time turned out to be a step too far for Joe public .
VM

 

[Swarm]

Very true VM. A lot will also screw their faces at the thought of bits of wax too. I'll probably try a few frames of CC next year. (More than likely, it'll be me who eats it )

 

[premo]

Hmm. I suggest you do some up to date reading.

Circular sections came in on the basis that there were unacceptable "losses" from square sections as bees prefer circular combs.

I worked those sections on heather and if the flow was iffy as it was so often they were very unreliable. Mind you they were invented in the States and their flows are a lot stronger than ours.

The simplest way for the small unit manager is to work a few frames of CC in amongst the extraction fames. Preferably Manley frames.

Take a Nat super. 11 frames. Take out five, and intersperce your cc ones with the drawn frames. Side of box and drawn frame, CC, DF, DF, CC, DF, CC, DF, CC. YOu may or may not get another DF in, and if not replan the two Df's, numbers 3&4. Again if you are not so keen reduce it to three.

On the Heather in my Langstroth supers I had 50% cc. worked very well.

As it stands my blossom CC sells at £9-50 per pound. People buy it often in multiples, best so far was 7 packs to one customer.

PH



PH

I did say it was an old book 1950 and was not sure if they were used today, I am no expert but the sections in this book are full right to the corners and I can remember the ones I saw at the honey show were also full to the corners, must be that the bees are lazier today than when I was a lad

 

[Hivemaker.]

I can remember the ones I saw at the honey show were also full to the corners, must be that the bees are lazier today than when I was a lad

A strong colony on a good flow will produce very good, well filled English sections, if the hanging section holders are used, rather than the old type section crates.
Use around 3 or 4 or more, in the middle of a super, with normal drawn combs at the sides.

 

[enrico]

If you use square cut comb frames then make sure you put the wax in the right way round!! look at a normal piece of foundation and make sure the square cut comb wax goes in with the points facing up and down and not left and right!!! Sounds stupid but I used them years ago and that was my first mistake, secondly I had to force the bees to lay build them out by not giving them ordinary frames otherwise they would just ignore them. I gave up in the end, I was losing honey, sales weren't that brilliant etc etc. Now I put one frame of unwired wax in and cut that into bits which I then pop in a jar of normal honey. Looks good and sells better and for more.
Good luck
E

 

[alanf]

Most customers will expect runny honey in the comb...

What you want are bees which make nice white cappings, not all bees do this so again you need to select your colonies. Ideally the comb should be drawn and filled quickly and then removed as soon as it is capped.

One of the chaps round here who produces cut comb keeps the packed containers in the freezer to slow crystallisation. Opposite to the usual method of clearing honey by warming but he says it works for him.

 

[Hivemaker.]

One of the chaps round here who produces cut comb keeps the packed containers in the freezer to slow crystallisation. Opposite to the usual method of clearing honey by warming but he says it works for him.

Freezing the combs works very well,have done this for several years now,we usually freeze a couple of thousand heather cut combs each season,and even whole supers of comb to be cut out at a later date.

 

[testka]

One of the chaps round here who produces cut comb keeps the packed containers in the freezer to slow crystallisation. Opposite to the usual method of clearing honey by warming but he says it works for him.

Maybe mistaken but believe the other reason for freezing cut comb is to kill any potential wax moth eggs which may be present?

 

[Onge]

I just use empty Dadant sized super frames (Langstroth medium).

No cut comb foundation just an empty frame with a comb guide.

The perfect cut comb without everyone else's chemical input from the cut comb foundation.

 

[snoop]

I just use empty Dadant sized super frames (Langstroth medium).

No cut comb foundation just an empty frame with a comb guide.

The perfect cut comb without everyone else's chemical input from the cut comb foundation.

What is a comb guide?

 

[Skyhook]

Did a little bit last year, mainly for my own consumption but found a very few other people who liked it. My observations would be-

1) I cut the comb into rectangles with a knife on the advice of an experienced producer. Later heard several people complaining of comb cutters breaking.

2) Had trouble getting the lids to fit the containers well (white plastic boxes from Th's). Later heard of other people having the same problem.

3) found it rather faffy and messy to do, which is awkward as you want to present the combs cleanly. I think next time I might stick to chunk comb, but if so will use narrower spacings- I was on wide spacing, and a strip of that hardly fits through the neck of a 12 oz jar.

4) It takes about 6 lb of honey to produce 1 lb of wax. On that basis, you need to be sure you're getting a decent price.