extracting honey

[Rosti]

Have used porter escapes but now just gently brush the girls off the frames in-front of the hive. Actually find this is ok as my porter escapes always left bees in.

Interested in the oil and fume board comment though...
can you recommend a supplier?
All the best,
Sam

Nat Fume board (£12) and Bee-Quick Oil (£10) from Thornes - approx prices as at Mar 10

 

[Skyhook]

[QUOTE=
I really do think a book might be of great assistance to you. If you are asking these questions your typing time might be better spent reading.

Spiridoula 8- as another newbee, strongly recommend Ted Hooper 'Guide to beesd and honey'- bought 2 months ago, hardly taken my nose out of it. Wouldn't want to be doing this without it.

 

[MuswellMetro]

Nat Fume board (£12) and Bee-Quick Oil (£10) from Thornes - approx prices as at Mar 10

or as posted on another thread

cordless leaf blower

removes the bees in 10sec..never used it but if other find it ok, might consider buying one

 

[Stiffy]

or as posted on another thread

cordless leaf blower

removes the bees in 10sec..never used it but if other find it ok, might consider buying one

Have thought of using one but always afraid I would end up blasting them all over the place and really peeing them off rather than clearing.
Would like to see video of one being used properly?
(will google and see if there is any)

 

[Poly Hive]

Almost deff on Youtube. Usually blown down a chute to land some what wind swept on their own front door.

PH

 

[Hivemaker.]

They don't get to upset being blown out of the supers,more confused i would say,i blow them down from the top supers first.

 

[louiseww]

If you went to Plumpton for your course are you a member of the Eastbourne beekeepers Association? Eric hires out an extractor and I am sure other BKAs do too.

 

[alex]

I saw a demonstration of supers being cleared like this at our local association a few weeks ago. The super is removed, full of bees still, then the lid is placed back on the hive. The super is placed on its side on top of the flat roof (with all the frames hanging in a vertical position, not horizontal). Standing behind the hive, the bees were blown right out through the bottom of the super into the front of their own hive and they very quickly just flew back inside the hive, hardly seemed disorientated or mad at all. I'd consider this myself if I had a large number of supers to clear but it's not really worth the extra equipment for me, being on such a small scale.

 

[Hivemaker.]

I think the bee's enjoy a bit of strong breeze on a hot day....some use a lazy susan to stand the supers on.

 

[beebreeder]

Like I have commented in another thread, check the engine exhaust as some of the cheaper ones duct it into the airstream and two-stroke honey would not be to good, mod is usually easy.

 

[spiridoula 8]

Well I took your advice and curled up with a bee book while keeping an eye on my supers and honey. My plan was to wait till this weekend to try to extract honey from about five frames of super although I was baffled as to why my supers weren't filling very fast.

And here it all starts to get a bit confusing.

I noticed something very odd about three weeks ago. The centre frame of the super was brown, light in weight and capped off.

Back to my bee book.

No help.

And yesterday, blow me. Three of the frames in the supers have brood in them. And bees hatching.

So I have a very big hive full of bees. And almost no honey.

And yes. I do have a queen excluder.

What on earth could have happened?

And should I split the (two) colonies into two hives?

I am going to need another book.

S8

 

[margob99]

I guess you did the same as me some time this summer.

Hive inspection:

1. Take off the roof, put upside down on ground.

2. Take off honey super, put on top of upturned roof.

3. Take off Queen Excluder, put somewhere else.

4. Take off top box (usually another super) of brood-and-a-half hive, and put on top of honey super. Queen falls down into honey super.

Replace everything logically, and VOILA! you've got a Queen trapped above the QX, in the honey super.

 

[Mosquito]

I have done that...

 

[spiridoula 8]

so what I should do is to take out the excluder and put it above the super to treat the whole thing as a brood chamber? How do I over-winter? And why don't I have honey in the brood chamber (well, apart from the frames at the end). The middle frames in the brood chamber are largely honey free. Might have brood but I was in a bit of a hurry as the bees were grumpy and so didn't really look. I was also a bit grumpy, to tell you the truth. If I did as you have guessed, it would have been a while ago as I have tried to leave the brood chamber alone.

S8

 

[MJBee]

You need to find the queen. Next decent day have a good look through the super that has brood in it - leave it on the hive as you do so - she should be on or near the frames with brood in them. When you find her replace the crown board and remove the super AND queen excluder together and place on the upturned roof.

Go into the super again and take out the frame with the queen on, keep a close eye on her, and rest the frame on top of the brood frames, wait until she runs down into the brood box - double check she has gone from the super frame - replace the queen excluder and super.

After 21 days all the brood will have emerged from the super frames.

Alternatively remove the queen excluder and overwinter as a brood and a half I would still visually confirm the presence of the queen though.

 

[spiridoula 8]

Many thanks for your advice and reassurance. I decided to overwinter as a colony and a half, took some honey from the frames that did not have brood, moved the excluder onto the top, peered at the queen, fed with syrup and will put some of the new varroa treatment in later this week.

So from what I thought was a disaster, I now have a colony (thank you Heather) that I hope I can split next May and which seems in rude health, and something nice for the Spiridoula toast each morning.

S8