Extraction disaster

[dpearce4]

Well it started well. took my supers off yesterday evening, a few bees in them so popped them into my conservatory overnight with the window open slightly so they could get out.

How wrong i was, got up at 8am to find my conservatory full of bees, thought ok not to worry close window and leave until later to extract. Well while i was out down the allotment someone at home felt sorry for the bees and opened the window to let them out.

OMG got back and the back of the house looked like it had a swarm arriving and the conervatory looking like the cross between the somme and some bad B Movie as the comb in 2 supers had collapsed due to the heat and there was honey all over the floor with dead and dieing bees all over the place with hundreds trying to kill each other tring to get to the honey all over the floor.

Ended up having to extract outside after dark and i lost about 60lb of honey, robbed and all over the floor.

 

[pargyle]

Well it started well. took my supers off yesterday evening, a few bees in them so popped them into my conservatory overnight with the window open slightly so they could get out.

How wrong i was, got up at 8am to find my conservatory full of bees, thought ok not to worry close window and leave until later to extract. Well while i was out down the allotment someone at home felt sorry for the bees and opened the window to let them out.

OMG got back and the back of the house looked like it had a swarm arriving and the conervatory looking like the cross between the somme and some bad B Movie as the comb in 2 supers had collapsed due to the heat and there was honey all over the floor with dead and dieing bees all over the place with hundreds trying to kill each other tring to get to the honey all over the floor.

Ended up having to extract outside after dark and i lost about 60lb of honey, robbed and all over the floor.

Comes under the auspices of 'It seemed like a good idea at the time'.... very honest of you to share the experience - perhaps it should be the start of a 'confessions' thread ? We can all learn from each others blunders !

I could fill 10 pages on my own !!

Starting with leaving 2" of space below the frames in my home built hive - I now have 14 x 14 rather than 14 x12 frames extended courtesy of the bees !!

Unfortunatelty, the extra 2" now prevents me from dropping the mesh floor and sliding it out (briiliant bit of design) without slicing off 2" of comb on the bottom of the frames. I now will have to modify the the stand side rails so it will drop down a bit lower and allow it to slide out again. Like I said ... Seemed like a good idea at the time !

 

[drstitson]

"Starting with leaving 2" of space below the frames in my home built hive - I now have 14 x 14 rather than 14 x12 frames extended courtesy of the bees !!
"

The deep floor is not an issue per se - the germans seem to like their "hoher boden" which can be 3-4" high. admittedly at least some of those come with upper slats which mirror the top bars upstairs, forming an upper "floor" to stop the bees building down from the frames.

google for images of "herold magazin" or "bausperre beute".

any chance you can retrofit slats to your hive design (just thin stripwood screwed to underside of main box)? the free comb can be cut off and dealt with as one sees fit (tied into frames temporarily etc).

 

[Tom Bick]

Well it started well. took my supers off yesterday evening, a few bees in them so popped them into my conservatory overnight with the window open slightly so they could get out.

How wrong i was, got up at 8am to find my conservatory full of bees, thought ok not to worry close window and leave until later to extract. Well while i was out down the allotment someone at home felt sorry for the bees and opened the window to let them out.

OMG got back and the back of the house looked like it had a swarm arriving and the conervatory looking like the cross between the somme and some bad B Movie as the comb in 2 supers had collapsed due to the heat and there was honey all over the floor with dead and dieing bees all over the place with hundreds trying to kill each other tring to get to the honey all over the floor.

Ended up having to extract outside after dark and i lost about 60lb of honey, robbed and all over the floor.

Ouch thats a hard lesson learnt and must have been a right mess.

If it makes you feel any better I have a couple of stacks of supers consisting of part extracted and full supers and yesterday before going off to apply thymol treatments to my hives did a bit of adjustment to one stack consisting of two empty and three part full supers. On my return to the garden thought it was odd that I was met by a few bees at the drive and when I turned the corner what could only be described as a swarm of bees over the top of the stack. Bugger Bugger Bugger they have had approx three hours at that me thinks. I closed off the gap and within 45 mins they had given up and left so time to release some of the bees inside so open the gap out come a 1000 bees and more I close the gap and within 15 mins a couple of thousand bees trying to get back inside until they eventually give up. I expect I will be trying to shift all the bees from that stack for most of today.

I now think I got away lightly on reading your post and I expect everyone in time will do a similar mistake. I am sure I know the beekeeper whose bees had a good day yesterday and has not as yet asked to borrow my extractor this year but just may be knocking on the door soon.

 

[Heather]

I still remember the post and picture on here when a chap was sieving his honey from the extractor .... during a football match
2" of honey all over the floor!

 

[domino]

Makes my choice to carry full supers over a field by hand seem sensible now.

Bad luck dpearce4

 

[dpearce4]

Cheers all your making me feel better.

Tom thats just what my conservatory looked like and still does this morning, there are so many bees that i cant even get in to wash the honey off the floor. Not sure what i am going to do about it.

 

[domino]

Cheers all your making me feel better.

Tom thats just what my conservatory looked like and still does this morning, there are so many bees that i cant even get in to wash the honey off the floor. Not sure what i am going to do about it.

Won't the bees clean it up?

 

[Tom Bick]

I dont know either you may try opening a window for short periods slowly bleeding off the bees and hope when they return with reinforcements they get board trying to get in to the conservatory and leave so you can release more bees. You will also have to mop up the honey and once thats gone no more bees.

I did consider releasing the bees from my stack of supers latish last night but thought no too far to drive so will sort it today, or I hope to.

Good luck it sounds a nightmare something to laugh about in time.

 

[Luminos]

Poor you, as if there hadn't been enough problems with having an allergy!
...is the person which opened the window still living, btw...lol

 

[enrico]

Sorry, duplicated the one below!

 

[enrico]

Late evening, try opening a window and putting a bright builders light outside! Might work!
I felt so sorry for you but I have to say I did smile, only a bit honest! Well no, actually a lot, well no, I laughed out loud!
We have all made so many mistakes, mine was when I shook a swarm of bees into a hive and missed, straight into my wellies!
I really really hope you get it all sorted. Thanks for sharing!
E

 

[user 6228]

Ouch ... that will make the rest of us much more vigilant about insect security with the honey.

The lessons I've learn from this are...

1) get all the bees off before shutting down for the night
2) be insect safe before shutdown
3) have an insect proof store for frames/supers
4) make sure everyone in the house hold knows about the insect security rules and consequences
5) it takes only one bee to fetch all of the foragers from a hive.

Have you got any pictures of the mess...
Just so I can reinforce the messages to myself and the beekeeper by sticking it on the frame/honey store.

As regards cleaning the mess, window cleaners scraper.(I can remember if its tiles). Then add water and wet vacuum cleaner
use all the stuff off the floor to make mead...
just remember how apples for cider are really collected (no its not like the Cidre advert or the Magners advert)

 

[pargyle]

"Starting with leaving 2" of space below the frames in my home built hive - I now have 14 x 14 rather than 14 x12 frames extended courtesy of the bees !!
"

The deep floor is not an issue per se - the germans seem to like their "hoher boden" which can be 3-4" high. admittedly at least some of those come with upper slats which mirror the top bars upstairs, forming an upper "floor" to stop the bees building down from the frames.

google for images of "herold magazin" or "bausperre beute".

any chance you can retrofit slats to your hive design (just thin stripwood screwed to underside of main box)? the free comb can be cut off and dealt with as one sees fit (tied into frames temporarily etc).

Thanks for that, I'm not unduly concerned - as you say, it's just a bit of free comb that I can cut off. The slats idea is qute a good one but I've got a mesh floor in the bottom of the hive and it's the structure that it is framed with that forms the two inches of space. I'm just going to lower the two rails that it drops down onto when I release the hive clips that hold it in place and then it will clear the free comb on the bottom of the frames and I can slide it out as I intended.

Hindsight and next hive build will rectify matters.

 

[pargyle]

.... straight into my wellies!
Thanks for sharing!
E

That was a coffee all over the desk moment when I read that .... Sorry, still laughing at the thought - how did you cope with it ? Can't type ... eye's watering !!

 

[BeeNice]

Good case of taking a large cloth to help with extraction, I brush the bees off the frames and put the honey frame quickly into another empty super and cover up quickly. Before I put it in the car to take home I move, the now full super, away and any bees left get brushed off to fly home. No bees, no problems, but when leaving any frames around will attract bees. Had to put rolled paper around the closed shed door in the summer because so many bees were getting in after 'waiting to be cleaned' frames and I got fed up putting each and every bee out of the shed.

 

[Tdf]

the best way to do it is to stack the supers in a small room with one window, the bees will all fly onto the window and brush them out every so often until theyr all gone

 

[drstitson]

"I dont know either you may try opening a window for short periods slowly bleeding off the bees and hope when they return with reinforcements they get bored trying to get in to the conservatory and leave so you can release more bees."

or apply a Snelgrove approach and open and close windows on alternating sides of the conservatory in sequence?

 

[drstitson]

"The slats idea is qute a good one but I've got a mesh floor in the bottom of the hive and it's the structure that it is framed with that forms the two inches of space. I'm just going to lower the two rails that it drops down onto when I release the hive clips that hold it in place and then it will clear the free comb on the bottom of the frames and I can slide it out as I intended."

i realised that - just needs 2 rails inside the framing and the slats run across level with the top of the frame (assuming Bottom beespace in the hive above, otherwise would need to be 8-9mm down).

 

[BeeJayBee]

Ended up having to extract outside after dark and i lost about 60lb of honey, robbed and all over the floor.

Oooh, that's awful.