Brix is just the scale used for measuring sugar content, usually with a refractometer. A matchstick or cocktail stick just lets you get a drop of honey from a cell that you can pop on the refractometer plate to get a reading of the sugar content.
I think that's a pretty awful idea ... whilst technically measuring the SG will give you an indication of the water content - if you are going to sell your honey and be confident that it is not going to ferment then you really do need a refractomer ... for what they cost these days it's really a no-brainer.
But ....the honey hydrometers are not calibrated in SG% they are calibrated in water percentage - so how would you recalibrate a brewing hydrometer ? > I know ... buy a refractometer, check the honey with your beer brewing hydrometer - write on it the water % with indellble felt tip pen (after waiting at least five minutes for the hydrometer to settle in the honey - and having at least a 5 litre tub of honey to give it enough room to settle) and then throw away your refractomete in favour of something that does a worse job in 100 times the time ....
Uncap the sealed frames any uncapped on the same frame say 10/15% is likely to be ripe and can be extracted, just cells may not bee full enough for them to cap over. A quick test of BRIX will confirm, using a matchstick as a dipper try several cells (Note to BBKA they have other proper uses).
Other wise jiggle the frames at the hive and leave uncapped with bees, remove empty frames to accommodate them. Removing some to do so should be fine if they have room for forage to be ripened.
Addendum - honey measured at 19.5% with refractometer so will wait a bit longer…. ho hum.
Are the frames all capped? Water content can vary between frames.
And between cells in the same frame!
It varies, some are half capped, others only 25% or so. It’s been like this for nearly two weeks…. Too much humidity maybe or I moved the box to the top too soon? Had also left varroa floor in as had a spike I treated with OA a couple of weeks ago (with supers off) so have been monitoring. Take that out to allow for some air circulation? (No matchsticks, promise!!)
Just checked the uncapped frames in a very heavy super (full Langstroth seriously heavy) with refractometer 16.9% water. Probably 75%+ are capped so will extract in a couple of days. The stack of two brood boxes (one a demaree) plus four supers is becoming a challenge to inspect. So hope to extract another super before the lime comes in to flower (hopefully) in a fortnight.
Full? Or capped? If it's capped the bees will have checked the water content for you. If it's not fully capped I check some of the bottom cells before extracting. If its not ready I don't extract. I hardly had any spring honey, the supers were full but it had already granulated
Could you please tell me (newbee) more about jarring & how it worksMy first extraction of the year was this weekend too, and two weeks later than last year. I had two fully capped supers, another super with just a pair of capped frames in the middle and the fourth super is no where near ready yet.
Still, I'm looking forward to jarring it later this week as I'm sold out of last year's crop - plus, jarring is so much less strenuous and messy than extracting
Whatever you do don’t put labels on until you sell it and invest in one of theseCould you please tell me (newbee) more about jarring & how it works
