Heather honey harvest!

[elainemary]

Plus a few utility room appliances and copious amounts of newspaper

V good, car crash by the end with hubby muttering “everything’s sticky in this house” and “this door handle is sticky Elaine…you need to review your process…”

Appliances aside from washing machine, are ground source heat pump…his baby.

 

[elainemary]

Nice colour to the heather.
The press looks like it did a good job on squeezing the wax

Superb pressing, cappings are almost dry

 

[elainemary]

For those of us that do not have heather honey (and maybe like me, no idea what the pictures are showing), could you explain what is in the pictures, and which part of the process it is.
I'm pretty certain the 2nd picture is not a kebab cooking, but Iay be wrong
Thankyou.

To expand on Dani’s very good analysis of the pics

-The 2nd picture that looks like a kebab..it’s a rubber bladder.
-The press works on water pressure (hence called a Hydropress).
-Connect the press to kitchen tap (max 3bar, works 1-2.5 bar).
-Bladder inflates and presses against the chunks of heather honey scraped or cut out of frames.
-Heather is pressed through the filter bag and slowly drains down the outsides of the press into a collecting tray with a hole in
-monitor pressure, as this kit is designed for pressing fruit. Fruit juice flows much faster than honey so honey can overflow from the back if you don’t watch out

Hence copious amounts of newspaper as I had a little accident. Managed to reduce pressure in nick of time.

All of course ably supported by a very helpful beekeeping buddy

 

[Erichalfbee]

All of course ably supported by a very helpful beekeeping buddy

How has the Heather done this year?

 

[elainemary]

How has the Heather done this year?

None in the valley - all balsam, normally 50:50.
Heather was good in the end at home (less than last season) 2 supers 2colonies, plus enough in the brood box for their winter stores. Harvested c75lb plus a few cut comb.

Normally I’d move couple colonies up here, but decided not to, as the weather forecast was so poor. Too late to move early sept when the sun came out, as little else for them in aug if the heather hadn’t flowed. Main Flow latest I’ve seen, normally mid aug vs 2nd week sept this yr

 

[Erichalfbee]

Well at least you have a some for yourself. It's my favourite honey.

 

[Black Mountain Honey]

Extracted heather honey today, using new Spiegel Hydropress purchased for our association. What a great piece of kit. V dry wax at the end of process. So much easier than manual press or loosening and spinning out.
Thanks to one of the Forum members @pete darbyshire for the recommendation last year

Aren't these good! The best bit - it does the filtering at the same time so its ready to settle and can be jarred immediately.

I grew so tired of loosening and then extracting only to have to filter again at a later stage before jarring!

 

[Erichalfbee]

ready to settle and can be jarred immediately.

Do you blend your heather, Laurence?
Much as I love heather honey I got a bucket from a friend which the bees had blended themselves. It half set on its own to a gorgeous creamy consistency and tasted wonderful.

 

[Black Mountain Honey]

Do you blend your heather, Laurence?
Much as I love heather honey I got a bucket from a friend which the bees had blended themselves. It half set on its own to a gorgeous creamy consistency and tasted wonderful.

We do both.

Straight heather honey and a heather blend

 

[ericbeaumont]

a heather blend

I recall that Peterbees' heather blend out-sells straight heather.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I recall that Peterbees' heather blend out-sells straight heather.

Peter was at Conwy Fair
I didn't see an y blend

 

[elainemary]

Aren't these good! The best bit - it does the filtering at the same time so its ready to settle and can be jarred immediately.

I grew so tired of loosening and then extracting only to have to filter again at a later stage before jarring!

Watched your swing cage video which has its place but for heather agree it’s a lot less effort!

 

[deemann1]

Aren't these good! The best bit - it does the filtering at the same time so its ready to settle and can be jarred immediately.

I grew so tired of loosening and then extracting only to have to filter again at a later stage before jarring!

I like your youtube channel.
Did you ditch the heather loosener and revert to pressing ? .
I just hate destroying all that comb in a press

 

[elainemary]

Watched your swing cage video which has its place but for heather agree it’s a lot less effort!

Do you blend your heather, Laurence?
Much as I love heather honey I got a bucket from a friend which the bees had blended themselves. It half set on its own to a gorgeous creamy consistency and tasted wonderful.

I don’t blend my own, the bees do it for me (depends on location and year).

A surprise is there is no ‘straight’ heather blend class in the National honey show schedule. Only ling heather. Why not? It’s a class in many local and the Great Yorkshire Show
Delving into the National schedule, I could only see a clsss of ‘soft set heather blend’, eh? What is that? Never seen that on sale up here in my part of Yorkshire and never seen it in a show either or for sale’s or talked about.
Maybe there is demand elsewhere??????? Anyone know?
Should I / we suggest to the National they drop the soft set heather and change it to Heather blend?

 

[Erichalfbee]

soft set heather blend

That's exactly what my bee blended heather did all on its own.
Would the heather blend class be bee or beekeeper blended?
Seems to me you couldn't tell the difference so maybe that's why there isn't one

 

[Curly green finger's]

I sell natural soft- set heather blend which hasn’t been blended by me - in fact it’s delicious probably tastes better than purer ling honey .
It’s a natural blend of summer honey/ling heather.

 

[Black Mountain Honey]

I like your youtube channel.
Did you ditch the heather loosener and revert to pressing ? .
I just hate destroying all that comb in a press

Thanks

Yes - my operation is small enough to warrant destroying the comb each year.

I started with pressing, moved to the loosener - sold it and reverted to pressing. Loads better for us