What did you do in the Apiary today?

[pargyle]

Ooooh, extracted my first honey yesterday. Very exciting! Only two supers, not all frames used and those used (my theory was to get them off (I have 14x12s) and if too watery would feed back) only partly filled but all capped or shake-test-successful and all came out beautifully and less than 18.5%. Bees were fine when taking off and putting back the wets. 16lb in all from 12 frames.

The only mishaps were trying to get the extractor out of the utility to clean and put back in the garage whilst the bees were still flying - ended up leaving it there overnight as boyfriend was stung when he tried to lift it and there was a bee under the rim that he didn’t see, and power washing the uncapping tray on the front yard and spraying boyfriend’s car with the residue which the bees also found and rendered his car inaccessible for a while
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You have to be careful spreading honey or washing residues about as bees can smell honey from miles away and (as you have found) will attract ANY bees in the area. It can bring disease into your area and start robbing. Try to get any water from washing extracting kit down the drain. I find that a hosepipe is just as effective as power washing and makes less of a mess . If you take the cage out of the extractor and close the tap you can use it to wash the smaller items of kit and then just drain the residue into a bucket and straight down the drain.

Well done with your first harvest - it's a moment you never forget. Save a jar or two forever to remind you where you started.

 

[sarahcorlett2566]

You have to be careful spreading honey or washing residues about as bees can smell honey from miles away and (as you have found) will attract ANY bees in the area. It can bring disease into your area and start robbing. Try to get any water from washing extracting kit down the drain. I find that a hosepipe is just as effective as power washing and makes less of a mess . If you take the cage out of the extractor and close the tap you can use it to wash the smaller items of kit and then just drain the residue into a bucket and straight down the drain.

Well done with your first harvest - it's a moment you never forget. Save a jar or two forever to remind you where you started.

Thank you- great advice.

 

[Swarm]

Thirteen supers removed today and that's the last of this season's honey. Very pleased with the condition of the colonies, all looking healthy and well populated.

 

[E&MBees]

Finished clearing the supers from one out apiary. Just the other site to finish tomorrow.
Had an unexpected surprise in one colony. Briefly opened the top brood box to assess stores, to discover a red marked queen. At last inspection, mid July the resident queen had a white dot. The colony next door is queen right, so not sure where she has come from. Bit of a mystery! Colonies are still a good size which is excellent.

 

[Nannysbees]

Second vape today.
Left the syrup feeder on, couldn't have pushed the cup down far enough, ended up hundreds of bees crammed in there, stupid mistake!!!!! Emptied them onto the landing board and to show how displeased they were, one sneaked into my husband's suit and stung him on the neck. Again lesson learned

 

[Swarm]

Second vape today.
Left the syrup feeder on, couldn't have pushed the cup down far enough, ended up hundreds of bees crammed in there, stupid mistake!!!!! Emptied them onto the landing board and to show how displeased they were, one sneaked into my husband's suit and stung him on the neck. Again lesson learned

Don't blame yourself, some of those cups enjoy popping back up after being secured and I've even known the sudden rush into the cone to pop them up.
Once cleared of bees, put a piece of slate on top of the cup, then the lid, then something flat and heavy to keep them in place.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I’ll second the slate. Never trusted those lids. Just feeding one colony at present. 2 litres of honey gulped down in 12 hours.

 

[The Poot]

Two hives with two supers each. Top supers removed today. On checking stores in the broods, I found nothing at all! Never seen this before at this time of year. So, I added fondant onto the frames as a stop gap while the bees clear the final supers, then it will mean heavy feeding a little earlier than expected.
The supers contained several totally dry frames, several were being filled with honey and two only that were partially capped.
The supers to come off tomorrow were quite heavy, so there may be a few frames to harvest, but I’ll be feeding quite a lot back.

 

[Sutty]

Had an unpleasant hive I was planning to unite but not found the queen last 2 inspections.
Moved them 12m, put their super on next-door (few inches away) hive, and moved that hive to half-way between the 2 hive locations.
Hopefully will bleed off the flying bees so I can find the queen, dispatch & unite.
Annoyingly the unpleasant hive is the supercedure daughter of my loveliest queen!

This turned out more interesting than I expected!
I went through the hive, much easier now depleted of flying bees, and found "the" queen - only to realise it was my favourite old queen who makes nice bees (though much of the blue paint had worn off).
I thought "well something has massively changed" and looked through the remaining few frames - sure enough another big queen!
I presume the new superceding queen is the source of the unpleasant workers, so I've dispatched her and left them with the original re-marked queen. I've put them back on the original spot to regain some of the foraging force.
If I hadn't looked closely I'd have dispatched the nice queen, left the unpleasant one, and united with a decent queenright hive, potentially losing another nice queen.
Of course they may try to supercede her again and it's getting late in the year - if they do I hope the virgin goes to the respectable drone congregation area not the dodgy one her predecessor did!
Every day is a school day!

 

[Erichalfbee]

On checking stores in the broods, I found nothing at all!

Same here in one or two. One lot guzzled down 2litres of honey in 12 hours.

 

[Garry R]

I generally let the extractor drain overnight and then have the hose ready outside. I leave the tap closed and work in the middle of the lawn and fill it full of water which is a huge dilution factor which when the small amount of residual honey is dissolved I reckon the bees don't bother. I turn the handle to swirl it around and let it sit for an hour with the lid on and the occasional swirl and then just drain it off into the ground and repeat, Never have any problems with bees or wasps at that level of dilution. After that I just leave the tap open and power wash thoroughly and then let it dry in the sun (if we get any)!! Store when dry. Never see bees foraging on the washings if it's diluted like that. Trick I guess is to get the first washing done as soon as the extractor is outside.

 

[Swarm]

Two hives with two supers each. Top supers removed today. On checking stores in the broods, I found nothing at all! Never seen this before at this time of year. So, I added fondant onto the frames as a stop gap while the bees clear the final supers, then it will mean heavy feeding a little earlier than expected.
The supers contained several totally dry frames, several were being filled with honey and two only that were partially capped.
The supers to come off tomorrow were quite heavy, so there may be a few frames to harvest, but I’ll be feeding quite a lot back.

Did you check the frames? I have three fairly heavy supers, they look capped until you lift them. These have all passed the old shake test but water content hovering around 19% at best with some frames over 20%. I've finished extracting now so these three will be spun out today and fed back.

 

[The Poot]

Did you check the frames? I have three fairly heavy supers, they look capped until you lift them. These have all passed the old shake test but water content hovering around 19% at best with some frames over 20%. I've finished extracting now so these three will be spun out today and fed back.

No. - they’re coming off today regardless to compress the hives down and will be assessed then.
I was taken aback yesterday at just how populated one hive is - absolutely rammed with bees the cluster under the clearer was huge and reducing space seems a little counter intuitive!

 

[judith.ribenfors]

Sorting through surplus brood and super frames prior to winter storage. What does anyone do with some mouldy pollen in supers ( not used as brood frames) choices are , A leave the bees to sort it. B. Help them by using a dental pick to scrape the affected bits back to foundation.or C. Melt the comb down... Which I'm loathe to do as it takes much more energy for the bees to start from scratch.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I was taken aback yesterday at just how populated one hive is - absolutely rammed with bees the cluster under the clearer was huge and reducing space seems a little counter intuitive!

Quite alarming isn’t it? But they do fit in.
I have my vaping ekes on top and some of them are clear. There are a LOT of bees.

 

[Swarm]

No. - they’re coming off today regardless to compress the hives down and will be assessed then.
I was taken aback yesterday at just how populated one hive is - absolutely rammed with bees the cluster under the clearer was huge and reducing space seems a little counter intuitive!

The three partially capped/not capped supers amounted to a final reading of 19.2% in the settling tank and is now in three invert containers ready to go back to them.
Bee numbers are very good.

 

[The Poot]

Quite alarming isn’t it? But they do fit in.
I have my vaping ekes on top and some of them are clear. There are a LOT of bees.

I’ve not had colonies this strong at this time of the year before - I guess it’s because they’re all 2023 queens (largely from swarming (!)) that are “going for it” and think this weather is normal.

 

[The Poot]

The three partially capped/not capped supers amounted to a final reading of 19.2% in the settling tank and is now in three invert containers ready to go back to them.
Bee numbers are very good.

Yep, that’s what mine look like - it’s a lot of mouths to feed with little or no income at the moment. Feeders are now on and will be filled this evening. I put quite a lot fondant under the clearer boards last night, as I was concerned at the total lack of stores in the broods. It was completely gone in both hives this afternoon. I think I’ve hung on too long before removing the supers this year and have caused them to be on the verge of starving. At least it’s not because I stole all their honey! One super removed today was as if it had been put on for cleaning, it was completely dry.

 

[Swarm]

My landlord went on holiday July 12th, two days later the weather turned. Looking at the supers I've removed, there was no change at all other than a couple of partly filled ones that were cleaned out. They've had nothing since then or at most, a subsistence trickle, a little bit of greed when taking the Spring crop would have meant dead bees unless fed. My double broods, albeit dummied to eighteen frames are all a very healthy, heavy weight. The single broods are the old queens now built back up from a nuc at swarm time. I was concerned about the 2021 queen as they were hanging out the front of the hive when I put the clearer board on. The bees didn't clear so I left them a couple of days but still no change. At least a hundred bees or more that needed shaking and I scooped the clumps off the underside of the boards with my hands which was far kinder than dumping them all.

 

[Erichalfbee]

If your clearer board exit holes are in the middle a little puff of smoke into the clearer gets the bees out of the way.
Otherwise a similar puff under the board before you take it off has the bees moving away.
No need for thumping the board down or shaking the bees into the box.
Any that are left will find their way home if you put the clearer upside down with a corner against the entrance.