When to harvest?

[TonyPayne]

I have some supers that have been almost full for some time now. When is the best time to take them off? Can I take the full frames and just replace them with foundation? What happens to the honey if I leave them until the end of August in the hope that the last 5% of the cells get filled, does it start to crystallise like it would in a jar?

Thanks,
Tony

 

[Dadnlad]

If your frames are 95% capped - have them off
Plenty of time to fill them again

Idealy you would replace with a drawn super, but if you havent got one then foundation wil do

Or make sure your extractor/buckets are ready, whip the super off spin it out and get it back on the same day

 

[drex]

If oil seed rape honey in any of the frames it has probably already crystallised and will not spin out. Any such frames I give a good misting with water and feed back to the
Bees.
It is unlikely, even at the end of the season that all frames will be totally capped. Uncapped frames can be safely extracted if you hold them flat over the hive and give a good shake. If nothing comes out then the moisture content is likely to be OK for extracting. If drops come out they are not ready. I do the shake test at the apiary then check water content with a refractometer before extracting . Anything less than 19-20 is OK to extract.
I get the supers back on the same day, and if short of drawn comb will make up extra supers alternating the drawn extracted frames with foundation. If a flow is on the foundation is drawn quickly.
Less than 50% of my OSR crop was capped this year, but moisture content still OK to extract

 

[For want of a better word]

My New Zealand Italian bees and my neighbors imported Buckfasts have started to remove and use the stores in the supers put on in the last 6 weeks...
IF you remove the supers do not forget to feed them!!

Defra have put out a starvation notification to all beekeepers registered on Beebase.

Yeghes da

 

[TonyPayne]

Thanks for the advice, I'll have a rummage through the supers next weekend and see what I can take off.

 

[enrico]

Remember you don't have to take a whole super off. You can take capped frames out of various supers, just don't leave any gaps, either reduce the number of supers or fill the gaps with fresh frames.
E