Honey Harvest!

I spent an excellent (and enjoyable Saturday and Sunday morning) harvesting my honey. It was reasonably hard work lifting the frames and picking away at the combs removing the cappings, but with the help of others (and a few beers) the time passed quite swiftly!

However, before I could enjoy myself and conduct all this fun stuff I had to go and take the supers off my hives. I first went to the Botanical Gardens and removed 3 supers on the afternoon of 4th July. What a nice way to spend the day you might think... I'd agree, if it wasn't 41C (105F) and I didn't have to do all that lifting and hauling around of the supers! I was soaked with sweat within minutes! The good news was that my girls didn't seem to mind me doing it!

While I was at the gardens I checked my nuc and found the "squashed" swarm cell was still in place but that the bees in the nuc had started to form a new queen cell. I removed this as I found the queen and I plan to combine the hives sometime later this week.

I removed 5 supers from my hive at home on Saturday morning; at 6.30am it was already about 30C (85F) and again it proved to be really hot and really unpleasant. by the time Sunday came and I had to remove my final 2 supers I really didn't have the appetite to get fully kitted up. Anyway, thankfully, the hot weather here broke on Saturday evening (daily highs had been over 38C for 10 days running) and it was a much cooler 20F (70F) at 6.30am. It was still hot but I managed to remove the supers easily enough. Who has a good idea for a refrigerated beekeeping suit?

Once again the honey from the three sources was quite different in colour and flavour. The Botanical Garden Honey being quite "strong", the honey from home "sweeter". To summarize:

Botanical Garden Honey = 24.5 kgs (54 lbs)
"Big" Hive Honey = 50 kgs (110 lbs)
"Small" Hive Honey = 22.5 kgs (50 lbs)
"Observation" Hive = 3 kgs (7 lbs) - from one deep frame.

Total = 100 kg (220 lbs)

Nice Job Girls!

The 2012 Haul!

My Motley Crew