Jarred

My carton full of very fetching hexagonal 1/2 lb (or 227g) glasses was starting to look wistful and seemingly wanted some form of fulfilment. Having put the jars through a dishwasher in the morning - thanks, Merrill! - I therefore decided to jar the honey toady.

So down to school it was. When I arrived in the kitchen, armed with a variety of tubs to catch any honey spillage, I noticed to my horror that the settling tub had a leak and a pool of honey had slowly and stickily spread across the work surface. Had obviously not screwed the bung in tightly enough when assembling it. Drat. Half a glass of honey gone that way.
So started the jarring with cleaning up. 

The filling itself was easy enough. There was scarcely any bubble-scum on the surface, but I did leave it slightly too late to cream it off, so a lot of jars have a bit of bubbly in them. To be honest, I really like that creamy froth on the top and always looked forward to opening a new jar to get that. Next time I know to cream it off immediately (and save it for myself!). The last two jars were admittedly a bit muckier (no insect legs, though), but good enough for me.

The honey harvest

Cleaning up afterwards was a doddle again and I am falling in love with the power shower tap.

All in all the bees produced 25 jars, so just over 12 lb, which I think is not bad at all, all things considered. Am very pleased. Now I'm just waiting for the labels, which I designed and ordered last night, to arrive.

Honey harvest

With the honey extractor in school and all else prepared, today was finally the day to spin out the honey.
In the morning I quickly (and luckily - as will be seen later) read up a bit more about what to expect and then donned old gardening clothes (in the expectation of being covered in honey and unwilling to sacrifice decent clothes for this) and packed my capping board, a towel, the plastic tubs, a bread knife and a feather. Yes - a feather. This in fact turned out to be the most important piece of equipment of the day.

The tool of the day

A book had said if the super still has some bees in it, then you can remove the frames singly and brush the bees off with a feather; if you do this some distance from the hive, they will just fly back to their hive. Hence the feather.
The more perceptive among you already know what's coming.
The Moon super was of course not empty of bees, but still had a sizeable population crawling around in it. So, I threw the towel over the top (rather than in) and wrapped it around, ensuring it was tight so no more bees could get in (the chances of the ones already there leaving of their own accord was minimal), and brought it to the waiting car. I then removed the one-way doors (also known as porter bee escapes) from the crown board (the hive's roof), took out the queen excluder and left the Moon to itself.

Back to the super wrapped in a beach towel by the car.
This was some way from the hive and I thought (beesuit still on), that I would tickle the bees out of the super. I think as many flew back into the super as I flicked out. No question of them blithely flying back to their hive - they were in the super for good. Wrapping the present up again tightly, I put it in the boot and drove it to the school kitchen entrance. Here, having put the super on the floor, I attempted once again to coax the bees out of the super. Having no wellies on anymore I was slightly worried at the number of bees buzzing around my ankles and moved the super to an outside table. By this time some wasps were interested too.
The bees being as unwilling to move out of the super as squatters who have just found the ideal premises, I resorted to taking the frames out, one at a time, brushing them free of bees and carrying them singly to the kitchen, all the while ensuring that I had no followers. I really pitied the bees. There was I blatantly daylight robbing them of their honey and they never followed me, but just buzzed around the super. None attacked me, although they always showed a keen interest when I returned to steal another frame.

Finally I had everything as I needed it: extractor on the floor in the kitchen, capping bowl and board in place, next to it a tub of cold water to wash my hands, the empty super to take the frames once spun out and a settling tub with the frames in for the time being.

With some trepidation I took the first frame - not a full one - and tentatively sawed away at the capping with the bread knife. Soon I got the hang of it, though I think I cut too low down quite often and thus condemned a lot of honey to the capping bowl rather than to the extractor. Surprisingly, when uncapped, the honey did not start flowing in silly amounts. In fact, it hardly dripped at all and I was able to load the extractor with four frames with hardly any drips, drops or sticky spots appearing anywhere.

Uncapping the honey stores

When the frames were in the extractor, it was time to give it a spin. After a few turns one way, you turn the frames round and then spin again. This, apparently, is to prevent the honey for the inside breaking through to the outside. After four spins (sounds like a washing-machine) and a jolly waltz of the extractor around the kitchen, despite me wedging it between my feet and knees, the honey was out.

Waltzing Mathilda

The uncapping was the messiest stage and I often had to lick my fingers clean of honey. That was the good part. The honey is really delicious: a dark gold and quite runny with a sweet but quite clovery taste to it (I'm sorry, I'm not a honey gourmet, so can't describe the taste in all the floral language I'm sure professional honey-tasters use; I also have practically no clue what different types of honey taste like, so couldn't even say what's gone into the mix). And while uncapping, you can have little bits of wax with it, so it feels like the fresh honeycomb honey. Well, it is fresh honeycomb honey, I suppose.

Putting the empty frame into the empty super

After all eleven frames had been spun out, I realised that most of the weight on the frames was actually the wax, not the honey. Nevertheless, I had the feeling that I had collected some honey. This was dripping from the main extraction chamber through a sieve to a settling tub. As I had hired the extractor for two days only, I had to unsettle the honey from that settling tank to my own, final settling tub.

The first look into the tub after the extraction had finished was very exciting as I had no clue how much honey there would be. With all due mathematical precision, I'd say it's a fair amount. To think that just one hive that was building up its strength this year collected that much honey in a shortened season is amazing. I am very proud of my Moon bees and have forgiven them all their propolising ways.
Well, I actually already did that yesterday, when I did the varroa counts.

Only thing left to do was to fill the honey from the metal settling tub into the plastic one. This was the moment various people who were in school for various reasons chose to show up and taste a bit of honey. Talk about honey thieves. They were all very excited and enthusiastic about the honey. That's the good thing about a school environment, too: you'll always have someone milling around, who you can talk to or who will (hopefully) appreciate what you're doing. There were even some pupils around who were very excited about the honey.

From sieve to settling tank to settling tub

The clearing up at the end is what most people warn you about. But, to be quite honest, there was very little honey drippage, so work surfaces were mostly clean. Being in a school kitchen it was no problem to find sinks large enough to accommodate the extractor and tank and - I loved this part - the school kitchen also has a great shower-head-type contraption, where the cold water comes out at high pressure! Ideal for cleaning all the metal tank, because cold water is all you need (so easy the washing up, really).

Fours hours later, after all was done, washed and stored I packed my things into the car again. Some bees were still buzzing around where I first put the super down, the poor things. The honey is gone, gone, gone (for them....).

Together with some pupils, who were eager to learn more about the honey extraction process, I returned the super with the wet frames to the Moon so that the bees can clean it out. Gives them a bit of honey and me clean supers ready for next year.

In a way it's been a long day. Am very pleased that everything (except for the beginning) went so smoothly (and even that obstacle was surmounted). Feel just a little more like a beekeeper now.
In school the other teachers there congratulated me on the honey and I kept thinking, none of this is my work. You should be thanking the bees. So a big thank you to the bees from Moon - they are stars! I am very very proud of them.

Medication...

Folllowing yesterday's varroa count and the distressing results for Star, I put some Apiguard in today. This is a chemical that should kill the varroa to a level that is manageable. The bees then get a second helping of chemicals in January and that should hopefully solve the varroa problem for the time being.

Apiguard applied directly to the brood frames

Am still upset that the Star is suffering so much.
Left them their supers, as they have practically no honey in them anyway. Hopefully they'll clear those out soon.

Varroa count

Today I collected a honey extractor and settling tub for the honey harvest tomorrow. I have set up in the school kitchen: another advantage of beekeeping in a school is the kitchen is on an industrial scale so the sinks are large enough to fit in and be able to wash the extractor, sieve and tub. Had I had to do this at home I would have despaired (or used a hose). The kitchen also has plenty of tables and work surfaces and is designed to be besplattered with food, so my honey harvesting in there should really be ideal.

Am only harvesting from the Moon, as Star doesn't even have one side of a frame full of sealed honey.
And finally I may know the reason.

Took out the varroa boards today (a detailed breakdown of the mite drop is below) and thank God I had divided them up into ocean squares otherwise I would have had a terrible time counting. After 13 days there are quite a lot of varroa crabbing about on the floor (yes, some of the ilk were waving their arms around). The Star hive is badly - really badly - infested and I will start treatment tomorrow. They have five times as many varroa as the Moon, which is really doing well and shouldn't need treatment at all. With two hives that close together where drift is certain to occur, this is interesting to say the least.

Mite drop statistic for Moon (13 days)

Mite drop statistic for Star (13 days)

Without having a single clue, my guess is the Moon bees' propensity to propolise everything (they are expert gluers) might have something to do with it. Star does not propolise half as much as Moon does. The varroa count is all the more astonishing as I have done more drone trapping in the Star than the Moon, so there should theoretically be fewer varroa mites in the Star.

Am now already a few steps ahead and thinking of re-queening the Star with the next Moon queen next year.  

DIY capping board

As hinted yesterday, I did a little DIY job today - just some bits of wood screwed together. To be able to uncap the honey without creating too much of a mess, you do it over a tub. As the honey is in frames, this can get awkward cutting and supporting and so on, so you put a board across the tub and rest the frame on that, tip it so it's over the tub and cut the caps off.
So far so good. Books suggest making a hole in the wood so you can put the lug of the frame in that, to prevent the frame from slipping while you cut (everything will be covered in honey, remember). But I don't have the tools to make circular holes in planks of wood very easily. So my idea was to screw a lid upside down to the board, which should have the same function. I didn't want the lid to be too big so I spent some minutes scanning all the glasses in the supermarket till I found this one.
French Dijon mustard.

My uncapping tub with board.

Buried in Books

Not the bees! No, like the pupils I so often teach, I am now leafing through books, learning, doing my revision - what ever you want to call it. The test I have coming up is honey extraction. As I want to do it as right as possible, I thought I'd do some reading up, so as not to be caught unawares (as so often lately).

A selection of B..books - not that I've read them all.

Lucky I did, because it seems I will need to do some DIY tomorrow. I also need to buy some plastic tubs (for mopping away the honey that will be everywhere, apparently). Am also planning to phone around tomorrow to beg, steal or borrow a honey extractor, as the honey must be jarred this week.
Am quite excited and suitably nervous.

Will keep you posted - literally.

Super inspection

Inspected the hives yesterday after my ten days away.

In the past whenever I've been to inspect the bees, I've always done a full hive inspection, lifting out each frame - much to the annoyance of the bees who are trying so hard to gunk everything together with bracecomb and propolis. As I was driving to school (the joy of going to school during the holidays!) I thought that the only reason I'm doing a full hive inspection, really, is so that I've done a full hive inspection. There's no real reason to do it: the bees aren't going to swarm, the queen is fine and if there are plenty of bees, then everything should be ok. I don't want my beekeeping to become too invasive, as I'm sure the bees basically know what to do and don't need me telling them (not that I can waggle-dance).
So, in a break with tradition I thought this time I'd only look at what really interested me: the honey crop in the supers. Thought this 'inspection light' might make my bees happier, too.

As I wouldn't be in the brood chamber, I thought I'd try leather gloves again, just to see if they're really that bad. They are. Could hardly lift a frame out with them on.

Smoker went brilliantly (I had had some difficulties with it in the past) and the bees were well-behaved, really.

Moon has a super nearly full (so that means some honey!). There's still space on the outward frames and not all honey is capped yet. Hope they can do that till next week, when I have to take the honey off. Weather looks ok for that. The Moon hive was not nearly as busy as last time, so I assume the queen has reduced her laying a bit.

Star is not doing much with the supers. Instead of focusing on a few frames and getting those done properly, the bees are drawing out comb on most frames, but always only on one side. I'm sure that wind, the earth's magnetic field or moisture have something to do with this orientation, but it's weird. There'll be no honey from Star, I fear. My poor Star-struck bees. Sometimes I think a task-force from the Moon might help them sort themselves out.

What was interesting, was that throughout my inspection quite a number of wasps buzzed about the place, making a general nuisance of themselves. At one time I saw a bee and wasp locked in close combat on the ground. Unfortunately the wasp got away, as did the bee, fortunately (lovely chiasmus, there; can't get the English teacher out of me). Because of this, the bees flying around were a lot more aggressive and ready to sting. My clothing was stung a number of times, but the fascinating thing was that most of the bees went for the little bee emblem a friend of mine had made me and sewn onto the suit. They couldn't sting that, though, as the wool was too high for them to get a purchase on the suit (and skin!) beneath, which was lucky for all involved.
Some enormous, mutant killer hornet, they must have thought.

The bees' sworn enemy - with apologies for the lack of focus.

Bee Battleships

Went to inspect the hives yesterday, but before I did, I drew a grid on the varroa boards as I will do a seven-day varroa drop count to see whether I need to do anything before winter.
Once again preparation would have paid off, as I used my trusty permanent marker, that has helped through many a permanently marking situation. Obviously too often, as the pen ran out as I was drawing the lines. It just about held, but the lines are very faint. I will have to redraw them with a fresh pen. I also labelled the columns with letters and the rows with numbers, so if the bees get bored (no pun intended), they can play varroa battleships, or similar.

Oh, and I did have photos of all this, but my computer swallowed them without a trace, so unfortunately there are none. I will try to take some of one board when I'm next out there. Sorry...

This is the board after it's been in a few days. As you can see, the bees have already started playing battleships and there's a wasp sunk in A5.