Little confused here, I thought the bees capping the honey was them saying the moisture level is good to go? I was taught to not harvest a frame until 80%+ was capped.
Usually once the bees start capping majority of the honey on the frame is in the ball park and he does confirm the moisture level with his refractometer. But you are right it’s a good yard stick to go by and as a small beekeeper i personally stick to it. I think larger commercial beekeepers use dehydrators
Cool to see a starter. 5 year beekeeper in the Southeast US and it is hard to maintain the health of my bees due to no rural areas left and too much urban expansion.
th-cam.com/video/tGD7CA12i-Y/w-d-xo.htmlsi=cPe2gt8YJYGXnrew For anyone that wants to educate themselves a little more I would say this fella lays it out pretty straight. Just because your honey is capped does not mean it’s dry and just because it’s not capped does not mean it’s wet. Trust your refractometer. As far as colour this is great light honey from along a creek with wild flower but bees also have access to canola fields so the honey will be more clear.
I was reading comments while watching and felt some were not being fair to you. Then you showed sugar water pails on top of honey supers. There's no defending that. If bees can fill a super a week on canola, they can surely adulterate honey in a few days from buckets.
So I had pulled half my honey supers when I put the sugar water on as the main nectar flow was over where I had the bees on the canola. I pulled the other supers 2 days later which I think I mentioned in video(that was unfortunate and I probably should have just waited but I got called away). Since then I moved my bees to chase the nectar flow on a field phacelia and hairy vetch that was planted in June and won’t be cut till the end of September for swath grazing. As soon as I moved my bees I put the supers back on and pulled my pails. Anything they collected would have went into the top of the bottom two super as my queen excluder is above that I plan on leaving two supers to overwinter up here in the north. Does that make a little more sense, or would you still object to my logic ?
I would also to Highlight the original comment. Here in germany it is illegal to Feed the bees with sugar water and harvest the supers and call this honey. As the bees will store the sugar(water) also in the supers. Feeding the bees with sugarwater and extracting 100lbs of honey a week later is not a miracle nor related to hard work. BTW: This is the method how (Fake) China honey is made. They just provide sugar water to the bees all year around.
I am fairly educated on the matter, not sure what your comment means or what you see that’s not so good. Most of my frames are less than 10% uncapped and if I’ve checked the water content and it’s under 17% then from the resources I’ve talked to and read this honey should be good. This particular box I did pull early to test out some of the equipment but again I was diligent on checking water content. Your comment seemed more pointed than helpful in my mind.
Great video! Love your style!
Love the startup, you have some decent equipment there to go forward.
Little confused here, I thought the bees capping the honey was them saying the moisture level is good to go? I was taught to not harvest a frame until 80%+ was capped.
Usually once the bees start capping majority of the honey on the frame is in the ball park and he does confirm the moisture level with his refractometer. But you are right it’s a good yard stick to go by and as a small beekeeper i personally stick to it. I think larger commercial beekeepers use dehydrators
@ gotcha! Thanks
Cool to see a starter. 5 year beekeeper in the Southeast US and it is hard to maintain the health of my bees due to no rural areas left and too much urban expansion.
Not normally but this was the first go at it. That’s why I checked it with the refractometer and it checked out good. What are your thoughts?
th-cam.com/video/tGD7CA12i-Y/w-d-xo.htmlsi=cPe2gt8YJYGXnrew
For anyone that wants to educate themselves a little more I would say this fella lays it out pretty straight. Just because your honey is capped does not mean it’s dry and just because it’s not capped does not mean it’s wet. Trust your refractometer. As far as colour this is great light honey from along a creek with wild flower but bees also have access to canola fields so the honey will be more clear.
You harvest uncapped honey?
We all harvest uncapped honey.
Nothing wrong as long as water content is correct. My uncapped honey is usually in the 16 percent range which is good.
This is an example of more money than sense.
I was reading comments while watching and felt some were not being fair to you. Then you showed sugar water pails on top of honey supers. There's no defending that. If bees can fill a super a week on canola, they can surely adulterate honey in a few days from buckets.
So I had pulled half my honey supers when I put the sugar water on as the main nectar flow was over where I had the bees on the canola. I pulled the other supers 2 days later which I think I mentioned in video(that was unfortunate and I probably should have just waited but I got called away). Since then I moved my bees to chase the nectar flow on a field phacelia and hairy vetch that was planted in June and won’t be cut till the end of September for swath grazing. As soon as I moved my bees I put the supers back on and pulled my pails. Anything they collected would have went into the top of the bottom two super as my queen excluder is above that I plan on leaving two supers to overwinter up here in the north. Does that make a little more sense, or would you still object to my logic ?
I would also to Highlight the original comment.
Here in germany it is illegal to Feed the bees with sugar water and harvest the supers and call this honey. As the bees will store the sugar(water) also in the supers.
Feeding the bees with sugarwater and extracting 100lbs of honey a week later is not a miracle nor related to hard work.
BTW: This is the method how (Fake) China honey is made. They just provide sugar water to the bees all year around.
It seems delicious
Most places it is illegal to sell sugar water honey as real honey.
Dude, I highly recommend you to educate yourself on the matter first! BTW, this honey is not looking good.... 🤢🤢🤢🤢🤢
I am fairly educated on the matter, not sure what your comment means or what you see that’s not so good. Most of my frames are less than 10% uncapped and if I’ve checked the water content and it’s under 17% then from the resources I’ve talked to and read this honey should be good. This particular box I did pull early to test out some of the equipment but again I was diligent on checking water content. Your comment seemed more pointed than helpful in my mind.
@@pfckamphuis9298 The honey looks good. I appreciate a hardworking man. I wish you all the best!