Today was the final harvest, and I am absolutely delighted with the amount of honey I ended up with - far more than I was expecting. Its about 18% moisture, quite runny and definitely not the thick heather honey that I’ve seen from hives a few miles away.
Could there be more honey to be extracted ?
I allowed the FlowFrames to drain. It was a warm day, sunny, and I waited until the last drip was captured.
However, when lifting the FlowFrames out of the super I noticed that some of the FlowFrames are considerably heavier than others. They give the appearance of still containing honey.
My plan was to store the Super in a sealed box ready for the next season.
Do I leave the honey in the FlowFrame ? Or do I remove the wax and try to extract the honey on a sunny day, or in the warm, by gravity ?
If I did leave the honey in the FlowFrame, is there a risk of honey, greater than 18% moisture, fermenting ?
I am a little concerned that there may not be enough honey in the brood box. I have a feeder in place feeding the bees syrup, and later, honey that spilled from the frame that ended up on the floor.
I would welcome any thoughts from beekeepers with more experience
I would wash them in hot water to remove all remaining nectar so it doesn’t ferment over the winter and then dry them thoroughly, maybe with a hair dryer.
“We found that with repeated opening/closings of the Flow™ mechanism almost all the honey would flow out. We know that thixotropic honeys do respond to agitation but cannot say yet whether this would work with 100% of a thixotropic honey in the Flow™ frames.”
aka - you can soak the frames in warm water if necessary to soften the honey.
"If honey has crystallised in the Flow™ Frames, you have two options:
Wait for the bees to remove it: Attempting to harvest the honey will have disturbed the comb a little. The bees will likely remove the crystallised honey to repair the comb.
Remove it yourself: The frames will need to be removed from the super and soaked in warm water to soften crystallised honey.
If you are in an area that is prone to crystallised honey, we recommend harvesting as soon as the honey is ready."
In total I took off about 12lbs of honey from the FlowFrames - it was quite runny and flowed well.
However, now I’ve removed the super and inspected the FlowFrames, and judging their weight, there is still a lot of honey remaining. On closer inspection it is thixotropic - more like a gel, and isn’t flowing.
I am told heather honey is like a gel.
Early in the season the bees flew off in the direction of the heather. . . but I’m told nectar from heather doesn’t start until later in the season.
Mid-season and the bees did a 180 - preferred to fly over hedges, tall trees, a main road, and buildings. It wasn’t the direction I’d intended them to go, but there’s nothing I could do to persuade them otherwise.
Hahaha, sounds like you need a beeherder LOL
That would be a good sight
All I can say is to try out those suggestions above - opening and closing the Flow Frames multiple times - this might jiggle it enough to get it to liquidify and flow out.
Otherwise if the frames are capped, and the jiggiling doesn’t work, you could try soaking the frames in how water and see if that softens the honey enough to flow out.
You obvisoubly don’t want it hot enough to melt the wax and let water in.
Any way, let us know how you go, as you are one of our early Flow pioneers
