Natural Beekeeping International Forum

[PennineFoxhound]

Hi there, I am involved with a local conservation project, we have our first beehive ('modern' not natural/topbar). I am trying to persuade the others that we should leave all the heather honey in the hive over-winter and if there is any remaining next spring, remove it then. They say heather honey will harden if we leave it in hive and so won't be able to extract/bottle it. I can't find any evidence to argue with that... can you help please?

[Mark Young]

I would suggest in the interest of conservation that the hardening of the honey in such situations is really a secondary concern.

For the first year I left all the honey on. I made a record of the stores before winter and again at the first flow; that gave me an indication of how much stores they will need available in future years for a successful winter. That should avoid starvations or having to feed inferior sugar. I also believe the excess honey helps jump start the spring build up which benefits everyone...

Then you can start your harvesting the following year, fully aware of what you can/cant take.

And I suspect if you wanted, that there will be a little spare in the spring for you to share amongst yourselves anyway . Extraction may be a little more time consuming but hey, that's half the fun...

P.S Just stating the obvious but if you use an excluder (please don't) then remove it as way too many people make the mistake of leaving it on over winter.

[catchercradle]

[Tavascarow]

Heather honey doesn't crystallise so isn't going to get 'harder'. But darker honeys have been proven to be not as good for wintering than lighter ones.
Dark honeys increase the bees need to deficate more often (Increased impurities) so if they are confined by cold weather & can't fly?
I know some bee keepers who keep back clover honey to use as winter feed & extracts all the darker & more crystalline honeys for bottling or to save for spring feeding the following year.
There is an argument that in areas where bees are confined for long periods (Scandinavia, Canada etc) pure sucrose is a better winter feed than honey for the same reason.
I know that goes against 'natural' principles but what's natural about keeping bees in an area where winter lasts for seven months & there aren't any wild bees of the same species?

[imkeer]

Heather honey is always hard to extract, because it sets like a kind of gel. I have left it in over winter without any problem. The mineral content is higher, but does anyone really think that this is a problem for local bees?

Luc
http://hapicultuur.be/nl

[Paul Reyes]

I agree with you Tavascarow.