Beekeeping

[CloverKnollFarms]

I harvested mine 2 weeks ago. Got honey from 8 out of my 10 hives and ended up with 237lbs to go with the 75lbs I got in July. Yields were down but still a pretty decent amount considering the drought conditions for out area.

We had a pretty extensive drought too. No measurable rain for three months. Brutal.

We had 5 established colonies from last year, the others were all added this year.

I have two new locations that have some great nectar flows, that we just placed hives on this year.

We harvested honey from (4) of the (11) we have going into winter. The first year swarms, except one, didn't make excess. Several new swarms were too weak to put up enough for winter, so they were culled.

Considering the weather and the few established hives we had this year, I'm happy. We earn more from building hives than we do honey sales... I don't think that will ever change.

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

Off to buy another $1000 in lumber for hives and stand builds this winter.

Its a good feeling having the shop stocked for 5 months of building. Now I can just hibernate.

These new frames are turning out amazing. I think I'm on track to build my 700th frame!

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

Luckily lumber prices have been really stable.

6 hives there. Some assembly required.

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

11 sheets of plywood processed into parts!

 

[drumminj]

Is that an SAF Natura honey extractor in the background 2 pictures up? If so, the layens version?

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

Is that an SAF Natura honey extractor in the background 2 pictures up? If so, the layens version?

Yessir. Its a SAF

 

[drumminj]

Yessir. Its a SAF

I'm always amused by the details that stick when I'm researching something. The green legs and shape of the tub looked very familiar to me.

The used extractor I bought is a manual 9 frame radial/3 frame tangential SAF. Looking forward to getting to use it next year.

It's crazy how quickly our weather changed here and the bee behavior changed. Went from highs in the 80s and lots of foraging activity on the asters and last of the goldenrod to lows in the 40s and the bees seem to have buttoned themselves up for winter. Didn't see any foragers on the buckwheat in our garden beds today (planted as a cover crop).

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

Yeah our flow is over and the bees are quiet. I'm just building boxes and teaching another guy how to build his own... I don't think he will actually do it once he sees the whole process

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

Cleaning up some beeswax to make our winter lip balm. We make about 150-200 sticks per year.
I make 35g ingots to make the batching easier

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

My daughter gets her own special blend for Boston weather.

 

[Torvy]

Wife just pulled about 12 lbs from our hive. We don't do anything cool with wax yet. Maybe that will bee a next year thing.

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

Wife just pulled about 12 lbs from our hive. We don't do anything cool with wax yet. Maybe that will bee a next year thing.

Wax cleaning is fun, IMHO, and the margins on lip balm are also awesome.

Wax cappings are great because they are so clean. Darker brood comb takes a little more work because of all of the cacoons.

 

[fishin coyote]

What are you using to melt in, double boiler? I use a yard sale crockpot. Which takes a while but is nice in that I don’t have to babysit it the entire time

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

What are you using to melt in, double boiler? I use a yard sale crockpot. Which takes a while but is nice in that I don’t have to babysit it the entire time

I put the whole lot in a wax pot on the stovetop with water. I melt it all down, pour through cheese cloth, clean wax floats, impurities stay in the cloth or water.

For the lip balm melt, I set the oven at 180F. I measure all the components, melt them together, place them in a glass kitchen measuring cup.

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

Assembled a few frames tonight. Got 8 more bee boxes ready for interior insulation.

 

[RayIN]

Assembled a few frames tonight. Got 8 more bee boxes ready for interior insulation.View attachment 4325475View attachment 4325476

Have you seen the commercial on TV where the man puts a bee hive together before reading instructions?

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

Have you seen the commercial on TV where the man puts a bee hive together before reading instructions?

Negative

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

So this time around I enacted a few more quality control measures for these boxes in a box... Wow, what a difference. Keeping the inner and middle components aligned so that the outer panels align perfectly, has been a challenge. But this time around they are amazing. I planned to build these orders over winter... But it seems I'll be finished by Dec 1

 

[ponytug]

So this time around I enacted a few more quality control measures for these boxes in a box... Wow, what a difference. Keeping the inner and middle components aligned so that the outer panels align perfectly, has been a challenge. But this time around they are amazing. I planned to build these orders over winter... But it seems I'll be finished by Dec 1View attachment 4327251

What did you do differently? (Looks gorgeous)

All the best, Peter

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

What did you do differently? (Looks gorgeous)

All the best, Peter

I have begun measuring corner to corner for all of the interior walls to ensure they are centered to the bottom. Also made a jig to ensure the interior wall heights are correct and uniform. They are all within about .015" after assembly. Those set up your exterior walls, so if they are off, your exterior walls will be misaligned

It's really an issue of stacking tolerances as you build them from the inside out. The original plans do not address that issue or any ways to mitigate it. I've been building them for about 5 years and each time tweak the process. These are by far my best boxes ever.