Quote:
Originally Posted by MikeWaters
The beehive had been doing pretty poorly. The same number or less bees than when I started. Hadn't filled out all the comb. It seemed as if the hive was in retreat.
It had been about a month since I last opened it (which is way too long).
So I opened it up, and to my surprise it is doing quite well. There is new comb, and the hive is almost full comb-wise. Lots more bees than before. And not that many hive beetles (I killed all that I saw). So that means there is a fall nectar flow going on right now.
So I put on the super yesterday (the 2nd story of the hive designed to capture honey production). I don't expect I will have any honey to harvest. It will have to all stay so the hive survives the winter.
My member neighbor gave me a nucleus hive, as well as some wax foundations. He also gave me a stainless steel honey extractor. Basically it is a hand-powered centrifuge to remove honey from frames. It's probably worth $300 used. He used to have hives, but hasn't had them in a long time.
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That sounds more sophisticated than our centrifuge, which was a sanitized galvanized garbage can with two hand-welded wire baskets in turn welded to a central axis with a gear at one end, with teeth that meshed with a crank (the gearing was such that it took a bit of effort to get it moving, but once you had momentum, you could really cruise). Used an electric hot knife to cut off the wax cover, and then chewed the wax like gum.