Poorly chicken

[Daphne]

OK chaps - have you done your extracting yet? We did ours on Sunday and got 41lbs which isn't very good considering we got 60lbs last year, though in a way I am grateful for anything given at one stage we thought our prime hive had swarmed and locally apparently all harvests are down, by as much as 50% Interestingly the honey is darker than the past 2 years and richer and sweeter in flavour. I put this down to the fact that the seasons were odd this year and very very warm in April, followed by a bit of rain and not much sun all summer, so I am presuming perhaps the balance of nectars was different to the norm.

 

Anyway, I have yet another saluatory tale. You may remember last year I had to go to A&E because I stupidly got my hand caught between the handle and the extractor and this year OH has already been to A&E because of a bee sting. This time we borrowed a more modern extractor, but still a manual one. My co-beek was doing his stint but leant on the lid, which was made of toughened (ie brittle) plastic. It shattered into 3, sending huge shards everywhere miraculously missing my co-beek, the cats, the stuff in the room and luckily I had gone to wash my hands otherwise it would have gone straight at me. Even more miraculously my co-beek managed to pull his hand to safety rather than it disappearing into the extractor. It makes my stomach turn writing about it.

 

I can't believe how expensive they are and how dangerous. I know both times a certain degree of operator error has occured but surely this sort of thing shouldn't be allowed to happen. In fact this extractor came to us with one side of the lid missing, and now I know why - I bet something like this has already happened. The thing that makes me really furious is that there is no way for the lid to be securely fastened on/in. There are no clips, no recesses for it to slide and lock into. You literally try to poke it under the central bar and hope for the best. Or not in our case.

[Old Speckled Hen]

I have one of these

 

 

The top comes in two halves. The flat end sits under the top bar and the round one has a k"Ooops, word censored!" on the underside that makes it sit fast but I'm sure it isn't really secure.

My husband is quite handy with things like that so we will both have a think about making a locking top.

Thanks for the warning, Daphne. A mishap did cross my mind as I leaned on the lid just to steady that first wobble

I did try to even up the frames as far as weight went but it's not always possible.

[Olly]

Crikey, thanks for the warning! I have (use of) a rather old manual extractor, and the lids are stainless steel but I am very wary about making sure it's all stopped before I go near it.

 

I'm hoping to get another harvest of honey, the weather was so changeable here at the weekend I didn't go in but last time I looked there was some capped. I need to get it off soon so that I can do the thymol treatment before it's too cold, but it was so chilly yesterday I wonder if I'm too late already! 41lbs sounds good to me Daphne, I'll be happy to get another 20lbs or so.

 

Glad there was no harm done to anyone.

[Daphne]

The one we used was quite similar to yours OSH, but without the tripod and without any form of lid k"Ooops, word censored!"bage. The lid was plastic and in 2 halves as that one seems to be.

 

Is that a motor or is it manual? Ours was manual. One trick we learnt, through bitter experience, was not to turn the handle too vigourously, although I could see the difference in the amount of honey extracted when I did it gently (feeble) and when co-beek did it vigorously (much more). Everybody tells you to balance the thing, but sometimes it just isn't possible. I also didn't much like the cages inside,they are obviously made to be all-purpose but the net result is that our national frames were thrown around more as the cage would have taken wider frames (or possibly national frames with a lot more honey on than we managed )

[Old Speckled Hen]

It's an eight frame radial with two screens to take brood frames tangentially. It's driven by a drill.

It worked a treat, starting slowly and building up speed.

50lbs honey this year. I'm pleased with that considering the bloomin" swarming

[Kermit]

It's an eight frame radial with two screens to take brood frames tangentially. It's driven by a drill.

It worked a treat, starting slowly and building up speed.

50lbs honey this year. I'm pleased with that considering the bloomin" swarming

Blimey! Very posh. Yorkshireness must be catching - my first thought was that I wouldn't pay all that money for a motor when I can turn it by hand

[Old Speckled Hen]

Dave

have a look at Agri Nova

The drill driven Giordan extractor is only £25 more than the manual one and for the £375 I paid for it at Stoneleigh this year I think it's a bargain

[beesontoast]

Thanks - I will add that to the list of the hazards that top bar hive beekeepers don't have to worry about...

[Peaches]

Bad luck, Daphne!

 

We extracted last night and have about a quarter of what we got last year and our honey is much darker and tastes a bit more spicy. We wondered if our bees had got into some heather somewhere - but maybe it's like you say, just a different mix of nectars. Anyway, we're going to bottle it tonight and whittle down our list of friends to get honey as there won't be enough to go around!

[Kermit]

Fi (Peaches) and I have bottled about 2/3 of our harvest and got about 10lbs done so far. Nowhere near as good as last year - 50%. I have done a couple of chunk jars too - look really good. Will post pictures soon.