The bee keeper diaries

[allen_kcCard]

What is pulling boxes? Taking them apart to extract the honey? What happens with the bees over winter?

[Iowanian]

Originally Posted by allen_kcCard

What is pulling boxes? Taking them apart to extract the honey? What happens with the bees over winter?

Basics. There are what are "deep supers" and mediums/honey supers.

In the Midwest, you typically need 2 deeps with 10 frames each for the bees to live. The bottom one is typically where the queen lays most of the eggs and the second you want to see full of capped honey going into winter. They build their hives in a shape and usually have honey in the top.

We let them fill 2 deeps, and then when they are about 70-80% full you add a honey super. They are more like 6 1/2" deep with 10 frames. ( in the type of hives I have). When the honey Super is 80% full of capped honey you add another.....and hopefully another. All hives of bees are different and I don't know why. I have some I got the first day and one hive has 3 honey supers full and the other might fill one.

Each of the honey super stars will weigh probably 40lbs. A gallon of honey is 12lbs

So, when I said pull the boxes, I was referring to taking the honey supers, blowing the bees out and harvesting honey. In Iowa we do that before the golden rod blooms because that pollen makes the honey taste like shit.

I will document and share the harvesting process around Labor Day.