Manual of the apiary

by Albert John Cook

The extractor enables us to remove uncapped honey in the fall, which, if left in the hive, may cause disease and death.

By use of the extractor, too, we can throw the honey from our surplus brood-combs in the fall, and thus have a salable article, and have the empty combs, which are invaluable for use the next spring. We now have in our apiary one hundred and fifty such empty combs.

If the revolving racks of the extractor have a wire basket attachment, at the bottom as I have suggested, the uncapped sections can be emptied in the fall, if desired, and pieces of drone-comb cut from the brood-chamber, which are so admirable for starters in the sections, can be emptied of their honey at any season.

By use of the extractor, we can furnish at one-half the price we ask for comb-honey, an article which is equal, if not superior, to the best comb-honey, and which, were it not for appearance alone, would soon drive the latter from the market.

WHEN TO USE THE EXTRACTOR.

If extracted honey can be sold for fifteen, or even twelve cents, the extractor may be used profitably the summer through; otherwise use it sufficiently often that there may always be empty worker-cells in the brood-chamber.

It is often required with us during the three great honey harvests—the white clover, basswood, and that of fall flowers. I have always extracted the honey so frequently as to avoid much uncapping. If the honey was thin, I would keep it in a dry warm room, or apply a mild heat, that it might thicken, and escape danger from fermentation. Yet, so many have sustained a loss by extracting prematurely, that I urge all never to extract till after the bees have sealed the cells. The labor of uncapping, with the excellent honey knives now at our command, is so light, that we can afford to run no risk that the honey produced at our apiaries shall sour and become worthless.

If the honey granulates, it can be reduced to the fluid state with no injury, by healing, though the temperature should never rise above 200° F. This can best be done by placing the vessel containing the honey in another containing water, though if the second vessel be set on a stove, a tin basin or pieces of wood should prevent the honey vessel from touching the bottom, else the honey would burn. As before stated, the best honey is always sure to crystallize, but it may be prevented by keeping it in a temperature which is constantly above 80° F. If canned honey is set on top a furnace in which a fire is kept burning, it will remain liquid indefinitely.

To render the honey free from small pieces of comb, or other impurities, it should either be passed through a cloth or wire sieve—I purposely refrain from the use of the word strainer, as we should neither use the word strained, nor allow it to be used, in connection with extracted honey—or else draw it off into a barrel, with a faucet or molasses gate near the lower end, and after all particles of solid matter have risen to the top, draw off the clear honey from the bottom. In case of very thick honey, this method is not so satisfactory as the first. I hardly need say that honey, when heated, is thinner, and will of course pass more readily through common toweling or fine wire-cloth.

Never allow the queen to be forced to idleness for want of empty cells. Extract all uncapped honey in the fall, and the honey from all the brood-combs not needed for winter. The honey, too, should be thrown from pieces of drone-comb which are cut from the brood-frames, and from the uncapped comb in sections at the close of the season.