old brood comb for honey

[MichaelW]

Assuming you are using organic methods and have no comb contamination in your hive from chemicals. Should you be able to retire old, dark brood comb and use it in honey supers. The benifits of culling old comb in the brood chamber has been documented, but seems a waste to not use it if it is not contaminated. Or will other nasty things build up that cause poor flavor, or some other problem.

[Michael Bush]

IMO it makes no differenct to flavor or color (other than the illusion that the honey is darker because the comb makes it appear that way before you extract it). Some people think it does. They can be harder to uncap because the cocoons usually protrude a bit more than the level you uncap, but I uncap them all the time. The wax moths do like cocoons better than plain wax. It is harder to sort the honey by color when you can't see the color as well.

[MichaelW]

Thanks,

Yet another reason to go organic.

[Aspera]

I routinely use my former brood comb for honey supers and have noticed no difference in the quality of the honey. If you mind having pollen-clouded honey or treat woith lots of "hard chemicals", this may not be a good practice for you.

[stangardener]

im guessing that it could also be crush and strained?

[Michael Bush]

You can crush and strain it, yes. But I try to sort it out so the white wax and the brood comb wax are in seperate piles when I am done processing them. Sometimes the cocoons soak up so much wax you don't get much out of brood comb. And the brood comb will make that nice white wax a lot darker.

[Aspera]

I forgot to mention that crush and strain is what I am currently doing. This is probably why I got so much pollen in my honey.

[Michael Bush]

Yum. I love pollen. smile.gif

[Joel]

Except in comb honey tongue.gif

[Michael Bush]

If it doesn't have brood cocoons in it, price it an extra $0.50 and label it as "comb honey with pollen". I'll eat it and some other people would love it, I'm sure.

[stangardener]

that last post is a wonderful example of "every thing works if you let it".

[guatebee]

Personally, I find chewing pollen in the comb so much more tasting than dried pollen. But then, I am a fan just like most in this forum. Give it a try, there could be surprises. Just have a plan B if customers start requesting more comb honey with pollen!!

[notaclue]

Okay... so how long can you safely use comb before you need to pull it and let the girls replace it?

I'm speaking of course about AFB, antibiotics, and the like. Things that I've read about but haven't seen a time frame for non chemical or minimum chemical saturated hives.

[Joel]

The unwritten rule is 5 years.

[Michael Bush]

>Okay... so how long can you safely use comb before you need to pull it and let the girls replace it?

I've had some that was about 25 years old...

>I'm speaking of course about AFB, antibiotics, and the like.

I never used antibiotics and I never had AFB.

> Things that I've read about but haven't seen a time frame for non chemical or minimum chemical saturated hives.

If you had checkmite in the hive, I'd scrap them immeadiatley. smile.gif

Since Cumaphos and Fluvalinate both build up in the wax, I'd say you would be better off to do it more often than five years if you use these.

Seems like, among those who change combs, they usually go every 5 years.

[clintonbemrose]

I always changed comb in a hive body by dating the frame and changing 2 frames every year so that a comb was never older than 5 years. This is the way I was taught by a wise old Beekeeper to help control deases carried on the comb.
Clint

[girl Mark]

I just posted this in another thread:

http://apis.ifas.ufl.edu/apis84/apjul84.htm#2

I heard second-hand that they had some evidence for a shorter time frame recommendation, but I didn't look deeply enough to corroborate that.

Mark

[Joel]

It's not just about what we put in the hive or what diseases affect the bees within that hive. Bees also bring in toxins from pesticide laced pollen sources, polluted water sources and depending on where you live the normal air contaminates that we breath every day. We should also look at contamination with bee feces associated with long terms without cleansing flights, nosema and the occaisional case of dysentary as well as mold, wax mothe feces and other normal hive occurances. After some extensive research and starting on an aggressive culling campaign (brood combs mainly) I've come to believe clean comb contributes in many ways to a healthy hive.

[ December 18, 2005, 11:15 AM: Message edited by: Joel ]

[bourdeaubee]

assuming that bees in nature make hives in trees that maybe used by many different collonies over many years.somehow these hives remain strong.How is there brood any different then man made?

[Michael Bush]

>assuming that bees in nature make hives in trees that maybe used by many different collonies over many years.somehow these hives remain strong.How is there brood any different then man made?

It's a lot smaller. smile.gif

[girl Mark]

I asked that same question to New Mexico beekeeper Les Crowder, and asked him what he sees when doing feral colony removals for homeowners.

He said that he sees evidence that bees and wax moths are symbiotic- that in a large colony in a studwall, for example, there'll be evidence that at some point in the colony's existence, the bees moved the cluster and brood area away from it's original spot, and moved over to one end of the hive, let the wax moth eat the old brood nest area, and then later moved back to the 'destroyed' section and cleaned it up, then built a new brood nest right on top of the old wax moth signs, leaving the 'next' old brood nest for the wax moth.


Mark

[ December 23, 2005, 08:36 PM: Message edited by: girl Mark ]

[Joel]

I have found the same thing in feral swarm removals however I would disagree that it was a symbiotic relationship that existed. I would propose that wax moths are a parasite in honey bee colonies and do not reach populations capable of comb destruction unless a colony is weakened or gone. In fact a weakened colony with wax moth infestation will usually succumb to wax moth larvae destroying combs, defecating and webbing. I have never seen wax moths exist in large sustainable population in a strong hive. More likely what is seen is a hive that dies out or abscounds, wax moth populations explode and as the cycle winds down a new swarm moves into the location building comb in an adjoing area and once strong enough cleaning up the area of destruction left by the previous tennants.

[bourdeaubee]

Thanks for info on wax moths, but I guess what Im saying is, Hasnt anyone ever seen a very strong hive with very old comb?

[Joel]

Absolutely. I did not cull combs except for damaged or drone combs for most of our existance. I've (and I expect everyone) had many, many strong hives on old comb. Despite replacing a thousand or so combs over the past 3 yrs., I still have quite a bit of old comb that I am working to the outside. From the bees standpoint in the brood chamber, they will fill old comb with stores 1st. as they perceive this as brood combs that will need stores in spring. The cells are smaller from the buildup of cacoons, propolis etc which may be to an advantage if you are a small cell purporter.

I think if you are not in a high pesticide area, don't over use harsh chemicals and don't have foulbrood problems in your area you can use old comb successfully. 3 yrs. ago we instituted methodology that is designed to eliminate foulbrood without the use of Drugs (Mark Goodwin/Cliff Van Eaton resesearch). One of the main components is comb culling. Has worked exceptionly well for us. If you are running a few hives you have time to more closely manage for pest and disease. You can still be very successful running old comb.

[Michael Bush]

>Thanks for info on wax moths, but I guess what Im saying is, Hasnt anyone ever seen a very strong hive with very old comb?

Yes, I've seen many very strong hives with very old comb.

[Tomas]

Here's my question for everyone about replacing combs.

One of my hives absconded. Many of the combs were made of new wax--still mostly white because they had been partially filled with honey(they were left in the hive as reserves). Because of rainy conditions recently I wasn't able to get up into the mountains to feed them for almost five weeks because the road was in bad condition.

When I got up there some of these combs (now empty of honey)had a bit of mold growing on the surface of them. They also had become a more brittle than normal but otherwise were in good shape. There was no evidence of wax moths on these newer combs either(some of the older combs that were left did have wax moths).

The first strong flowering period has just started up in the mountains so the bees are beginning to work hard. Should I scrap these moldy combs or will the bees clean them up good enough to the point where it won't harm the honey or brood they put in them?

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Tom

[power napper]

Wax moths are attracted to old comb first in my opinion, they prefer comb that had used to raise brood.
Your bees will clean the "moldy combs" up nicely all by themselves!

[Michael Bush]

They all get brittle over time if the bees aren't working them. I don't understand it, but it's kind of like you best boots sitting around unworn for a while and they get stiff. But when you wear them they go back to being supple. If you give those brittle combs back to the bees they work fine and, for reasons I don't know, they don't stay brittle.