Ross Rounds Honey Comb Vs. Cut Comb??

[HoneyBee28]

I am looking to start producing/selling Honey Combs this year and was wondering if anyone has had any exprenice with Ross Rounds honey supers?
Are they any good and are they worth it?

Are they better then going with Cut Comb?

Also, if I do go with the ross rounds, should I just get a conversion kit? Which would be cheaper and where is the cheapest place to get the ross rounds compleate kit online?

Any tips/tricks to producing good honey comb? What do I need to know in order to start out producing honey comb? Any good books/articles I should read?
I have a pretty good hive with a very preoductive queen and I think they will do well with a extra super on them. Is there anything I should learn or do before adding a honey comb super to them?

Sorry for all the qusetions!
I know I have asked alot of qusetions, but I need the help as I have never tryed to produce comb honey and since reading about it I would like to give it try.


Thanks in advance for all your help! :)

[danno1800]

He owns Ross Rounds. He said the key to comb honey production was a young queen and a large population crowded down into the bottom deep. He uses a queen excluder for comb honey supers and does not use one for Ross Rounds. Good luck! -Danno

[Michael Bush]

It's easier to do cut comb. But there is a good market for the Ross Rounds if you want to do the work. It takes a good cut down split and crowding them up into the supers to do it well. There are some good comb honey books out there. Taylor's "The Comb Honey book" and Killion's "Honey in the Comb". Also Miller's "Fifty years among the bees" and Doolittles "A Year in an Out Apiary" which are not so much comb honey books, but that's what they were raising and they are a year of their techniques in sequence.

http://www.bushfarms.com/beessplits.htm#cutdown

[Allen Dick]

Search this site for "Ross Rounds". The topic has been fairly well covered.

[HoneyBee28]

Thanks so much for all of yall's help!!
And Micheal....I will be checking out those books! Thanks for referring them to me, I have been trying to find some good books about this but didn't know where to start.
Thanks everyone!

The hive I plan to use for this is EXTREMLY active and FULL of bees, I might need to requeen though for a younger queen but other then that this hive is a really good one, I hope the girls will do good this year!
Thanks!:)

[blueskybeesupply]

Dan:

I have been waiting to meet you for two years at Wooster, did you stop by and I missed you?

[danno1800]

I picked up some of your catalogs to hand out at our upcoming bee school. Thanks for being there. Maybe next year ot HAS in July. -Danno

[Grant]

I've had good success with Ross Rounds - very easy to use and the bees like them. But when sitting on a table at the Farmer's Market, the customer comes up, picks up a RR and says, "What is this?"

Never mind the label that says "Comb Honey." Their next question is, "How do you eat this?" Sometimes they ask, "Did the bees make this or did you?"

I sell 99% of my comb honey as "chunk" honey or "cut comb" honey. These are slabs of honeycomb cut from the frames, placed in a jar and the jar filled with extracted, liquid honey. And it's funny how these same customers never ask those questions with the honeycomb in a jar.

Despite a really cool product in the RR, my customers love cut comb honey. Customer preference will determine what form your comb honey should take, and sometimes you don't know what they want until you produce it.

If cut comb honey is what you want to do, start your comb honey with the thin surplus bees wax foundation. The normal wax foundation isn't really appropriate for cut comb honey.

Grant
Jackson, MO