End of season and uncapped honey.

[juzzerbee]

If honey is not capped by the "end of the season", what is usually done with it? I am afraid I will have multiple frames from multiple supers that will not be capped by the end of the season. Is this used for feeding through winter?

Thanks, juzzerbee

[throrope]

Harvest. Honey has a range for moisture content and I suspect when you mix that with the rest, you'll be there. I had enough uncapped last year and kept the jars in the basement. It all crystallized. That to me is honey, not nectar. The high sugar content of honey keeps stuff from growing. The all natural perfect self preserving food.

I read an article in Bee Culture about a Canadian producer any his honey dryer. He pumped his honey up and through a strainer that dripped it down a chamber the hooked to an cooling/heating unit that evaporated moisture until the honey was within required content.

Another posted about how much he loved his $30 eBay honey refractory and how well it worked.

If you're not selling, I suggest enjoying as is.

[ralittlefield]

If uncapped honey is left in the hive over winter will it cause moisture problems?

[beedeetee]

No, if anything it will try to absorb moisture, not give it off.

[Adrian Quiney WI]

Juzzerbee, in my area this year the honey is dryer than normal for some reason. I would expect the same for your area as it has been dryer there than here. I have 18 boxes in a box room (with a dehumidifier going for extra peace of mind). I tested cells in three different supers. In uncapped cells in box 1 it was 17.6%, uncapped cells in box 2 it was 16.5%, under capped cells in box 3 it was 15.3%. I have not seen honey this dry in all my years of beekeeping (5 ).
So I would be inclined to harvest your honey in good conscience. If you are worried about it take a sample to a beekeeping club, or a bigger beekeeper and get it checked out for peace of mind.

[juzzerbee]

Ok then. At this time both of my hives need another super, but since I have multiple frames of uncapped honey, should I still add the supers or let them work on capping the other frames as soon as they reach the correct moisture percentage? Is adding a super irrelevant to bees capping honey?(Meaning waiting to cap and spending the work capping the cells really isn't a big amount of work in "addition to" drawing and filling other comb.) Is it too late in the season to add supers? Is it too late to add supers with only foundation, requiring the bees to draw out comb yet this year? Thanks, juzzerbee

[Adrian Quiney WI]

Drawing foundation is usually done on a strong flow when they need the space. IMHO you would be better off extracting a couple of supers and then adding back the stickies. Is your Goldenrod flowing yet? Mine isn't. It is very distinctive when it starts to arrive in the supers - it smells like sweat socks.
Your decision really depends upon what is blooming or about to bloom.

[juzzerbee]

Thanks for the tip. I will have to spend a bit of time figuring out if the goldenrod is blooming or not. I don't even know what it looks like. Ha! I will "sniff" around the hive and try to figure it out. Is it okay to remove a few frames that are capped from a super and leave empty spaces or should I rotate in existing drawn frames(extracted ones) with ones that I remove? Are stickies extracted frames that have not been cleaned by the bees? Is this the same as wet frames?

So.....at this time the supers that are on my 2 hives are close to being all filled with honey and I am waiting for them to cap them. At this time the capping seems to be scattered throughout the frames and individual cells and not a nice solid area like my past frames were. Should I not add a super then and hopefully encourage them to "focus" of capping the cells when ready? I am afraid that they will feel that there is nothing for them to do until the honey reaches the correct moisture content and maybe "fly the coop". Thanks, juzzerbee

Adrian-In one of your previous posts you stated "under capped" cells, what is that and why does it happen?

[NeilV]

What to do with uncapped honey could depend upon weather, at least to some extent.

Where I live, it tends to go from a real nectar flow to really hot, dry weather around the end of June. When the nectar shuts down really fast, the bees always seem to have some frames that are cured honey but uncapped. The cappings are not there, but the honey inside has a dull look to it, because it does not have much moisture.

On those frames, I'll do one of two things. If I think a hive needs to have some honey left on it, I'll rearrange and leave the uncapped frames for the bees to use. If there are a bunch of the uncapped but cured-looking frames, I will take the uncapped frames and harvest them.

When I harvest the uncapped frames, I will generally put the honey from all the uncapped frames together and extract them into a single bucket. I do that because of the off chance that they really are too wet. I don't want to screw up the rest of the honey by mixing in the uncapped honey that might have too much moisture in it. I have never had any issues with the segregated, uncapped honey fermenting. Really, in my situation, the uncapped stuff has always been fully cured.

If I lived in a cooler/wetter place, I would probably be more careful and get a hydrometer (or is it hygrometer?) to actually measure water content.

Leaving the uncapped stuff on the hive definitely won't cause problems. Also, you need to have a little experience to tell by looking when a uncapped frame really looks cured.

[RayMarler]

The bees won't cap the honey cells until the cell is full. If it's not full, they won't cap it. In that case, the uncapped honey can get really dry and thick, thicker than normal capped honey. Extract it and give the wet supers back, or leave it for them to finish filling and capping during the fall flow if you get one.