[jslo722]

Another rookie question.....

I harvested for the first time last weekend. I have a pan full of wax cappings. It has been out in the yard for two days and the bees did a pretty good job cleaning up all the honey, but there is still some honey mixed in with the wax. Do I just rinse it off with cold water? Once it is clean I thought I would just store it in a bucket until I get around to making a solar melter. Does this sound right?

 

[jhs494]

If you do rinse it be sure and let it dry well, otherwise it will get moldy. You can spread it out on papertowels to dry. We place ours in ziplocs and put them in the freezer until we have enough to deal with.
The solar wax melter works great. When you get time to make one, it is hard to beat as far as ease of melting cappings and burr comb.

 

[Bsweet]

Thats about the way I do it. Works good for me. Jim

 

[jslo722]

Thanks for the tip, but I have more questions now.

Can I freeze it with the honey residue still on? If yes, will the honey and the wax separate when the wax melts at a later date? Or is it best to rinse first?

 

[Bsweet]

I have done both with good results. Jim

 

[jhs494]

We have a stainless steel screen in our uncapping tray and we let it drain in there first. We try to keep it from piling up in one spot to keep it from trapping honey between the cappings. Run them through the extractor in the cappings bag, then ziploc and freeze.
If you plan on melting, just a tip, keep your cappings separate from burr comb, the cappings are usually a much cleaner lighter wax.

 

[jslo722]

Thank you both for the advice!

 

[jmgi]

The bees will remove every last drop of honey from the cappings if you keep stirring them up so they can get to the entrapped honey. I prefer to not feed back honey out in the open because it could trigger a robbing frenzy depending on the time of the year. What I would do is put the honeyed cappings into a shallow container and set it on top of the inner cover (making sure the bees can come up throught the hole in the inner cover) of a hive or multiple hives if you have alot, then put another empty hive body on top of the inner cover, followed by the outer cover. That way the bees can clean up the honey without starting a frenzy. John