Contaminated super frames

[rockdoc]

I have some super frames with residual fondant and sugar syrup from this winters feeding. Will the remaining crystals melt in warm water without messing up the comb?

 

[oliver90owner]

They won't melt but they will dissolve.

 

[itma]

It will dissolve slowly in cool water.

Wax gets soft above about 45C.
If you stick to "Baby's Bath" temperature (36C ish maximum), and are patient, you should be fine.

 

[Foxylad]

If you not to desperate for the supers, you could feed it back in the June gap or keep it till autumn feeding.

Seems a waste to just pour it away.

 

[itma]

If you not to desperate for the supers, you could feed it back in the June gap or keep it till autumn feeding.

Seems a waste to just pour it away.

Its not wasting much. Sugar at under a quid a kilo ...
Whereas drawn comb is priceless, and the honey it can hold is worth something like 10x the price of sugar ...

 

[REDWOOD]

They won't melt but they will dissolve.

 

[oliver90owner]

Melting denotes a change of state.

Granulated honey at 18% water content >>>----->>> liquid honey at 18% water content.

Wax (solid) >>>-c. 63 degrees Celsius->>> Wax (liquid)

Both examples involve latent heat of fusion and are reversible with only a temperature change. The honey example is not as clear cut as wax melting or ice forming, but is still a change of state.

Dissolution is a somewhat different process.

 

[Amari]

I have some super frames with residual fondant and sugar syrup from this winters feeding. Will the remaining crystals melt in warm water without messing up the comb?

To avoid this problem I suggest next autumn you feed generously into a super then put the full super under the BB overwinter. No Qexcluder of course. If supplementary feeding is required put the feeder/fondant directly on the bb. Come the spring you will find the shallow (=ex-super) quite clean and empty because the bees move the sugar up into the bb. Then you can restore the shallow to above the bb. Works every time

 

[Rob55]

To avoid this problem I suggest next autumn you feed generously into a super then put the full super under the BB overwinter. No Qexcluder of course. If supplementary feeding is required put the feeder/fondant directly on the bb. Come the spring you will find the shallow (=ex-super) quite clean and empty because the bees move the sugar up into the bb. Then you can restore the shallow to above the bb. Works every time

Isn't there a risk that the queen will lay out the super?

 

[Erichalfbee]

I've done this for four years and she never has.
Come mid March the box is empty.

 

[Amari]

Isn't there a risk that the queen will lay out the super?

Rarely. This spring there was a small patch of brood in one out of seven shallows. This didn't matter because this year I am going to deploy 'brood and a half' - by moving the shallows to above the bbs.

 

[itma]

... This didn't matter because this year I am going to deploy 'brood and a half' - by moving the shallows to above the bbs.

The business of shifting shallow boxes top to bottom in Autumn and back up (above a QX) in Spring needs to be recognised up front as being "How to run brood-and-a-half ONLY in Winter but NOT in Summer".
That's the only justification for this particular manipulation.
As has been previously noted, the bees shifting their stores wastes stores and bee-power. And the practice is so open to misinterpretation and misunderstanding that the forum has seen a report of one beekeeper moving his super from above QX to under Brood after Christmas ...


This manipulation is certainly not necessary for those running brood and a half all year.
And those running brood-and-a-half-sized frames (14x12) need not fear that they are missing anything by being unable to turn their frames upside down in Autumn and back again in Spring!

Shifting filled supers around has nothing in common with the (fairly conventional) practice of putting wet supers under the brood for scavenging after extraction.

 

[Hivemaker.]

Shifting filled supers around has nothing in common with the (fairly conventional) practice of putting wet supers under the brood for scavenging after extraction.

Is that really the conventional place to put wet supers after extraction.

 

[itma]

Is that really the conventional place to put wet supers after extraction.

I said "fairly conventional".
And it wasn't cleaning wet supers that I was commenting on - rather the placement of (different-state) shallow boxes UNDER the brood for different reasons and different timescales.

 

[Hivemaker.]

I said "fairly conventional".
And it wasn't cleaning wet supers that I was commenting on - rather the placement of (different-state) shallow boxes UNDER the brood for different reasons and different timescales.

Cannot think of a worse place to be putting wet supers for scavenging.

 

[mbc]

Cannot think of a worse place to be putting wet supers for scavenging.

How about out in the open in the middle of an apiary? That would be a bit silly too.

 

[Hivemaker.]

How about out in the open in the middle of an apiary? That would be a bit silly too.

I know of some that that have done that as well.

 

[mbc]

Without a bit of thought it seems a convenient solution to the inexperienced.

 

[Finman]

.
It is very common that there are last year crystallized areas in super combs.
That is honey, because syrup does not crystallize.

If it is small amount, spray some water onto crystalls. Let is soften over night.
Put over the hive and bees clean/lick the crystalls.

If you put frames out to be cleaned, bees tear down good combs. It makes quite a riot into yard too and bee figting.

Very usual job in beekeeping.

.

 

[Hivemaker.]

Without a bit of thought it seems a convenient solution to the inexperienced.

What made me cringe even more was one of the honey packers with 300kg barrels outside all over the place, and in huge skips, no lids on most of them, wasps and bees everywhere, layers of dead and drowning bees and wasps in the bottoms of the barrels, not good at all, no wonder being near to some of these places are disease hot spots.