OSR - to move or not to move?

[Limousin Lass]

Yes, we are very lucky and have many large village gardens on our doorstep and a small orchard too. I might just sit tight and see what happens this year.... Or perhaps as suggested I could just move a couple of hives and see what happens. The OSR seems to be there every second or third year. It's going to be a learning process I can tell!

My main thought was that it's only my second full season and despite having 6 colonies at the moment, I only have 4 drawn supers. I wondered if being 'on-site' I might get some more supers drawn out more quickly.

You say the rape is there every few years. Just because you can't see it from the road , doesn't mean it's not on the farm. The farmer probably has a 2 or 3 crop rotation going. Wheat , Rape and Tenerife is a favourite with Arable farmers.

 

[mbc]

You say the rape is there every few years. Just because you can't see it from the road , doesn't mean it's not on the farm. The farmer probably has a 2 or 3 crop rotation going. Wheat , Rape and Tenerife is a favourite with Arable farmers.

Thats nothing, our farmers often rotate wheat, rape, barley and twelverife.

 

[Luminos]

 

[hedgerow pete]

yes i would move them, three miles in the opposite direction!!

 

[Finman]

You say the rape is there every few years. The farmer probably has a 2 or 3 crop rotation going.

Rape has special long rotation time. It has a disease Clubroot, caused by Plasmodiophora brassicae.
That disease is in all cruciferae plants like in cabbage and in natural Cruciferae weeds.

http://www.hgca.com/publications/documents/cropresearch/TS92.pdf

.

 

[beeno]

The slower the set the bigger the crystals.
The secret to soft set is to seed with some of the right texture and stir for a few days while it starts to set. Then jar at the critical moment.

I wouldn't worry too much about undrawn supers, if there is a flow they can draw in no time. May help to alternate drawn, undrawn in the super rather than a whole super of undrawn

Hi Davelin,
Not too sure about "the slower the set the bigger the crystals". Ivy sets rapidly and looking into one colony's frames last spring saw very large crystals that I had to spray with luke warm water to help the bees to clear. Also, clover is stated to set rapidly and my clover honey (bought) had very large crystals in the jar.
Maybe it is more to do with the production methods in producing soft set honey: Either leaving it to granulate naturally in which case OCR apparently produces large coarse crystals which are not easy on the tongue or 'process' the honey by introducing seed crystals from a previously successfully produced batch of creamed honey with small crystals. Then any honey including OCR is OK for texture if one likes the taste. A bit like making yogurt from a previous culture.
There is a lot to this bee business!

 

[iand]

We used to work on a 5 year rotation for Osr because of the risk Finman pointed out.

 

[Davelin]

Well the crystallisation of honey is complex because of the varied nature of honey, but the general rules of crystallisation are as I stated.
For example if you look at rocks, granite is a rock formed by slow cooling of magma and has large crystals, whereas basalt forms from a similar source, but cools rapidly and forms much smaller crystals. Slow cooling allows crystals to grow, whereas rapid cooling produces many more smaller crystals.

Naturally crystallised honey generally tends to have larger crystals than soft set because the crystals grow over time.
The introduction of about 10% of fine grained soft set honey into clear honey encourages the whole lot to set with a similar structure. I don't fully understand why.
Stirring soft set for a few days as it sets is also important; it's a bit like making ice cream, if you don't stir while it is setting it has large crystals and a coarse texture, but stirring disrupts the formation of large crystals and keeps the texture smooth. The key trick is to assess when to jar it, it needs to have formed a lot of small crystals, but obviously still needs to flow.

 

[VEG]

I never stir my soft set honey. I mix it in a settling tank with the seed and put it straight into the jars it sets with the size of the seed.


Craig

 

[beeno]

Well the crystallisation of honey is complex because of the varied nature of honey, but the general rules of crystallisation are as I stated.
For example if you look at rocks, granite is a rock formed by slow cooling of magma and has large crystals, whereas basalt forms from a similar source, but cools rapidly and forms much smaller crystals. Slow cooling allows crystals to grow, whereas rapid cooling produces many more smaller crystals.

Naturally crystallised honey generally tends to have larger crystals than soft set because the crystals grow over time.
The introduction of about 10% of fine grained soft set honey into clear honey encourages the whole lot to set with a similar structure. I don't fully understand why.
Stirring soft set for a few days as it sets is also important; it's a bit like making ice cream, if you don't stir while it is setting it has large crystals and a coarse texture, but stirring disrupts the formation of large crystals and keeps the texture smooth. The key trick is to assess when to jar it, it needs to have formed a lot of small crystals, but obviously still needs to flow.

Hi Davlin,
Thanks for the lesson I have got it! I must say I am a little bit disappointed though, as I have just learnt to look after my bees and now I have to nurse the honey too. Thanks for the analogy of rock formation, but I am an economic geographer! But rapid crystalisation leading to small crystals makes logical sense. The fact that I found large crystals of Ivy honey in my hive and large crystals of Clover ((Triolium) Rapid crystalisation according to one list which someone just contradicted in another publication) in my bought jar of honey was due to the fact that there is nothing natural about natural crystalisation. It has to happen under controlled conditions to give the right results. What a bummer for all the newbies. Struggle to keep it liquid and natural granulation sets like concrete! No wonder some leave it for the bees! Mine may still get it back!

 

[Finman]

How to manage the crytsallion process?

It is 2 years ago when I learned a new way to handel honey.

There are 25 kg buckets. I extract and sieve the honey. When it is ready and it start to crystallize, put the honey into those buckets. Stir them and you get fine crystal honey. I give seed crystall from old honey or I buy creamed honey .

This summer I made seed honey, but in store room the honey started crystallize sooner by itself

When jaring fully crystallized honey buckets, warm it up in hot air flow of it hot water (50) bath, and it softens.
You may mix rape honey later to other honey types. Put the stuff into 50 kg or 100 kg jaring container. Mix the honey and let the air pubbles to rise up.
Catch them from surface from greased baking paper and it is ready.

When warming up the honey, it melts partly. When it is in jars, it hardens again, It will be very good.

My opinion is that rape honey is like sugar water alone, but mixed with other honeys, it is very good part of mixture.

 

[Limousin Lass]

Rape has special long rotation time. It has a disease Clubroot, caused by Plasmodiophora brassicae.
That disease is in all cruciferae plants like in cabbage and in natural Cruciferae weeds.

http://www.hgca.com/publications/documents/cropresearch/TS92.pdf

.

Yes, you are talking about Club Root. When we started growing Rape 20 years ago there was a 7 year gap before it could go back in that field. The gap dropped to 5 then 3 years and some Farmers (we don't grow it here) now alternate Wheat and Rape.
You would not have done that on our old place as it had a history of Sprouts and Cabbage.
How long a 2 year rotation can be kept going before problems , would be my worry.

 

[YorkshireBees]

Like it or not (everyone can have their own opinion) Soft set honey made from crops of mainly OSR can taste very nice. With the right texture it can be very good.

Although I am biased as the majority of my honey crop over the last few years has been from OSR I do have to say that I have won Supreme Champion (Best exhibit in show) this year with soft set honey

It did raise a few eyebrows among beeks that do not consider soft set a premium honey but what can I say!!!

All I ask is that people give it a fair chance.

Back to the op's original question, as you have said the bees will easily locate and forage the OSR at that distance. How much difference the distance will make to the honey yield is anybodies guess!
IMHO the key to a good OSR yield (besides the weather which we can do nothing about) is having a well built up colony in time for the flowering!
Then it is a constant struggle to prevent them swarming. When you can achieve that then generally you will get a decent sized crop.

 

[Limousin Lass]

Like it or not (everyone can have their own opinion) Soft set honey made from crops of mainly OSR can taste very nice. With the right texture it can be very good.

Although I am biased as the majority of my honey crop over the last few years has been from OSR I do have to say that I have won Supreme Champion (Best exhibit in show) this year with soft set honey

It did raise a few eyebrows among beeks that do not consider soft set a premium honey but what can I say!!!

All I ask is that people give it a fair chance.

Back to the op's original question, as you have said the bees will easily locate and forage the OSR at that distance. How much difference the distance will make to the honey yield is anybodies guess!
IMHO the key to a good OSR yield (besides the weather which we can do nothing about) is having a well built up colony in time for the flowering!
Then it is a constant struggle to prevent them swarming. When you can achieve that then generally you will get a decent sized crop.

Would you think putting an already established colony onto Rape is a good opportunity to do a split. I was thinking of putting another Brood chamber on top of the present one in the Spring as the Rape starts to Flower. I have been asked to move my hives onto some Rape further North of me. All depends on the weather come Spring mind.

 

[YorkshireBees]

Would you think putting an already established colony onto Rape is a good opportunity to do a split. I was thinking of putting another Brood chamber on top of the present one in the Spring as the Rape starts to Flower. I have been asked to move my hives onto some Rape further North of me. All depends on the weather come Spring mind.

From my own experience, the last 2yrs especially this year when one of my apiaries was directly at the side of a field of OSR, the colony will expand at an accelerated rate as the OSR starts to yield and will require extra space to contain it and prevent swarming.

I personally use a form of demaree to prevent swarming whilst at the same time keeping the colony large. It also offers me the chance to create Nucs from the queencells produced in the demareed BB.

So in short yes, imo it is a good time to create splits.

Obviously creating a split will lower the work force (foragers) by a certain amount and affect the amount of honey collected but I still managed to double my crop this year (compared to the previous year) whilst creating a nuc from each colony!

 

[beeno]

Hi YorkshireBees,
When I was a child the only honey we ever had was soft set honey (shop bought). That's how I remember honey. Never realised it was such a big deal! Probably not OCR in those days.