Episode 20 - My First Nucleus - Heather Flows Still Going

We're on to episode 20 of the My First Nucleus series. I ignored all my advice, added an extra super. Let's see how much honey they've packed away in a week. Hi, I'm Laurence Edwards from Black Mountain Honey. Welcome to another episode of No Nonsense Beekeeping, episode 20 of the My First Nucleus series. 20 weeks in a row this colony's been on the go. Seems crazy to think that we've had this tiny little nucleus We built it up to a big colony, got a really nice crop down over the summer season, and now we're up at the heather and they're really doing the business up at the heather as well. So not going to do too much talking here today, I'm just going to get in there. Not going to take a look in the brood box, just not important at this time of year. We are going to take a look at how much honey they've stored in the national deep and the additional national shallow that I added. Now I know I spoke last week about not adding too much space and making sure that they're going to fill what's there, And I'd prefer to have big full frames as opposed to a larger number of partially filled frames. But the flow was just so good last week and the weather forecast was so good. You can probably see it in the background here. This is what it's been like all week long up here. Not 28, 29 degrees. It's not been scorching hot, but it's been really, really consistent. Hasn't rained once. Very, very still. And the bees have just been constantly working away on that heather. It's still in flower, you can smell it in the air, the smell is incredible. So they have had a week pretty much non-stop harvesting. In fact, it's actually about 6 days. It's going to be really interesting though to see the progress they've made. I just hope putting that super on hasn't done any damage, hasn't slowed them down a little bit. I'm sure we'll find out in the rest of this video. So I'll get my bee suit on, let's go and have a look at how much heather honey they've stored over a week. So once again, you can smell the heather in the air. It's about 6 o'clock in the evening again. It's getting a little bit cold now, it's about 17 or 18 degrees, but it's so still, no wind at all, that the bees are just foraging from very early in the morning to very late in the evening. So long as it's light and there's no wind, they're just going for it. I'm really excited to see if they've moved up into that super. And even if they haven't, I think that National Deep is going to be really, really looking good this week. Let's get inside, see how they're doing. Now, as you know, I will always hold my hands up if I've got something wrong, and on this occasion I definitely got it wrong. And I know I should have stuck with my advice, which was don't add that additional super. I don't think it's come to any detriment at all, but they have just looked at that and just said, yep, no chance, we're not going up in that super, thank you very much. And now I can make that decision to take that super away. Really, really easy decision because last week was the peak flow. That was the week where if they were going to go and do something silly and pack away a super over a weekend, that was going to be the week that they're going to do it. You look inside this super now and there is no chance that that's getting filled. So I wish I'd stuck to my guns, but as always with No Nonsense Beekeeping videos, I'll show you my mistakes as well as my triumphs. So in this instance here, I've I should have definitely not put the super on and just left them to it, as per my advice less than 6 days ago. So here's my super of honey, my gamble. It's not gone very well. They are not interested in that whatsoever. So know when to cut your losses. We'll take off that super, shake out the bees, and we'll put that back in the box of supers that the bees haven't filled this year. However, I'll start off with a negative and then we move swiftly onto a positive. Look at the state of that national deep there. Just think what this was like 2 or 3 weeks ago. There wasn't a single cell full of honey, and now look at all of those frames covered with bees. That means that each and every frame there, there's going to be something in it. Might be 10% full, Might be 100% capped, we just don't know yet. What I do know is they do not build white wax like that if there's not a flow on. They don't start bracing up the combs, it's not something that they do if the frames aren't full of honey. So let's pull a few of those frames out now and see what the yield is like. So there is a noticeable increase in the number of frames that's got honey in it. I'd say 10 out of the 11 frames that are in here Are pretty much full of honey. These are the most advanced in terms of capping, and they definitely move that on a little bit in a week. Not a huge amount because they're not focusing on the capping at the moment because there's still a flow going on. But what I'm seeing here is I've got every confidence now that give it another week or so up here, they're going to finish off this box, and I'm going to have a really nice haul of heather honey from all of my colonies up at the heather. Just for reference, here's another couple of frames, and as you can see, this started off life this year as foundation. They've drawn all of that out, filling it all with honey now. Same over here, that was just foundation, they've drawn it out, filling it all with honey. Lovely white cappings, lovely white wax. Now you can tell that this is heather honey. Obviously I can tell from the smell, but when you start to go like this on your hive tool, You look at the way that it folds up like that, and then you lift the hive tool off and it stays put. That is a clear sign that that is heather honey, and without a shadow of a doubt, I'm gonna eat what's on my hive tool now. So what's so good about the heather as well? When the flow is on, they're just the most well-behaved bees in the world. And I genuinely thought that bee was going to come and sting me in the face when I said that, and it would teach me for kind of taking off my veil and talking. But I just want to try this honey. There is nothing— right, I think I'm pushing my luck a little bit. I'm going to eat this honey. I'm going to get my veil back on. Right, I got away with it. No stings to the face. And oh my God, it is the best thing in the world. I look forward to this every year. Even when I think about it, middle of December, middle of January, I'm thinking Can't wait to get back up there and try some fresh heather honey out of the hive. You know, some things in life, they're just massive anticlimaxes, aren't they? You think about them the whole time, you build them up, and then you experience them and you're like, yeah, not that great. Eating heather honey out of the hive is the best thing in the world. Never gets boring. The taste profile is just incredible. I love being up here. One of my favorite things to do in the world. So the colony is looking great. Like I said before, probably 10 frames of honey in there now. Those outer 2 frames, they're still a little bit empty. Definitely doing away with that super. Wish I'd listened to my advice previously. But we've got another week up here, another week of the flow, although it's definitely dying off a little bit now. You're not seeing that ramp up, that huge amount coming in. I'd say we're on the turn now. Weather looks a little bit cooler next week as well, so we'll give it one more week and then we'll call it a day on all All of the colonies up here, and we will remove our heather honey for the 2022 season. That's not the end of this series though. This is the My First Nucleus series. So once we've taken off that heather honey crop, we're going to leave this colony up here to overwinter, but we're going to be doing varroa treatments. We're going to be feeding 1:1 syrup. We're going to be feeding 2:1 syrup. We're going to be getting the colony in the best position to overwinter so we can see it into 2022. So I hope you enjoyed that video. As always, please hit the subscribe button. Please hit the bell so you're notified of every video, and I'll see you next time. Bye.