Honey in May

Although the bees have been keeping us on our toes this month they have also been doing what they should. On Monday we put clearer boards ( boards that will let the bees go out of a super but not go back in) on 2 hives- the hive we had moved from garden had 3 supers on! On Tuesday evening we went back to bring them home and yesterday we spun the honey from them. The frames had a lot of pollen in them- earlier in the year the bees were finding plenty of pollen but not much nectar- hence the worry about starving bees with some beekeepers having to feed their bees.

Pollen filling lots of the cells in the frames.

We kept the two supers separate- the super taken from the garden hive was filled before we moved it to Cordwood so will be from different forage sources than the one from Cordwood. We can see Oil Seed Rape fields on the farm from the hives and although most of this super was also filled while the weather was fairly poor it could be Rape Honey which will granulate quickly- we will have to wait and see.
In total we filled 44 X 12 oz jars from the 2 supers- about 33lbs- not bad when lots of pollen was left behind to go back to the bees- hopefully they will still use this and clear the frames for more honey!