HONEY BEE AND HONEY EXTRACTION IN CAMEROON
Honey bee is an insect and the producer of the honey in question. Studying honey bees will help you in harvesting honey and giving you an idea on how and why the process of honey extraction is done the way it is.
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Class: Insecta
Order: Hymenoptera
Family: Apidae
Genus: Apis
Species: Apis mellfica
Honey extraction is the central process in beekeeping of removing honey from honeycomb so that it is isolated in a pure liquid form.
Normally, the honey is stored by honey bees in their beeswax honeycomb; in framed bee hives, the honey is stored on a wooden structure called a frame. The honey frames are typically harvested in the late summer, when they will be most filled with honey. On a completely filled frame, the cells will be capped over by the bees for storage; that is, each cell containing honey will be sealed with a capping made of beeswax.
Framed hive
The first step in the extraction process is to break or remove all of the cappings. This may be accomplished using an automated uncapper machine or with a manually-operated uncapping knife. Usually, these tools are used together, along with a pronged cappings fork. To facilitate cutting off these wax cappings, the knife is often heated. The removed bits of wax, called cappings, are rich in honey which can be slowly drained off with the help of some heating. This 'cappings wax' is very valuable and often used to make candles or other products. Automated uncapping machines normally work by abrading the surface of the wax with moving chains or bristles or hot knives. This, while messy, makes the process easier than doing this task manually.
Some beekeepers will also harvest (before uncapping the honey) the propolis, a resinous material bees gather to glue the frames together; propolis is used for its medicinal properties.
Once uncapped, the frames are then placed in a honey extractor, which spins them so that most of the honey is removed by centrifugal force. Care must be taken to ensure that all frames are loaded correctly, as the comb is angled slightly upwards to prevent the honey flowing out; if loaded incorrectly, this can also prevent the honey flowing out during extraction. Once extracted, the resulting honey will contain bits of wax and must be passed through a screen so that clean liquid honey results.
Any honey that can't be harvested, which includes crystallized honey left on the frames after extraction, or honey that is not capped over, and therefore unripened, is usually placed back into the colonies for the bees to clean up. Some beekeepers place wet frames outside so that it will be reclaimed by the bees. This must be done early in the morning or late in the evening as the bees will aggressively harvest such a rich source. Care must be taken so that this is done at a time when food is not scarce, or else bees from differing colonies will fight over the honey. In addition, this can spread disease from contaminated frames and can be a potential problem; this technique is not advised.
The extraction process is typically done inside a specialized room, or honey house, that can be heated (since hot honey will flow faster), with all of the necessary tools nearby and is washable. The room must be well sealed, as bees (and other insects) will eagerly try to enter and gather the honey. It is important to remember that honey is a food product.
The table below outlines the extraction process.
| Honey Harvest Process steps | Method description | Alternative Method 1 | Alternative Method 2 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Remove hive outer cover from top of the beehive super | ||
| 2 | Remove hive inner cover from top super | ||
| 3 | If no queen excluder was used, inspect frames for broodand only remove frames that are without brood. | Remove only frames that are 80% capped and without brood | Remove all frames that have honey but no brood |
| 4a | Add fume board to top of hive to force bees into lower parts of hive. | Remove super and use air blower to force bees from frames | Remove frames one by one and manually brush off bees |
| 4b | Repeat steps 3 and 4a until all supers are removed | ||
| 5 | Transport frames in supers to honey house | ||
| 6 | Heat and dehumidify frames in honey house for 1– 2 days | Do nothing | |
| 7 | Use refractometer to check that moisture content is below 18.5% | Do nothing | |
| 8 | Remove the wax cap on capped honey manually (Uncap) | Uncap mechanically | Cut out comb honey |
| 9 | Load honey extractor | Load honey press | Set comb honey chunks on drip pan to drain off honey from cutting edge |
| 10 | Turn on honey extractor motor | Manually turn extractor crank | |
| 11 | Run extracting process for several minutes | ||
| 12 | Remove extracted frames from extractor | ||
| 13 | Empty extractor sump: Let collected honey flow into storage container via gravity. | Empty extractor sump: Pump honey using a mechanical pump | |
| 14 | Filter honey | Let wax and other particles settle out | Run raw honey through a separator |
| 15 | Grade honey | Do nothing | |
| 16 | Bottle honey | Package comb honey | |
| 17 | Market and sell honey | Use honey for home consumption |
Top-bar hive
Top bar hives come in horizontal (trough) and vertical (of which the Warré hive is an example). Trough hives allow for continuous harvest through the season, while Warré hives (per Abbé Warré) are intended to be harvested only at the end of the season.
| Step | Warré hive | Trough top bar hive |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Remove roof and quilt | Remove cover |
| 2 | Remove boxes of comb from the top of the hive, being sure to leave sufficient stores for the colony to overwinter on. | Remove mostly full combs. |
Once the combs are removed from the hive, they can be processed in several ways:
- Encase them in a cage and use a centrifugal extractor as with framed combs. This was done in the early twentieth century.
- Preserving as-is to be consumed in comb form.
- Crushing the combs, straining the honey,
Honey bee life cycle
The honey bee life cycle, here referring exclusively to the domesticated Western honey bee, depends greatly on their social structure.
Colony life
Unlike a bumble bee colony or a paper wasp colony, the life of a honey bee colony is perennial. The three types of honey bees in a hive are: queens (egg-producers), workers (non-reproducing females), and drones (males whose main duty is to find and mate with a queen). Honey bees hatch from eggs in three to four days. They are then fed by worker bees and develop through several stages in the cells. Cells are capped by worker bees when the larva pupates. Queens and drones are larger than workers, so require larger cells to develop. A colony may typically consist of tens of thousands of individuals.
While some colonies live in hives provided by humans, so-called "wild" colonies (although all honey bees remain wild, even when cultivated and managed by humans) typically prefer a nest site that is clean, dry, protected from the weather, about 20 liters in volume with a 4- to 6-cm2 entrance about 3 m above the ground, and preferably facing south or south-east (in the Northern Hemisphere) or north or north-east (in the Southern Hemisphere).
Development
Development from egg to emerging bee varies among queens, workers, and drones. Queens emerge from their cells in 15–16 days,workers in 21 days, and drones in 24 days. Only one queen is usually present in a hive. New virgin queens develop in enlarged cells through differential feeding of royal jelly by workers. When the existing queen ages or dies or the colony becomes very large, a new queen is raised by the worker bees. When the hive is too large, the old queen will take half the hive and half the reserves with her in a swarm. This occurs a few days prior to the new queen hatching. If several queens emerge they will begin piping (a high buzzing noise) signaling their location for the other virgin queens to come fight. Once one has eliminated the others, she will go around the hive chewing the sides of any other queen cells and stinging and killing the pupae. The queen takes one or several nuptial flights. The drones leave the hive when the queen is ready and mate, and mate in turns, dying after doing so. After mating the queen begins laying eggs. A fertile queen is able to lay fertilized or unfertilized eggs. Each unfertilized egg contains a unique combination of 50% of the queen's genes and develops into a haploid drone. The fertilized eggs develop into either diploid workers or virgin queens if fed royal jelly.
The average lifespan of a queen is three to four years; drones usually die upon mating or are expelled from the hive before the winter; and workers may live for a few weeks in the summer and several months in areas with an extended winter.
| Type | Egg | Larva | Cell capped | Pupa | Average developmental period
(Days until emergence)
| Start of fertility | Body length | Hatching weight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Queen | up to day 3 | up to day 8½ | day 7½ | day 8 until emergence | 16 days | day 23 and up | 18–22 mm | nearly 200 mg |
| Worker | up to day 3 | up to day 9 | day 9 | day 10 until emergence (day 11 or 12 last moult) | 21 days
(range: 18–22 days)
| N/A | 12–15 mm | nearly 100 mg |
| Drone | up to day 3 | up to day 9½ | day 10 | day 10 until emergence | 24 days | about 38 days | 15–17 mm | nearly 200 mg |
The weight progression of the worker egg, larva:
| Days | Developmental state | Weight | Length | Food source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | egg | 0.132 mg | 1.2mm | yolk |
| 2 | egg | not listed | yolk | |
| 3 | egg | 0.09 mg | yolk | |
| 4 | larva | not listed | royal jelly | |
| 5 | larva | 3.4 mg | royal jelly | |
| 6 | larva | 33.3 mg | royal jelly/honey and pollen (bee bread) | |
| 7 | larva | 100.1 mg | honey and pollen (bee bread) | |
| 8 | larva | 134.5 mg | honey and pollen (bee bread) | |
| 9 | larva | 155.2 mg | honey and pollen (bee bread) |
Effect of smoke on honey bees
