It's mid September, and we have not yet harvested the summer-fall honey. In western PA, late August to early September is honey time, and in a normal year by now we would have easily already taken 100+ pounds of honey but 2020 has not been a normal year in any way, and the bees are having a catastrophic year the likes of which have not been seen in decades. The crazy weather in the spring, where we saw snow in May, still managed to yield spring honey for us, but for many beekeepers, summer-fall honey is their only crop, and this year is a disaster for them. The traditional dearth of July extended into August, the hot, dry weather relieved only by some rain in early September and for many of our fellow beekeepers, that rain is just too little, too late.
People often assume if there are flowers blooming, there is nectar, but we can assure you the presence of flowers is quite distinct from the availability of nectar. Flowers produce very little nectar under drought conditions, and in the case of goldenrod, a very dry July and August stunts the nectary development. Right now, goldenrod is in full bloom, late in the season, and as glorious a display as it is - there is little to no nectar being produced. The goldenrod on our property is ignored by our bees, which indicates there is no nectar, and likely no pollen either. In a typical fall, our apiary has so much goldenrod nectar and pollen being packed away by the bees that we can smell it strongly in our yard. This year? The smell is there ,but faintly so.
We won't proclaim disaster just yet; our bees feast on the vegetables and herbs in our gardens, which were well watered this year. What we did notice was that the forage was especially crowded this year, with our bees competing with native bees, butterflies, hummingbirds and other nectar-seeking animals and this extra competition this year, plus the stress of the drought from July onwards, appears to be affecting the fall harvest.
We have honey - don't worry! - but our fall harvest is smaller than that of past years. We will be harvesting before the end of September, and are confident we have at least 60 pounds of true excess. Just so you know, we do NOT feed sugar water to our bees, so we are not artificially creating fall "honey" and we emphasize this so consumers are aware that this fall, there may be some "doctored" honey, created by the bees packing away sugar water that is then harvested and mixed with the honey to increase the harvest. We only feed if necessary to prevent starvation of the bees. Our priority is that our bees eat their own honey. Typically, beekeepers harvest all the summer/fall honey, then aggressively feed the bees to encourage them to pack away the sugar water as "honey" for their winter sustenance. This practice has never sat well with us. We actively monitor our hives, and if we take some of the honey this fall, it is only because they have enough for themselves. If not -life goes on. We have less honey, but our bees have food for the winter. Beekeeping is a lot like parenting, and everyone has a different opinion. We respect each other, learn from our differences, and in the end, we make up our own minds. Bee Kind. Bee Thoughtful. Bee Independent. This is our Bee Philosophy.
As for us - we do have fall honey, and we still have a lot of spring/early summer honey, so we have plenty of that if you're hankering for some sweetness in your life!
Next blog topic: how to tell if your honey is fake or real.
Disclaimers: Blog posts are opinions, not advice. One thing all beekeepers will agree on, is that if you ask 10 beekeepers what to do, you'll get 13 different answers. Beekeeping is alchemy, nature, and a bit of magic.
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