A short time back there were some posts on Bee-L concerning honey records. While reading in one 
of Eva Crane’s books, I happened across an account of over 2100 pounds of honey in a year from 
a single hive situated near Pretoria in South Africa between 20 March 1948 to 19 March 1949.  
The hive was begun with a single queen in the lowest box beneath a queen excluder.  Extra 
queens were added in separate boxes with excluders below and above them. Six queens were 
used to build up the colony’s population and hive until it reached 16 deep boxes.  During the 
main flow only 3 queens were present. A platform and ladder was built to access the top boxes, 
and the entire setup was held in place with a system of stays.    

Honey supers were removed 7 times throughout the year and replaced with supers containing 
empty combs. 

At the end of the period a total of 960 kg (2114 pounds) of honey had been produced. 

Crane writes that before the flow, the colony was fed with pollen substitute in powder form and 
raw egg mixed with sugar syrup in a boardman feeder.

Apparently, the story was written up in ‘Gleanings in Bee Culture’ at the time.  The citation given 
by Crane is:

Kotze, W.A.G. (1949) Ton of honey from one colony in one year. Glean. Bee Cult. 77(8): 487-490

Regards, 
Dick Allen  

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