At 05:25 AM 8/8/96 +0000, you wrote:
> I have several hundred lbs. of extracted dark honey taken from disease
>free hives that I lost to the mites over winter. I would like to feed it
>back to the seven hives that I will try to winter this year. The question
>that I have is should I dilute it, if so how much. If I do not dilute it
>then what would anyone suggest for the addition of Fumagillin. I feed
>using the one gallon Zip-Loc baggies laid on an excluder under a shallow
>super with both spring (1:1) and fall (2:1) syrups. Can I use this set-up
>feeding honey.
>
>Thanks for any thoughts on this.
>
>Tim Damon
>Ann Arbor, MI  USA
>
Hi Tim
 
I agree with the others that if you can sell the dark honey, by all means do
so.  Three years ago I produced some honey that was dark and kind of smoky.
I thought about feeding it to the bees  but I tasted it first.  It was some
of the best I had ever tasted.  I bottled it and put some in a store that
sells my honey.  At first it didn't sell but when all the light honey was
gone, a few bottles were sold.  The next week many bottles were sold.  By
the third week it was gone.  I'm now getting request for more of it.  The
problem is that I don't even know the source.  If I ever get any more, I
will have it tested.  Honey in not only a good sweetener but is a natural
preservative.  If you have a bread machine, use honey instead of sugar to
make bread.
 
If you can't sell the honey or otherwise use it, pasteurize it then feed it
to the bees.  They take it well from the baggie feeder.  I recently took
some out of a hollow tree after removing the bees.  It was so contaminated I
couldn't use it so I bagged it and gave it back to them in their new hive.
They promptly put it in the super.  There followed a good flow for a couple
of weeks and I harvested the super.
 
 
Frank Humphrey
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