Smoker Fuel.
Has anyone else run out of their favourite smoker fuel? It has been a long season and I have no more hessian sacking despite Cynthia sharing a large sack with me a couple of months ago. They are not as easy to obtain as they once were but some local coffee shops will sell them for £1 each.
I’m not keen on cardboard as it burns too hot and fast for my liking and I prefer to stuff the smoker full of slow burning material so that it stays alight for however long it takes to inspect the colonies. Some of Linton’s outdoor cotton work shirts have seen better days so a couple of weeks ago I cut the buttons off an old one and tore it up for fuel. It works a treat and I’ve selected some more old pure cotton rags for the same purpose. The recent week of dry weather made fallen larch cones ideal smoker fuel and I’ve collected a bagful of various cones from the forest floor. On a recent foray the other evening, owls began hooting nearby long before dusk making it quite atmospheric and evocative of childhood adventures in the woods on the farm.
There is still a bit more smoking to do before I shut down all the colonies for winter. Because I took the supers off two colonies at the end of July during treatment with Formic Pro in the out apiary, I was able to replace them at the end of treatment and leave the bees to collect heather across the valley. Now they are just finishing sealing the last few frames destined for cut comb. Last week, I harvested several frames that were ready and padded out the remaining frames with insulated double shallow dummies.
It is getting cooler at night and darkness comes around 8:30 pm now. The swallows are still here and making the most of the warm weather and abundance of flies. I shall miss their squeaky calls and low swooping flight over the garden. Soon they will line up on the telegraph wires in readiness for travelling down to Africa.
Cut Comb & Ross Rounds.
One of the home apiary colonies that had been managed for a while as a 2-queen system was strong when I reduced it to a single brood box. I placed a shallow box of honey stores on top then the box of Ross rounds above that and they made a good job of filling the rounds this year with summer honey. I removed the queen excluder on the premise that the queen would not venture up through the honey and that the bees would have an easier time in the rounds without an excluder. They could store pollen below the rounds leaving them pristine, hopefully. When the rounds were nearly completed, I gave the colony more work to do finishing off some frames that I’d removed from another colony about to be treated with Apiguard which was healthy apart from varroa.
Smoker Recall Alert.
I was alarmed to read the report about the recent smoker recall on August 18th because I’d sent a very similar looking smoker to my new beekeeping friend in Seychelles in late April. Thanks to Andy Watson for raising awareness and contacting me. Andy saw the lovely photo of young Jeremy in Seychelles puffing away for his dad in a Beelistener Facebook post and expressed his suspicions because the smoker was similar to the one being recalled. I investigated as far as I could and made a decision based on the facts. You can read the details here, Product Recall (thorne.co.uk)
Bee supply company Thorne is concerned because one of their smokers has bellows made from reconstituted rough grey leather that may contain chrysolite asbestos. It falls below the General Products Safety Regulations 2005 (UK) and so there is a UK Government alert as well, https://www.gov.uk/product-safety-alerts-reports-recalls/product-recall-large-stainless-steel-beehive-smoker-2308-0055
Chrysolite is white asbestos and the mostly commonly used asbestos globally for building materials and other uses. Asbestos is a soft fibrous silicate mineral and one of 6 naturally occurring mineral fibres. However, asbestos is linked to cancers and in particular mesotheliomas. Some of us lost a very dear beekeeping friend recently from a mesothelioma acquired as a result of exposure in a school classroom during her long teaching career.
I investigated the smoker case because I bought the smoker for my friend from a German company Wiesenfeld, via Expondo, and it looked very similar to the one being recalled. I initially thought the smoker had been made in Germany. It certainly had Wiesenfeld stamped on the metal but when I enquired about the country of manufacture, Expondo confirmed that it was made in China. After a week or so waiting, I have just had confirmation from Expondo this morning (after the blog post went live) that the smoker I bought from them has no asbestos. Norman can keep the spare bellows which are always handy. Phew!
Model Numbers.
One of the identification problems lies in the fact that individual supply companies allocate model numbers to the products when they arrive in stock, so it was impossible for me to find out if the one that I had bought was in the potentially faulty batch. But are they really a health hazard? I telephoned Thorne and was given the following information. Three tests were performed on the offending bellows and the first showed a trace of asbestos, the second test was inconclusive, and the third was negative.
Thorne are taking a belt and braces approach and replacing bellows if the buyer has proof of purchase on smokers (XM9916, M5002, and XM5002) bought between April 2019 and May 2023. They told me that not all companies are taking the same precaution and replacing the bellow. Since Expondo have not yet replied to my question about the safety issue, I made my own risk assessment and went for peace of mind.
I bought safe replacement bellows in a shiny synthetic material at the cost of £5 from Thorne. Yesterday, I went to my local Post Office and the parcel is now winging its way to sunny Seychelles, where I wish I were heading right now as our recent heat wave is set to end soon!
I ordered a few essential things for myself including new bellows for my ancient smoker. My bee buddy Cynthia will be delighted when she sees the smart new green leather bellows. A change from the patched leaking ones on my nearly 20 -year- old smoker. She hates my smoker with a vengeance but I am fond of it, and my make- do and mend attitude has never been stronger. Admittedly, the lid used to fall off at the crucial moments, but that was before Linton soldered and bolted things and it works well for me. I narrowly escaped being given a new one for my recent milestone birthday and now my smoker should survive another 20 years!
Hello Ann. Thank you for sharing your method of arranging a colony’s home when you want a colony to make you comb honey: setting a super of Ross rounds above a shallow honey super that is nearly full and that sits atop a queen excluder. I wonder if the nearly full honey super primes the colony to store honey “above” rather than in the broodnest combs below. Question: Do you put the super of Ross rounds at the top to minimize the traffic of the nectar-storer bees walking across your capped comb honey, or just for convenience in inspecting the comb-honey super?
Hello Tom. Thank you for asking that question. The reason I placed the box of Ross rounds above a shallow box of stores was because I had removed the queen excluder to allow the bees easier access and I guessed that the queen would not cross the honey barrier to get upstairs. They were more likely to store pollen in the honey super above the brood nest and not put any in the rounds. One of the problems of producing Ross rounds at the end of the season seems to be propolis collection as they prepare for winter, and some of the cappings on the rounds were yellow tinged. I called it a day and removed the last 16 this weekend in good time for the weather change and cooler showery days now.