I finally had a chance to check out my hives other than propping up the lid or pulling out a frame. Lots of brood, pollen and HONEY? I was told that the blackberry flow is the last flow in my area, and that I might as well not expect more honey. I opened both hives and there are at least twenty frames capped and about five more 3/4 capped! I called my neighbour four miles down the road and her last honey to come off today was poor, only one frame of honey in one hive??? She was away in mexico most of the spring and summer, and speculates that could be why, queenlessness problems, no spring feeding. She was nice enough to offer her extractor so that I don't have to haul all the frames to my instructors farm. Nice to know another beekeeper so close by. Tomorrow I will extract and see what I have out of 25 frames. This should be wildflower honey which is my favorite, so this will be my winter supply! If these frames average what I have extracted, I should get 73 pounds from each hive, which is ok for packages started April 18th by a newbie?
I consider any harvestable honey on 1st year hives a success--especially when starting with foundation throughout.
Using medium boxes for everything and having a basic hive of 4 mediums I have always considered the 1st year a development year.
That is not to say I never get a harvest off of 1st year Hives, I do frequently, it's just that by not counting on it I'm not disappointed if a surplus is not realized.
Very black honey, i don't know if thats normal for fall flow honey (wildflowers), but I do have so joe pye and sunflowers that got worked pretty hard.