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BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. => Topic started by: AllenF on August 04, 2010, 08:59:23 pm

Title: Capped honey gone bad?
Post by: AllenF on August 04, 2010, 08:59:23 pm

Wife comes home and says she sold all my pint jars and needs more right before I get a call of a store in town that wants to buy the rest of my honey I can bottle.  That's the good part.   So me and the now 4 year old go to the apartment where I have been keeping the honey.   The remaining supers have been sitting down there for 2 weeks after being taken out of the freezer.   I start to extract the 2 super and as I am uncapping and playing with the 4 year old, I just happen to look down and see bubbles in the comb.   Fully capped and starting to ferment.  What the frak?  I set that frame in the sink and cut one side of frame and it has bubbles forming to.  I went and took some pics for ya'll. 
Questions:

1. Why did capped honey go bad?
2. Did I ruin the honey in the cappings tub with what little from a frame and a half of cappings went in there?
3. Should I worry about the other honey bottled and sold/unsold?
4. Should I spend $100 and make mead?
(http://a.imageshack.us/img707/8543/honey002.jpg) (http://img707.imageshack.us/i/honey002.jpg/)

(http://a.imageshack.us/img200/4002/honey003a.jpg) (http://img200.imageshack.us/i/honey003a.jpg/)

(http://a.imageshack.us/img705/5395/honey001.jpg) (http://img705.imageshack.us/i/honey001.jpg/)

I have seen honey go bad in uncapped frames, but you can see these we just uncapped.

Title: Re: Capped honey gone bad?
Post by: harvey on August 04, 2010, 11:34:27 pm

I took a frame of fully capped honey earlier this year about a month ago from one of the deeps,  I didn't notice any bubbles but the honey was very thin the caps almost looked wet, and the flavor was off,  I am not sure if it was fermented or just weird honey but if it all tasted like that I would be off honey in a hurry,  almost a watermelon kind of flavor?   

Title: Re: Capped honey gone bad?
Post by: AllenF on August 05, 2010, 12:09:34 am

This honey did not look very thin.  I gave it the shake test.   And it was sweet, as honey.

Title: Re: Capped honey gone bad?
Post by: hardwood on August 05, 2010, 12:32:05 am

Allen, was there an off odor...or taste?  When you freeze the honey contracts in response to the cooler temp. I've just not heard of it contracting enough to pull air through the wax cap before...seems possible though. I'd say if it tastes and smells ok it's fine.

Scott

Title: Re: Capped honey gone bad?
Post by: AllenF on August 05, 2010, 06:51:08 pm

It had sat out of the freezer for 2 weeks.   I run a dehumidifier that blows on the supers.   The space has the A/C set at 65.  Bubbles did not form for about a minute after the caps were removed.  I might just hold on to the bubble frames for a week or two to see if the taste changes.

Title: Re: Capped honey gone bad?
Post by: Kathyp on August 05, 2010, 07:10:32 pm

i bet there was air in the honey from the freezing and it just bubbled to the top when you uncapped it.  i'd extract it and put it in a separate bucket.  if it's ok in a couple of weeks, it's probably ok forever.

Title: Re: Capped honey gone bad?
Post by: AllenF on August 05, 2010, 07:19:30 pm

I have never had any of the froze supers do that before.

Title: Re: Capped honey gone bad?
Post by: slacker361 on August 05, 2010, 07:35:41 pm

there should be a way without buying a an advance chem set, that would show amount of alcohol and or the amount of yeast in the honey

Title: Re: Capped honey gone bad?
Post by: slacker361 on August 05, 2010, 07:40:30 pm

if you have one of these it might help

 try this (http://www.industrial-needs.com/technical-data/refractometer-PCE-ALK.htm)