# How to get moisture content down post extraction



## Joel (Mar 3, 2005)

Scott, it is not an easy task to lower moisture content in extracted honey but it can be done. You will need a relatively sealed room, a dehumidifier, a fan (window fan works fine) and some type of heat source. ( if it is a small room you de-humidifier will help on a hot day). You need to rasie the room temp to about 95- 100 degrees to maximize the moiture the air will hold that is migrating from your honey. Open 2 or three pails of wet honey and place them together so they are all touching or close to touching in the middle. Now take your fan and rest it on top of the pails so that the 1/3 to 1/2 the fan is blowing onto the top and accoss the honey. Turn your humidifer on high and your fan on medium. Keep the room warm and in couple of days you'll find your moisture content has improved considerably. Good Luck and save that crop!


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## hawkman (May 22, 2004)

Thanks Joel,

I just set it up, we'll see how this works.

scott


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## Robert Hawkins (May 27, 2005)

So who's this guy trying to claim my name? Scott from Maryland? lol

I don't know if you need to dehydrate. If I made such a mistake I would feed it back to the bees and spend my efforts on the next extraction. Expecially since you apparently don't have anything to measure the mooisture content. You shouldn't sell this product as "honey". Personal use is up to you. 

Hawk


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## Sundance (Sep 9, 2004)

How much honey is a "bunch".

If it is 5 gal or so then I agree with Hawk..... feed it back.

I saw a cool video where a older gent converted a bulk milk tank to a honey tank. He purged the refridgeration lines and used a hot water tank to circulate and heat the honey for easy bottling and moisture control.


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## Tia (Nov 19, 2003)

What makes you think it is too moist? Was it uncapped? I thought once the honey is capped it's "good to go." That's what I've always based my harvest on, which means that this year being so humid I've harvested less than half of my honey when normally it's all been harvested by now. I don't want to spend the money for a refractometer. They're way expensive and I think the bees know best when it comes to ready honey.


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## Jim Fischer (Jan 5, 2001)

There is capital equipment that one can buy to
do this, but the cost is very high and the
footprint required is large, beyond the dreams
of any but the largest operations.

Most "simple" schemes involve exposing a thin
layer of honey (maximum surface area for the
volume) to a flow of dry air. The drawback is
that dust becomes your enemy, and very fine
filter screens are your weapons.

Another possible approach is to get a refractometer
and measure the actual moisture content, blending
the "wet" (18% and up) honey with "dry" 
(15% and lower) honey to result in a blend that 
comes out just below the threshold of 18%, but 
even this is tricky work that must be done by 
hand, adding, mixing, letting things settle for 
a bit, and taking yet another reading.

Of course, when ALL the honey is on the "wet"
side, you've got a problem. If this is the
case, have you considered a venture into making
mead or selling the honey "as is" to someone
who makes mead with the understanding that
he should get to work quickly?

The best tool is a refractometer in the yard,
and an attitude of "we will pull no honey before
its time". Second best is to test supers before
extraction, and dehydrate them while the honey
is still in the comb (or put them back on the
hives, as bees work for free).

Betcha you have much more than $80 worth of
honey sitting there. Yes, tools are expensive,
but none of them are worth a hoot if you don't
have the one tool that will tell you something
about the stuff you wish to uncap and extract.

I saw one gizmo that used a set of rotating
discs to pull the honey up and expose the film
of honey on each disc to the air stream, all
in a sealed dust-proof chamber. Some Poindexter
somewhere came up with the concept, and it looked
very slick. But I'll stick with handing out
refractometers (on lanyards!) to teenagers, and
keeping it simple. If it ain't honey yet, it
stays on the hive.

> I thought once the honey is capped it's 
> "good to go."

I wish that this old wive's tale was true.
Most of the time, it is.
Sometimes, it can burn you badly.
Bees don't expect you to take their honey away,
and they expect to be able to fan away all
summer, and into fall, so they can and will cap
"honey" that is not quite honey yet.


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## hawkman (May 22, 2004)

First of all, around here in Md. its about 60-80% relative humidity just about all the time. In my mind even the strongest colony cant dry honey in those conditions. If we were lucky enough to get a 3 or 4 day run of low humidity, of course that would be the ideal time to remove it but I bet it will still be to wet.

What most of our members usually do is bring the supers in and put them in a warm, dry room with dehumidifiers and let them sit for a while during which testing for moisture content takes place. (over that 2-4 day period) When it reaches that magic number, it is extracted and bottled. I just screwed up and I did order a refrectometer for future use. I am not feeding back this honey, we dont get much of a second flow here, at least I dont. What we do get still isnt enough to feed through the winter. 

I am a 2nd year beekeeper and have been learning through my mistakes. I dont plan on selling this crop, I am just trying to get it right so I can give it to friends and associates.

I have been told that you can judge to a certain degree what the moisture content is by how fast the bubble in a bottle moves when turned upside down. That is the first thing judges do at shows around here. If it moves too fast or too slow, most of the time they won't even taste it. I have a bottle from a fellow beekeeper that I trust and he told me the M.C. in his bottle was right on the money. I know its crude but that is what I judged my crop against. I am confident that mine is way too wet. I have the output side of a dehumidifiers blowing on it with fine filter paper covering it. It is in wide, flat dishes. Should be interesting to see how this works out. Hope the refract tool gets here soon.

Thanks for everyones help,

scott


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## Beemaninsa (Jun 9, 2004)

I have lowered moisture well over 1% just by heating the honey in my bottling tank and leaving the lid off. Its a trade off. The longer and hotter you heat it, the more you damage the honey (darken and change flavor). If you just need to lower your moisture content a bit, this might work for you. IMO heated honey is better than fermented honey.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>> I thought once the honey is capped it's 
>> "good to go."

>I wish that this old wive's tale was true.
>Most of the time, it is.

I'm sure some of it has to do with your climate. A very moist climate would be more likely to cause problems. I've never had a refractometer and I've never harvested it unless it was capped and I've never had a problem. I've also never lived in a humid climate.


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## Tia (Nov 19, 2003)

As I said, this is the first year I've had the problem. It's always been capped long before now. If I leave it on the hive until they cap it, the bees won't allow it to ferment, will they?


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>the bees won't allow it to ferment, will they? 

I've never seen honey frement in the hive, but I can't say it's impossible. Again, I haven't ever lived in a humid climate.


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## Barry Digman (May 21, 2003)

From Weather.com just now...

Temp: 96
Feels like: 92
UV Index: 10 Very High 
Wind: From S at 6 mph 
Humidity: 14% 
Pressure: 29.93 in. 
Dew Point: 40°F 
Visibility: 10.0 miles

Our humidity is up to 14% today. Last week it was running 4% to 8%. I'm wondering if honey can be too dry, or if the bees can pull in enough moisture to finish it off properly. Mine seems fine, but it's a bit thicker than most I believe.


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## Tia (Nov 19, 2003)

Go ahead, coyote, rub it in. We've been at 80-90 per cent humidity for weeks now. We figure it's a good day if the humidity's at 60. 
Present readings:
Feels Like: 94° Dewpoint: 77° 
Barometer: 30.04 in and falling Wind: S 12 mph 
Humidity: 77% Sunrise: 6:04 am 
Visibility: 16.09 mi Sunset: 8:20 pm


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## ZEEBEE (Aug 22, 2003)

HAWKMAN,

I just pulled my supers yesterday and the CAPPED honey read 21% moisture on the refractometer!!

I have them stacked in a closet with a dehumidifier. We'll see how long it takes.

I got two mediums of Honey on each of my hives this year in MD. How'd you and anyone else close by do? 

Good luck!


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

For me this year, different types of bees had different stages of capping. Most of mine was capped and measured around 17.5%. One super came in at 19.2%. This honey I did dry using only a 5-gallon pale with a dadant 200-micron filter insert to prevent most of the dust and a small box fan to circulate air. In two days it dropped into the 17's. I stirred the honey periodically to help the process. Definitely don't give up on trying to dry it.
Good luck.


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## hawkman (May 22, 2004)

ZEEBEE

Last years crop in our club was the best in recent memory. This years crop was down by about 40-50% One of our members pulled 250lbs off of 5 hives last week. I havent heard how everyone else did but I will know in a couple of weeks at our next meeting. I took off a good bit and left more than I probably should have for wintering purposes, I dont like feeding and think the food they gather is better for them than anything I can supply. 

Make sure you monitor it closely, dont want it to dry. I did have one "hot" hive (newpackage this year) that produced at least 200 lbs by themselves, dangerous hive though and extremely aggresive with strong toxin. It took very little to turn worker bees into guard bees. One little slip and hundreds of them were on you. On the fence about what to do with that one, I really like that production. I guess all told, if I extracted everything, I could probably get about 400+ lbs. from 5 hives. Not great but not a terrible year either, plus there is still our little minor flow yet to come. 

Yearly rainfall totals and their timing during the year is a complex study. It has been proven that it has a major influence on small ground animal populations and the predators that feed on them. I imagine that one factor alone is also a major, determining influence on yearly nectar production. Compared to last year, our Locust bloom was lousy this year. Still working on that theory. Thanks for the encouragement folks.

scott


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## Tia (Nov 19, 2003)

I've got 9 hives, 2 of which are new swarms. Thus far, I've pulled approximately 200 lbs with 9 supers still on the hives that aren't capped. Normally by this time of year there's a nectar dearth until the goldenrod, but this year my girls are still frantically flying to and fro bringing in nectar like crazy. They keep heading out to the marsh--don't know what they found out there, but it sure is keeping them busy!
More humid than ever this morning: 
Feels Like: 88° Dewpoint: 77° 
Barometer: 30.11 in and steady Wind: SW 7 mph 
Humidity: 88% Sunrise: 6:05 am 
Visibility: 16.09 mi Sunset: 8:19 pm


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## hawkman (May 22, 2004)

Tia,

I'd go tromping through the detritus (swamp muck) and try to find out what there working on out there. Might be good, might not be. I dont have enough experience yet even to make a wild guess. Sounds like you will have an excellent year. It's so humid here this morning, I cant even see the barn about 750 feet away. Just plain nasty outside.

scott


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## Tia (Nov 19, 2003)

Scott, I'm afraid I'm not nosy enough to drag myself out to the swamp in this heat and humidity! We've got mosquitoes the size of Chevy's (needless to say, they don't spray in my area--bees, you know). Besides, even if what they're working isn't so good, what could I do about it? Put up little detour signs on their entrances? Whatever it is, the hives smell yummy so I know it's not ironweed (smells like gym socks).


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## Jim Fischer (Jan 5, 2001)

> I'm wondering if honey can be too dry, or if the
> bees can pull in enough moisture to finish it off 
> properly.

They don't need to pull in moisture, they need
to evaporate the nectar down to honey. In your
lucky case, the weather is helping them, so your
hives need less bees fanning, and can have more 
bees foraging.


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## Taliesin (Aug 31, 2003)

>I've never seen honey frement in the hive, but I can't say it's impossible. Again, I haven't every lived in a humid climate.

Common enough problem some years here in Norway during the Heather-flow in autumn.

It is quite late in our season, and certain weather-conditions combined with a heavy flow, can make the nectar and honey start fermenting in the hives. Our way of dealing with this here, is not to allow the bees to much space, and harvest the honey from the hives as they cap it, and replace with empty combs.


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## Tia (Nov 19, 2003)

Thanks, Taliesin. That's what I've been doing. Two harvests so far and my home hives should be ready for another harvest. As soon as it cools down a bit. . .


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## hawkman (May 22, 2004)

Tia,

If my bees were all of a sudden foraging when they never have, curiosity would kill this cat. I would probably come back looking like I was the big looser in a nekid paint ball gun battle from those skeeters. I just like to know what their bringing in and where there getting it, especially if its during a derth. If I could identify it and it was a fair to good nectar, I would try to plant some fields of it, just for the derth. The only thing you can do if its not a good nectar is to remove the frames filled with known nectar (ripen it yourself) before they get too contaminated and replace them with empty combs for them to store it in. And if its really bad and gets rockhard or something, try to extract it before it reaches that point. 

Still learning here,

scott


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## Joel (Mar 3, 2005)

Zeebee, if you put a window fan on top of those supers circulating the air through the moisture content will drop quiclly. Keep a close eye on them as in closet with a dehumidfier the moisture will drop quickly. 2 or 3 days may be too much.

As far as feeding honey back to the bees keep in mind all the bees in a 2 mile or so region (larger if during a dearth) will be there eating, you will start undesirable robbing behavior if it is done in the vicinity of your hives and the bees will not work available nectar sources, during the feed. You may end up with the same problem, capped, wet honey.


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## Tia (Nov 19, 2003)

Scott, you're a brave man if you'd be willing to go mano a mano with Coastal North Carolina mosquitoes! I failed to mention that I've done all kinds of planting to provide nectar during the seasonal dearth in this area, but my bees are flying over the vitex, abelia, squash, cukes, pumpkins and my entire flower meadow to gather whatever it is they're gathering out there in the marsh. Freaky.


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## MichaelW (Jun 1, 2005)

I just pulled my honey supers and an afternoon thundershower came out of no where and dumped on a couple of supers. The 10-day forcast was the same so I went ahead and risked it. I did my best to get them to shelter while I was trying to brush the soaked bees off. I put the supers on the back screened porch and set a window fan on top and propped the bottom of the stack up so as to draw lots of air through the stack. This worked pretty good till the sun came out and loads of bees started attacking my porch! I turned the fan off until it gets dark. Tommorrow after work I will bring the supers inside where the AC will help dry with the fan setup.

Should I worry to much about the moisture, humidity is like %95 for weeks? All honey was capped except for what got torn up removing the frames. I'm thinking the fan will be enough.


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## hawkman (May 22, 2004)

Tia,

Yep, Ive been a round or two with the likes of those fellas, pretty tuff there at the wrong time of the year. I was in Flamingo Florida, 10,000 Islands Region and the skeeters were so viscious there that if you didn't get them quick, when you smacked them they would leave a dime sized ring of blood on you. Actually have a Red Cross sticker that says " I Gave at Flamingo Florida". 

It would be just my luck after tromping through the swamp and getting torn up, only to come out in a field of fresh, late planted clover or a source that only blooms every 20 years or so. Now that would make me cranky. Still the curiosity is killing me. 

scott


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## hawkman (May 22, 2004)

MichaelW,
Id get them in the house asap if your locationis anything like Marylands. Check the moisture content. Honey will absorb moisture from the enviroment its in Its a hygroscopic fluid. Just learned that by hawking all the posts here. You want to dry it down to no more than 18% and perhaps a little less. I am no expert and made a big mistake from which I am sucessfully recovering from now and it takes alot of time and monitoring. Get it out of the humidity now if you can.

scott


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## MichaelW (Jun 1, 2005)

My local bee club concured that I should do more to dry it out. They offered the refractometer to test but since it was on display at the fair I decided to go ahead and take action without testing. We are still having daily showers.

I put the 4 supers in a small room in my house. They are stacked with a block under one side to allow air into the bottom, and they have a window fan on top to draw air through it. I also have a dehumidifier running full force in the room. After one night I could visibly tell a big difference that it was really drying it out.

Thanks


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## hawkman (May 22, 2004)

Take some honey to the show and test it. Dont let it get too dry or you will have other problems.


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## Barry Digman (May 21, 2003)

My thermometer sez 107, weather.com sez:

Partly Cloudy 103°F
Feels Like The surface of the Sun
Updated Jul 20 04:00 p.m. MT 
UV Index: 6 High 
Wind: From NNW at 5 mph 
Humidity: 7% 
Pressure: 29.84 in. 
Dew Point: 26°F 
Visibility: 10.0 miles

Ship me your honey and I'll drive it around in the back of my pickup for a while. That should do it.


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## Jim Fischer (Jan 5, 2001)

No reason to ship it all to New Mexico, but
the offer certainly is generous.

Here ya go, we do the math, so you don't have to.
Tape this to your honey house wall:

Approximate equilibrium between relative humidity
(RH) of ambient air and water content honey:

Air (%RH)___Honey (% water content)
---------___-----------------------
50__________15.9
55__________16.8
60__________18.3
65__________20.9
70__________24.2
75__________28.3
80__________33.1

But don't ask me "how long" it will take, 
that depends upon airflow across the combs. 
This is merely what you can expect in the way 
of "best case" impact of dry air on the
honey, and "worst case" impact of wet air
on honey, given sufficient exposure.

...and remember that humidity in your honey
house may be different from what the
weathermen says it is outside. Best to
buy a hygrometer, and hang it on the wall.


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## MichaelW (Jun 1, 2005)

"Dont let it get too dry or you will have other problems."

That was my next question, thanks. I think I need to turn it off when I get home. I already turned the fan off since the top super looked good. How dry is too dry? Below 15.9? Its so humid here I think I could kick it up a few numbers on the back porch if need be. I'm guessing too dry would be difficult to extract?

Thanks


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## drobbins (Jun 1, 2005)

Jim,

what's a cheap/quick way to determine relative humidity?
I know, wet bulb thingy, I don't have one laying around.
I'm near you, what's a ballpark for RH in an air conditioned house??

Dave


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## hawkman (May 22, 2004)

Too dry is about impossible to extract not to mention what will probably happen to the comb. Most judges like it between 16.5 and 17.5, sometimes 18% wwill still ferment, it really depends on the type of honey. The idea is to monitor it as its going down and extract not push the number all over the place.

Depending on how hard you run the ac and efficiency, R.H. will be between 40 and 60% in our area(s). 

Every time I see a judge examine honey at shows, most turn the bottle upside down and watch how fast the bubble travels to the top. On a 1 lb. standard shape bottle, a dime sized air bubble should take about 5-6 seconds. Thats what mine does at 17.5%. Faster means its too wet still. You should really test it with the refractometer before storage.

Jim Fischer, 

Thanks for the relative humidity/ moisture contet comparison chart. Im going to take it to the next meeting and pass it around, will be very useful to some of our newer members. Where did you find that?

scott


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## Jim Fischer (Jan 5, 2001)

> what's a cheap/quick way to determine relative 
> humidity?

Buy a temp/humidity/barometer set that hangs on
the wall. They don't cost much. Look for
"Taylor Instruments" if you want a good one.

> what's a ballpark for RH in an air conditioned 
> house??

Depends upon the outside humidity, unless you
live in a meat locker, served by a 20,000 BTU
industrial-grade monster of an A/C plant. Most
heat pump plants can't keep the humidity stable
to more than 10% either way of 50%.

> Where did you find that?

Between my ears.








Vapor pressure, typical hygroscopic property
of honey under cappings, and Relative humidity,
pump them through some standard equations.

Used to do that sort of stuff with nothing but
a slide rule.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

And the slide rule was much faster for many such things than a calculator.


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## Barry Digman (May 21, 2003)

Heh. I had nerd friends in school with slip sticks on their belts or in their shirt pockets. Adhesive tape on their horn-rimmed glasses, high-water pants, driving mom's station wagon if they drove at all, no dates for prom. I get fruit from some of them at Christmas. And pictures of their airplanes and "cabins" in Vail.

I can't do the math to calculate estimated moisture content at an RH of around 20%. Tried, but can't remember how to fit a trend line to the data in the table and come up with the right answer. Can anyone help?


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## Jim Fischer (Jan 5, 2001)

> I can't do the math to calculate estimated 
> moisture content at an RH of around 20%.

At that RH, you end up with honey candy!
Semi-solid, impossible to extract unless your
extractor pulls more Gs than a Navy fighter
pilot trying to out-loop a MIG.

The number would be something like 5% moisture.
Nonsense to try that, so if you have 20% RH
(you lucky devil), you just have to check
a few frames in the stack every 6 hours or so.


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## Dwight (May 18, 2005)

I have had capped Honey Ferment on a couple of occasions. It gets cold quick here sometimes and I think maybe if we get a late Golden rod flow the bees may cap the honey before it is fully cured just to get it done before they need to start clustering. Note: Both times the honey fermented it was honey in the hive which femented during winter or early spring. I have never had any honey I harvested Ferment.


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## MichaelW (Jun 1, 2005)

hawkman 

Honey scaled in at 17 after extraction. I think I did the fan and dehumidifier for 24 hrs, then just the dehumidifer for another 24. Thanks, looks great!

I think I ended up with mostly tulip popular this year. Pleasantly suprised its not mostly clover.


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## hawkman (May 22, 2004)

Glad to here it worked out. I had to learn the hard way and dried it AFTER extracting. It will last a good long time at 17%, mine ended up 17.5 after alot of unecessary work. Mmmmm, Tulip Poplar.

scott#2


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## TwT (Aug 5, 2004)

if the moisture content in the honey is to high, and you put the honey in jars, and kept at about 80 degree temp, how long would it take too ferment in closed jars?


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## Jim Fischer (Jan 5, 2001)

> how long would it take too ferment in closed jars

Wow, there is no way to predict - too many
variables. Easier to just buy a refractometer
and not bottle honey that is "too wet".


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