Plastic tray for harp

01 · THE THREE PIECES

Harp, electrifier module and tray

An anti-velutina harp works with three things: the wire frame, an electrifier module — mains, solar or battery — and this water tray underneath. The harp itself carries no electronics, so buying it on its own and expecting it to work is the commonest mistake in this family. One module can feed up to five harps, so an apiary with several needs only one electrifier — but one tray per harp.

02 · WATER, AND A FEW DROPS OF SOAP

The hornet falls stunned, not always dead

The shock leaves the hornet unconscious for a few minutes, and if it lands dry and in the shade it can come round and fly off again. Water prevents that, and it also stops ants and birds carrying the bodies away before you can see them. The trick that makes the difference is a few drops of soap in the water: they break the surface tension, so a stunned hornet cannot rest on top or crawl out over the rim.

03 · YOUR MEASURING INSTRUMENT

What you count when you empty it tells you whether the harp is well placed

This is the less obvious reason to have one. Emptying the tray lets you count the catch, and that count is the only thing that tells you whether pressure is rising, falling or steady, and whether the harp is where it should be. Our published reference is 4 or 5 bees per 100 hornets: if you get far more bees, the harp is badly sited — it is not the wire spacing that fails, it is the placement. With a dry tray that count does not exist, because the bodies disappear.

04 · BEFORE YOU BUY

It fits under the Tartago harp (TA-6090) and under the one in the complete kit. At peak pressure, July to October, empty it every one or two weeks. And the framing that holds for the whole system: a harp is protection for the apiary, not eradication — it cuts attacks at the entrance, but it does not remove the local population nor replace nest destruction.