Sticky Business

Well here it is Sept 4th and I am finally getting around to extracting honey. We got all but 4 frames of honey out of the hives, I decided to leave those frames there as it was still uncapped. If we were to take uncapped honey, it would ferment, so the plan is to leave it in the top super which will become the attic box when we put the bees to bed for the winter. The bees will cap it once the humidity level is just right, then I will latch on to it and maybe save it for spring for them or take it for us. More than likely I will keep it for the bees.

I learnt a ton of stuff today. I learnt that if your house is cool, the honey will be thick like molasses. I also learnt when you spin honey in the kitchen and the machine has no lid.....need I say more. Its going to take me a good week to clean up once I am done.

So we began with uncapping the frames of honey and placing two the frames in the extractor.

                                                              Uncapping the honey

Placing the 2 frames in the extractor

                                                    Spinning the honey out of the frames

Then we spun the frames for about a minute on both sides. Once all the frames are done, then you begin the very sticky business of running the honey through 2 sizes of sieves. Sounds quick and easy but for a couple newbees....it took almost 2 partial days to complete the whole job. I am still wiping up sticky door knobs, countertops, dishes, floor, dogs heads and chairs. The only thing left other than putting the honey in jars and containers, was to clean beeswax. This is one of my favorite things to do. Like the honey....the end result is so rewarding.

                                                    The end product, beeswax and honey