Harvesting the honey!

I have to admit this is not Forage yard honey… Most of the honey produced in the hive is to be left there to give the bees loads of food over the winter. We will however, have a few of the honeycombs in order to sample the difference in taste between Sussex Cottage honey and Forage Yard honey. 

I was delighted to be invited to watch how the honey is taken from the boards in the supers and made into honey in jars! The capping wax on the boards is first heated until it melts enough to allow the flow of honey from the bees stores. Then the boards are placed in a spinner and rotated until the centrifugal force on the boards forces the honey to the sides of the drum where it dribbles down to collect at the bottom of the spinner. When enough is collected it is drawn off and filtered through a sieve to remove bits of bees and other debris. At this point it can be jarred but it is rather nice to pour it through a finer sieve so the jarred honey looked like liquid gold.

Lots of hard work but this time not for me as I was a mere observer!