Honey Harvesting

Yesterday for the first time since 2008, we actually harvested our own honey.

Frames of honey, honey extractor all ready

In 2009, we had an attack of mice which destroyed the hives. (Mouseguards not on.) We acquired another hive BUT the cold winter was no good for them. Then 2011 had a cold Spring and 2012 was another cold Spring. I had nearly given up when we decided one last time in 2014 and got some bees. We didn't take off any honey.
BUT this year, we have honey! Hooray. About 40 lbs worth.
I put the Porter bee escapes on on Friday to clear the supers where the honey is stored. Then early, early on Saturday morning before the bees were up, I  went out and retrieved the supers.
One or two bees remained in the supers and were easily brushed off.
At that time in the morning, the bees are not flying. This makes it so much easier and likelihood of getting stung is much decreased.
Then I set up the honey extractor -- which is hand cranked. The wax cappings are taken off to reveal the honey and the frame is put in the extractor. Then the frames are spun round and round. Centrifugal force gets the honey out.

Honey from the extractor pours into the filter

It works well except if there is a high proportion of heather honey. Heather honey is like jelly and very hard to extract. The best way I have found is to crush the frames and melt them -- releasing the honey. The honey melts at a lower temp than the wax. Thankfully though my youngest son has strong arms and the honey was all spun out.
This year's honey is relatively pale. Heather honey also tends to be more amber/caramel in colour. I suspect there is fuchsia. I know there is thistle in there. It tastes absolutely wonderful.
After being extracted, the honey gets filtered to get rid of the wax/dead bees etc. I also put the cappings in and allow them to drain.
Once filtered the honey is bottled.

Heathcliff inspects the jars of honey

Other than bottling  a couple of bottles for my youngest son to take back to uni with him, I am just waiting for the honey to drip through.
The spun supers are put back on the hives so that the bees can clean them out. The bees hate wasting any honey. They will clean everything. It is sort of amazing.
The bees still have time to forage and rebuild their stores. I will give them some Apiguard as a tonic/guard against varroa. And then they will be shut up for the winter.
In Feb time they will be fed on fondant and the cycle will be gin again.

Beeswax

One of the things I have been doing over the holidays is to make beeswax candles. I had not used up the beeswax from this year's harvest, and we were getting low on candles. There is a certain amount of satisfaction in making candles. Melting beeswax releases a wonderful perfumed scent and its fun to pour the wax into the mould and then the heart stopping moment when you know the candle is set but perhaps not quite ready to come out but you are going to try any way. Soft warm wax is very tactile.
I only managed to ruin one candle this year, and the wax was easily remelted.
It is a timeless process. Beeswax has been used since time immemorial, just as honey has. Cave pictures have included honey/beeswax hunting representations. However, it was not until the mid 19th century that modern beekeeping was born.
Until the invention of whale oil and then paraffin, beeswax was the clearest light. It does not smoke like tallow. Its light though is yellower than the white-blue of paraffin. And when it burns, beeswax releases the most wonderful scent.
I tend to make taper candles as they fit into the candle holders.
Beeswax is also used in a number of products from cosmetics to furniture polish. The cleanest wax from commercial beekeepers tends to cosmetics and the worst for furniture polish.
Because the bee uses the very efficient hexagonal shape, it does not produce much wax and pound for pound, beeswax is more expensive than honey.
Anyway, when I look at my candles and my store of honey, I am very pleased to keep bees. It is a worthwhile hobby and hopefully one which will grow in popularity. However, despite bees being one of the most studied creatures through history, we actually do not know that much about them and the dangers the modern world/chemicals/practices present.

Minding beeswax

Now that the honey has been all gathered, and the apistan strips to protect against varroa mites are in the hives, my attention turns to the wax. I already rendered down the cappings wax a few weeks ago, but now I need to take all the broken comb and the bracing comb of the various frames and melt that down.
Beeswax pound for pound is more expensive than honey and is an important by product of keeping bees.

There are different grades of wax -- the lighter, the more prized. Capping wax because it tends to be nearly white is the sort that is used in cosmetics. The wax that comes from the old brood combs is probably only good for polish -- although I have been known to make it into candles but they don't burn as well I don't think.

Anyway, I now have candles to make -- generally the tapers as they are the most useful. This can be quite fun, but it is also time consuming. Disheartening when the mould topples over and the wax spills out. But fantastic when the new candle emerges. And I did not really get any candles made last year. My dh is now making noises about having very few candles left...

I use a variety of moulds. Thornes which is the biggest British beekeeping supplies store also has a sideline in candle making equipment. They are always very helpful. And their products are top quality. But be warned -- they have a wide variety and there is a lot that goes into candlemaking.

As an aside, the coal industry in the Northeast used tons of candles in the Regency period and several fortunes were made supplying the tallow candles. Until I really started looking into the Northeast during this period, I did not realise how diverse the industry was and how many different things were needed to support the coal mines. Interestingly, the rebuilding of London after the Great Fire owed a lot to the tax on seacoal. The Northeast was the primary supplier of coal to London. I am currently reading Peter Ackeroyd's new book -- Thames and it is full of interesting facts about trade, docks and the general importance of the river. Thames may be a prehistory word.