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How and when to reap your first batch of uncooked honey and honeycomb from a yard beehive.
I needed to share with you an image together with the main points of my first uncooked honey harvest as a novice yard beekeeper.
The honey after all included the scrumptious honeycomb, a wholesome pure chewing gum.
Timing
Harvesting honey from my very own yard hive was not an in a single day success by any means.
My first colony was established in March 2023, so it took over a 12 months for the hive to develop to the purpose the place extracting some honey might even be thought of.
In different phrases, it’s unwise to take away honey from a colony that’s newly established, small, struggling, or in any other case not thriving and bursting on the seams with sufficient honey, nectar, and pollen to help itself.
The honey with honeycomb within the photograph above got here from one body that met the factors for availability for the beekeeper to take.
Harvest Honey
The method of harvesting the honey was fairly straightforward.
I merely disregarded the few bees that had been on the honey body and introduced it into the kitchen.
Then, I fastidiously scraped the honey with intact honeycomb into a big bowl as you’ll be able to see above.
The honey with the comb can be saved in a glass bowl with a safe lid within the pantry.
After the honey was faraway from the body, I positioned it on the patio propped up on the facet of a chair so each side had been simply accessible.
The patio will not be removed from the hive, so the bees simply found it and rapidly started the clean-up of any sticky remnants.
As soon as cleaned by the bees (which can solely take a day!), the body may be put again within the hive.
I most well-liked to have the bees clear the body away from the hive versus placing it instantly again in (the bees will clear it wherever you set it!).
The reason being {that a} body with some unfastened honey would danger some dripping all the way down to the underside of the hive and attracting wax moths…a dreaded infestation that I’ve had issues with this season.
Whereas there are different strategies for harvesting honey that work nicely too, it is a quite simple and simple method for a small harvest.
Hopefully, that is the primary of many extra to come back!
Be taught Extra About Yard Beekeeping
If you want to learn extra about my adventures as a yard beekeeper, the rising listing of articles is underneath the yard beekeeping class.
