The Boojum Beeyard: Honey Harvest! Part 2

One of the most exciting aspects of keeping bees is well underway at the Boojum Institute: The honey harvest!!

Just like any agriculture, bees are “farmed”. Egg farms have chickens that lay eggs, vegetable farms have acres of produce that they grow, and dairies have cows that are milked. Beekeepers keep bees for a couple of agricultural purposes. Bees are transported to orchards and farms to help pollinate the crop and increase yields. Another agricultural use for bees is probably the first thing that comes to most people’s minds: honey!

Honey is the rich, sweet liquid gold that honeybees produce. It is amazing in both taste and healthful properties. To learn more about honey, see Bee Knowledgeable Answers: Honey! and Bee Knowledgeable: Bee Savvy! for more honey facts!

We pulled the honey from the Boojum Bees in September. If you missed it, you can catch up: The Boojum Beeyard: Honey Harvest! Part 1 This week we extracted the honey from all those frames we pulled! Here’s how it went:

First we set up our uncapping tank. This is a long, deep, rectangular, stainless steel basin that has a drain.

 photos: Robyn Young

A large screen fits inside the tank onto which the wax and honey will fall during the uncapping process. The screen catches the wax and any honey that escapes the combs can drip through to the bottom of the tank. A drain and valve on the bottom allows the gathered honey to drain out into a bucket. A bar is also fitted horizontally across the top of the tank. This acts as a rest for the frame while uncapping.

The first super of honeycomb fames to be uncapped:

The frames full of capped over honey cells are hung in the uncapping tank to one side of the bar. We use a hot knife to slice off the wax caps that seal the honey cells. This knife is electrically heated and easily cuts through the wax.

This was my first experience in extracting honey and I learned a lot. Here I focus on learning to master the hot knife.

 The caps that were missed by the hot knife are scratched open using a scratcher, a tool that looks like a sharp, metal comb.

After the frames are uncapped, we place them on the other side of the bar. They are ready to be extracted. The wax caps fall onto the screen in the uncapping tank and any dripping honey drains down. That way, as little honey as possible is lost in the process.
Here is our four frame extractor:

The large, steel cylinder holds a four-sided cage. The uncapped frames are fitted inside the cage.

When the extractor is turned on, the cage inside the cylinder spins. The honey is flung from the open cells by centrifugal force, splattering the inside walls of the cylinder. Look closely at the following photos, can you see the honey being spun out from the frames? These shots were taken while the extractor was in motion; the camera’s shutter speed was able to capture this without much blurring:

 We extract one side of four frames, and then turn them around to extract the other side.

If the frames are not fairly even in weight, it will unbalance the extractor. Then it must be held down to keep it from jumping off the bench:

The honey then runs down the inside of the extractor and collects in the bottom. A valve lets the honey pour out:

 We strain the last bits of wax from the honey as it drains from the extractor into the bucket.

Down to the last set of frames! The whole room is redolent with the rich, heady aroma of honey. Yum!

Almost 200 pounds of honey was harvested from the Boojum Bees! How cool is that? And if you happened to have been visited by the Boojum Bees in your classroom, this yummy honey is the product of those very same bees!

And all that wonderful White Sage and Buckwheat honey may soon be available to you! Support the Boojum Institute for Experiential Education and the incredible, once-in-a-lifetime experiences they offer. Support the Boojum Bees. Watch this blog to find out how to get your very own Boojum Honey as soon as it is available!!