Our first Honey from the Hive:

- Keith Roberts from The Valley Hive came to the house with a honey extractor which he set up in the kitchen.

- We suited up.  We removed the wooden and plastic honey combs from the ‘honey super’ (the top tier of the hive the queen can’t enter-so no babies up there) and brought them into the kitchen.  They were heavy.  (Click pictures below for a slideshow).

- We cut out the honey comb with a knife from three of the wooden combs.  I wanted some like that so that I could put some honeycomb into each jar of honey.  I wanted some for centerpieces, and for parties.  To keep the combs, I had to be freeze them for 24 hours to kill any potential live contaminents.  They are now in my fridge.

- Keith used an electric knife to cut protruding comb from the front surface of the plastic combs and a wire fork to prick the back side of the honey combs open.  They honey can’t drain out unless the surfaces are cut open.

- Three plastic combs are inserted into the extractor at a time.  It spins to use centrifugal force to extract the honey.

- We put the honey through a strainer into a bucket with a spigot.

- We filled the jars.  Our extraction day yielded approximately 15 pounds of honey.  Two jars went into Keith’s Honey Competition…Keith advised that our 8.5 oz. jars would sell for $17-20 each and our 1 oz. jars would sell for $5.  Of course, none of them are for sale!!

This is a photo of the original hive in the chicken coop roof.  Notice how the bees original architecture mimics the vertical slats in the hive box.