My granpa and then my uncle had a slighly larger backyard honey operation, we were using pre-printed wax sheets and we were collecting few times per season. We collected the honey by cutting off the top layer of wax that seals the cells and then centrifuging the frames with a crank-powered contraption.
The clearest honey was made by adding fresh frames and collecting them in sync with the blooming of acacia flowers (I live in Italy).
Reading your article makes me want to start again!!!
You are my idol. Do you have chickens too?
Iām a follower of BoingBoing on the Twitters. I like Honey.
i agree, this is a great post.
I wonder how a mead made from that would tasteā¦
Now thatās more like something to irritate the neighbors. I wouldnāt mind bees in the neighborhood, but a couple of the people behind me have roosters, and thereās simply no call for that in suburbia.
I, on the other hand, have noisy project cars. So we all just try to get along.
Thatās a cool story, Mark. Thanks for sharing.
Bet it will be a lot healthier too - Bet there is a heck of a lot of chemicals and stuff like that that you wonāt get in Markās Honey!
Bet it tastes good too!
A chicken is not a rooster. Chickens are quiet and great neighbors. Roosters are the devilās work.
I hear that there are some plants that, if fed upon by the bees, can create poisonous honey. I have quite a few azaleas at my home and I hear these are one of the plants. So, no bees for meā¦
My parents used to have five bee hives and chickens. The neighbors brought a rooster.
And theyāre illegal to have in many cities, too, 'cause of that infernal racket they make in the morning.
Speaking of roosters, hereās a picture of the man with the largest cock in the world.
1 Gallon? Seriously? Healthy bees create healthy surplus. Sick bees donāt.
You sound like youāre taking great pride in not taking care of your pets.
I Got 10 Gallons off of each hive this year, and even thatās not worth writing home about.
Nor did I have to cheat and harvest off of brood comb either - Which is the larger part of the reason your honey is so dark. It is tainted with the feces of bee babies.
Anyone can put bees in a box and neglect them. Thatās not beekeeping.
My dad used to do this when I was a kid, I thought it was the coolest thing ever. We had a special knife that had to be heated to get a clean cut. The machine looked just like this one- it had to be cranked and cranked to get up to speed, the lever was slammed down to disengage the crank, and it would gradually spin down.
We also had a home-made observation hive in our living-room window for a couple of years- it was simultaneously compelling and terrifying to get so close to the beesā¦
When we bought our 1900s city house we got some chickens and a rooster with it. At some point one of our neighbours asked worriedly if everything was alright with the rooster as she hadnāt heard him in a few days.
I must admit the chickens are miniature silkies, but the rooster can still crow loud if he feels like it.
Sounds deliciousātoo bad Iām on a low-carb dietā¦
Just curious, not a bee expert; how do you know he used the ābrood combā. If heās using 4 out of 24 combs, thereās hardly a need?
Is every dark honey full of bee poo? Germans are mad for the dark honey, I wouldnāt have thought they were killing bees every time they make it. Always thought the colour was more to do with the pollen used. Manuka honey is another example.
This is exactly like our centrifuge! Same crank and gears, same āknifeā valve to spill honey at the bottom! It only was ādirect-driveā, no ādisengageā feature!
Just be careful that your winner isnāt in Australia. Sending honey there, and to many other countries, is illegal and could get you and your winner in trouble.
Quarantine between continents is a good thing mostly and to be applauded. Australia seems to be free of Verroa mite at the moment lets try to keep it that way okay?
