Honey Harvest

We harvested honey this week. Things went much better than I was expecting. The last time we checked on the bees there was no sign of eggs or larva in two of the three hives, which means the queens were most likely dead. The third hive (the swarm we caught this year) was looking really weak and we thought it was doomed for sure. That was about a month ago. I really didn't think we were going to be able to harvest any honey this year. And the possibility of losing all three hives was looking all too real.

Since then they have started laying eggs and the swarm is growing! We took 12 frames of honey from the two healthy hives (we're going to let the swarm keep what little they make this year.) We took more frames last year but the frames we took this year were much more full.

We took the frames home and extracted them that night. It only took about 3.5 hours this time. We're getting better at it! We ended up with about 3.5 gallons. It's less than last year, but we did two harvests last year, too. We'll see how things go over the next month. Maybe we can get another harvest in this year.

The honey is different than last year. It's more mild. Last year we started at a berry farm then ended up next to a large clover field. We left the hives next to that clover field again, but this year they planted potatoes instead. Too bad. There was a field of red clover about a mile away that must have added to out honey, and of course the wild blackberries, which are a given in this area.

We look forward to a good year of cherry tomatoes in the garden and the delicious salsa that comes from that!