Extracting honey from the hive is a very messy process!
We extract honey in the fall. We start by pulling out frames of sealed honey from the hive. We use a smoker because it helps to calm the bees.
We head indoors. If you do it outside, you end up with lots of bees around, trying to steal the honey! We use a hot knife to remove the wax cappings, and then we load the frames into a centrifuge. The centrifuge spins the honey out. We run it through a screen to filter out wax (and the occasional unlucky bee).
Our favorite part is tasting the honey from each hive. They are all a little different. So fun!
