my first honey harvest
my first honey harvest
Every journey begins with a first step.

So far, I have told little about my personal path to beekeeping. In the end, it was one of my neighbors who, as an experienced beekeeper, was willing to answer all my questions and introduced me to beekeeping bit by bit (quasi Spubi, only that the platform did not yet exist at that time ;-)).

Piece by piece and yet with "turbo

The beekeepers among us will fondly remember 2020: warm early, great bee weather and accordingly a great bee year. We had our hands full, prepared a "bee plot", built hives, caught swarms (several at once) and also had the prospect of an early harvest early in the year. Time seemed to fly. For me as a newcomer, of course, again particularly exciting, how the gold of the busy little bees is brought into the final form of consumption (here honey jar). I was therefore very excited when I was told to "keep the coming weekend free, that's when it starts".

But first it was time to prepare:

Most meticulously cleaned the place of future action and all the necessary tools (uncapping harness, slingshot, hobbock, bucket and much more). Then was tested towards the end of the week: By eye control and with the help of a "refractometer" it is looked whether the honey fulfills the necessary conditions for the withdrawal. "Bingo" - everything looks fine.

Afterwards, we set the so-called 'bee flukes' (a kind of filter system, which lets the honey bees from the honey room back into the brood room, but no longer makes the honey room accessible to the bees). The result: a (nearly) bee-free honey room that can be lifted from the hive as is. Here I was glad that we were two, because a full honey room (for the beekeepers: 10 Rähmchen Zander) is really heavy. We then took the honey chambers to the "beekeeper's room" to 'spin them off' there.

From here it gets sticky.

With a kind of mixture of fork and spoon (uncapping fork) we scrape the wax layer from the completely "capped" honeycombs. Capped means that the bees draw a thin layer of wax over the honeycomb pots filled with honey, thus sealing the comb. The honey of a capped honeycomb has been almost completely dehydrated and is already there in the way we like to enjoy it later. Now I stand there with apron and the uncapping fork and carefully scrape the top layer of wax from the comb. A great product comes to light: the finest blossom honey. Now just don't give in and hold your tongue - hygiene has top priority, we are working with a foodstuff. This is drilled into me again and again. The ambition is great not to contaminate such a pure product and to meet the personally high quality standards.

Honey march!

As soon as I have uncapped the first 4 combs, they are put into the extractor. A motor powered by electricity roars and turns the combs so fast that the honey of the combs splashes against the pot wall of the centrifuge and runs down the side. After a while, a considerable amount of the liquid gold has collected at the bottom of the pot. The whole room smells deliciously of honey. At the same time it is very warm, we have closed windows and doors so that no bees - attracted by the honey scent - come to it. At some point the time has come, the combs have been turned and are now empty. The amount in the spinning pot is considerable - up to 4 KG can weigh a single comb, a large part of which is honey. Now the lower opening of the pot is opened - similarly as with a sluice - and the honey flows out - "honey march" it is called. The honey is now filtered several times, from coarse to fine, as it still contains larger impurities (e.g. wax residues).

From the extractor through the filters, the honey makes its way into buckets. It is a great bee year 2020, so we need several buckets at once. In the manner described above, we keep going until all the honey chambers are spun down. Looking back, it was exciting, thrilling and just great, but also a laborious and exhausting work that requires a lot of preparation on the part of the bees but also the beekeeper. The result was an absolutely delicious early harvest, whose development I was allowed to follow since the beginning of the year and of which I am very proud (eig wahr, because unfortunately I ate it quickly :-)).

The honey harvest, a formative experience

I have fond memories of my first honey harvest and hope that through Spubi more bee lovers can find their way to a beekeeper and be taken into the same instructive and inspiring world. My relationship with honey has been permanently changed by this. Not only because I decided to become a beekeeper myself, but also because I now know how much work and effort goes into even the smallest jar of honey.


Your Spubis (here: Grischa)