October 20, 2012 – 6:00 am
Honeybees build comb. It’s part of what they do. It’s part of who they are. And being, as it is, actually exuded from glands on the undersides of their bodies, the honeycomb that bees build is literally part of them. Comb is literally part of the super organism that is a honeybee colony.
It’s a bit strange, therefore, that for the last 150 years in western beekeeping some have come to see the comb as separate to the bees – something you can replace with pre-made wax, or with plastic, even, without noticeable ill-effects for the colony. But within a wholistic approach to beekeeping, natural, bee-made comb is central. Here’s why. Read More »
January 19, 2012 – 6:00 am
Once you’ve harvested your natural honeycomb from your Warré (or other kind of top bar) beehive, it’s time to make get some of that goodness into jars! Fortunately, like many other aspects of natural beekeeping, getting the honey out of natural comb is easy and simple, once you know how.
We’re just at the start of our beekeeping journey, but still, even though we don’t have whizz-bang equipment, we found this a wonderfully tactile and rewarding experience. It’s prettymuch just a case of crushing the comb, sieving it, and bottling the results. 100% organic yum, with all the goodness of the honey still utterly intact.
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December 1, 2011 – 6:00 am
I am incredibly excited to report that we’ve just harvested our first ever box of honey from one of our warré beehives. Whoohoo! We are now awash and dripping with organic warré honeycomb. Sweet.
The box we took is from the warré hive that had two colonies combined in it last year because of the terrible season. This hive is now incredibly strong and healthy, and building comb and storing honey like there’s no tomorrow. Read More »
